Tim Bromund

I'm guessing by power steering, that he has cable steering with power assist, not hydraulic steering. Not a lot of options anymore for cable steered boats. It sounds like Raymarine now has all the bugs worked out of their new Sportpilot so that would be your only real option, unless you can find a Simrad AP12 or AP14 used somewhere. I have an AP14 on my cable steered boat and love it, but they haven't made them in several years. Other than that, I believe you'd pretty much have to convert to Hydraulic Steering which would add a couple grand to the cost of the Autopilot. Tim

If you start in 60 fow you'll probably drive over most of the browns. We regularly catch them in mid summer in 30-45 fow out of Olcott. I would work 30-60 east of port before you move out to 60-100, you will very likely also get kings in that 60-100 zone. Tim

Yeah, what he said X10 Tim

((As an aside - why?)) because I/O's are typically just marinized chevy engines. For example, you can get a brand new crate carburated 5.7L vortec putting out 315 hp at the crank for under $7K, or an MPI 5.7 Vortec ar 325 HP for under 8K what would that cost for comparable HP in outboards? 25-30 grand? http://www.michiganmotorz.com/complete- ... -p-61.html http://www.michiganmotorz.com/complete- ... p-342.html Tim

Wish I had an answer for you. I have 2 each of wire, 50lb power pro and mono divers, and my wire divers rock every time, but regarding my power pro divers, not only do they get far fewer bites, most of them are hit and runs or lost fish. I don't understand why. I have the drags set the same as the wires, just barely holding in place when trolling but seldom ever get a good hookup with the braid. It's very frustrating. Tim

You can order them directly from Rapala/VMC http://www.rapala.com/VMC/Hooks/vmc-hoo ... lt,sc.html http://www.rapala.com/9650-Round-Bend-T ... oks-treble Tim

Howie, if I may make a few comments regarding a couple of your points: Point 3 is unworkable as it would add mountains of complications to the people/volunteers running the events to ensure that everyone on any team that may have crossed the line had all of the appropriate licenses (NY and Canadian) and how would they determine that everyone was fishing legally without the coordinates. If you want to take on the headache of enforcing that, knock yourself out. By limiting it to NY waters as verified by GPS coordinates, that all goes away. Point 4 and the timing of the events, those dates are set primarily based on the availability of dockage/slips at the ports in question. I don't know what the situation is in July on the east end, but at Niagara and Orleans, if they spread those later into the season there wouldn't be enough open slips available in the affected ports as more and more seasonal dock holders put in for the year, particularly with the rag boats and strictly pleasure boats. I assume the availability of transient dockage in Oswego and Sodus must be sufficient in July to accommodate the number of entries. Tim

you'll do better with about a 20-30 foot leader after the core. Running long leaders completely mutes and negates the erratic rise and fall action of the core (and copper) as it snakes through the water that makes those presentations so effective. Tim

I thought about that but have decided after shopping around for used riggers that I'm gonna buy new. As for the probe, I can hold off on that I guess. Do they make a temp probe that is cheaper than $600? Couldn't you just take temperatures manually to find the T-cline and then setup the riggers there and watch blow back (angle of lines?) Or is the probe just that much easier? Depth Raider and Moor Subtroll 900 are both way less than 600 scoots http://www.marinegeneral.com/productcat ... ryid=10969 IMO, with the crazy currents we have on Lake O, down speed is much more important than temps. Tim

Daiwa 47 size reels fit 1000' of 30 lb wire perfectly with no need for backing, just put a wrap of tape (electrical or duct) over the knot after you tie the wire to the spool arbor, otherwise it will slip on the spool. That's true for all reels unless they have a little post on the spool to tie the line to. I've been running the bright Malin 30 lb wire for many years. Tim

minutes of latitude on your GPS coordinates (middle series of numbers). For instance, at Olcott (my home port), the harbor is approx 43.20.300 North Latitude so that would be 20N, each minute of Lat is approximately 1 mile, so again out of Olcott, 29N is around 9 miles offshore, you some times might also hear it referred to as the 29 line. Tim

why would you want to delete it?

Oh no. Not this battle again. Salmon season is half over and we are going to start the Giants stink thread! Hey, I didn't start it.

see, even giants fan's equipment is fake.

oh you silly girlie-men fans

this is the Coast Guard's main page http://www.uscgboating.org/default.aspx under the regulations tab you can find all of the federal and state boating regulations. Honestly, it's not the easiest site to navigate, but all of the info you are looking for is there. Tim

It all depends on what kind of charge your boat is putting in the water. Most boats are fine and a black box wont make a lick of difference, but if you have a grounding problem somewhere, it can definitely help. When I first got my current boat back in 2002, the first couple seasons, I could count on 1 hand the number of rigger bites we got over the course of an entire season, divers and cores caught plenty, but the rigger bite was dreadful. so I took my multi meter and tested like they suggest on the pro troll black box site and found that I was throwing .2-.28v off my rigger cables, so I bought a Cabelas black box and once I installed it we started catching fish on the riggers again. Over the last 10 years I've rewired almost everything and replaced almost every fastener on the boat with stainless and somewhere along the way I must have corrected the problem, because it isn't necessary anymore, we get tons of bits on the riggers, so I no longer even have the black box on the boat, but at the time I absolutely believe it made a difference. Tim

I bought the new TD antenna and a 300' spool of TD wire this spring, but after talking to Brian and hearing about him losing 2 probes and sharks already from the cable breaking, I ended up putting on the new antenna but I transferred the new last year, 300' spool of coated cable from my old Scotty to the new HP Scotty and sold the 300' spool of TD cable. Last weekend even with the new brass antenna, I lost signal at about 80' with the coated cable. Previously with the Depth Raider spring antenna, I was good down over 140. Didn't get the boat out this past weekend, but hopefully I can figure out a way to get better depth with the coated cable or I may have to buy another spool of TD cable and cross my fingers. Tim

and a lot more here http://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor/23270.html DEC research vessel nettings have found good numbers of brown trout in the lake, particularly around the Brocton Shoal area, but almost nobody targets them in the lake for some reason. Tim

Lowrance has been on that same planned obsolescence schedule for decades. Did they offer to let you trade it in for $250 off a new one? That's their usual game.

Yup, fisher, That critter looks nothing like a possum

Jekyll has it right.

Not quite the GTA, but there are a lot of walleye in the Lower Niagara River. Tim