How do?

[Shade]

What is proper way to tune a spoon?

Shade

[muskybob]

Howie, just keep stepping on it till it's right

[Big Dave]

I found that trying to push it through the plastic bubble on the package does a fine job too!! with the thin ones.

[Capt Vince Pierleoni]

Tuning trolling spoons is "old school". Most of todays popular and effective spoons like Dreamweaver and NK come already finely tuned. They work well with a variety of approaches and trolling speeds. They can however, get out of tune by being bent by fish or cockpit chaos. Most of the time you can reshape them by placing your thumb inside the "cup", and bending it with the other hand. Although it may never be the same as "factory", there are countless stories out there about the randomly bent spoon that produces the best.

Tuning become popular in the 70's and 80's on the Great Lakes(and many years prior on the finger lakes) with spoons like Suttons, Millers, Northport Nailers, and Southport Slammers. These spoons are easily cupped for slower trolling, and flattened for faster trolling. Lots of trial and error, which enhanced the "game".

[Shade]

Thansk Capt. Vince. I will probably just buy 2 new spoons. I have a Carbine 14 and a Shiznit that got beat up at the end of the season by a couple of Kings. I'll try my best but still replace both spoons.

Shade

[Yankee Troller]

Thansk Capt. Vince. I will probably just buy 2 new spoons. I have a Carbine 14 and a Shiznit that got beat up at the end of the season by a couple of Kings. I'll try my best but still replace both spoons.

Shade

Love that Shiznit! I would have like to seen Runnin Rebels response to this thread. He is a spoon bending legend!

[larry]

Rick, not only does Jerry bend, fold and mutilate spoons but he's also been known to cut Smithwicks in half. trick is to get them to have action for the speed I'm driving. I've had to accidently break off many of these experiments but some are exceptionally productive and make it into the tournament box. As far as technique to bend spoons, bend it, hang it over the side and watch it, bend again, watch again till you get an action that fish would hit. There are a multitude of things that change the action of spoon that you should try before bending one up, hook size, hook weight, o-ring sizes, swivel types (flat, rounded) and tying (closed knot or open loop)