Ahh, I get it, also known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act tax rebate reel.

I bought a Quantum Cabo 40 midway thru the season as my every day spinning reel and this thing is awesome.

I still like my assortment of Okuma Epixor and Coronado reels but those are now for my sons and guests, I will keep the Cabo to myself!

Jerry Brown is still cheaper. (blue and yellow are stiffer than the white too)
Won't even consider it until Streamline tests its ABS.

Some new lines I've been using are working out well.

I was using diawa boat braid. It's a color change solid line that is very smooth. It tests close or under it's rating.

Moved to hollow core to using splicing over knots. The JB hollow 60 white is fantastic to cast and test well over that. It's more difficult to splice but if you splice a piece of 80 on the end for loops you only have to splice the 60.

Also trying some tuf-line hollow color change line which seems to be a nice line also but haven't used it much yet.

VS 200, love it. But should have gotten the 250. The price was right.

Diawa SP minnow. I haven't caught on it yet but ive got confidence in it already.

Sebiles, yeah they are like crack when the fish are in.

AS Elite belt, now that is a surf belt. IT gets nice and tight and you can hang a kitchen sink off of it.

AS Cobra bag. Its a damn good bag. I havent gotten a hook stuck in it yet. Good closure and lots of storage. The side pockets. One of them holds a pill bottle with swivels etc, the other fits a water bottle nicely.

Princeton Tec Remix headlamp. Great light. The white is bright and you dont have to cycle thru the white to get to the red. Its holds a charge for quite a while, but i did have to knock it around a couple of times to get it started.

11' Lami SS one piece. I really like this rod. Its great for plugs as small as an AH stubby and works up to around 3.5 oz. nice and parobolic for throwing eels.

GOOD:
shankas 14" rubber! big thumbs up
intova torch! small, waterproof, affordable. huge thumbs up
GRS slims! :btu:
CSW907 seeker! bomb proof rod! a new favorite.
commando bag! roomy, great quality and very well made. great guy to boot!

BAD:
samurai braid 50lb - many wind knots

Tallica 20 two speed, multi-species, the berries !
Shimano sustain 8000 nice and smooth.
Sebilles, hate to pay it they work.
Samurai braid, love the stuff.
Small salty needles.:uhuh:
Tactical clips.:kewl:
New stand up tuna stick with abalone wrap, very pretty, yet to hook up on it
St croix 9 foot legend. good and bad.

What are you if you own both a ZB and a VS?

Lucky
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

If I was lucky Eb I would have beaten my PB this year, Oh wait you have to fish to do that never mind

I got that new Aqua Skins belt this year too, and I love it. Great investment, it should last me a long time.

My canal bike (Bikes:rotf2:) were the best new equipment I used this season! Nice being so mobile!!:uhuh:

And likely single :rotf2:

Your either a guy who has too much disposable income or one who can't make up his mind.:)

I tried Tuff-Line braid this year.

Good - Absolutely no wind knots.

Bad - It has a covering over it that will build up at the roller bearing when it starts to wear down. Not a horrible thing to know that your line is tiring out I guess, but it was a little annoying.

Caught some nice fish on it and it cast well.

:uhuh::uhuh:

accurate boss 270 from charkbait at 200 bucks. without a doubt the finest reel I've used. maintenance free all season. silky smooth drag with plenty of capability, not bulky big large enough not to get lost in my hands. downs: if you love a lever drag for its adjustibility thru-out the range, this one is not it. took a bit getting used to engaging the lever drag after the hit because it's tucked in close to the frame and the handle is pretty large.

Seeker clb708 blank, acid wrapped, using the Al Goldberg recipe. very nice live bait rod. Far from state of the art but a great tool.

the best: JAWS ji7601 rod blank. Acid wrapped, bottom fish killing machine. so sensitive and powerful for a 10-20 pound blank. super medium action bending down into the reel seat on the big tog, fluke, sea bass. if I did not have so many damn rods already, i would buy a new 6' light 12-30, 7' 15-40, and 7 1/2' 30-60

put a full season on my ZB-27 (1st gen) that i got in the fall of last year. Im more impressed with it now after more time. amazing. smooth, consistent drag with never a stutter - from small to high 30's fish.... worry free after much swimmng , banging, dropping, etc... i dont care where they build them, blah blah, whatever else - for the kind of fishing i like to do - it does it very well and has needed no babying.

Afterhours needles - great build and superior finish..... for some reason I had not used any of Don's needles over the years - but this year they outfished every other needle in my bag by a wide margin, in many different areas and conditions.... super durable finish.

Sebile stick shad I was as skeptical as everyone else - but had nights/mornings at the canal when nothing else was inducing hits, but the sebile was a fish almost every cast. undeniably expensive, annoying to have to change hardware, but if you were to rate it by " number of fish hooked per number of casts factoring in price" it was still probably the most efficient lure i threw.

Samurai braid i know others have found it to not hold up well to abrasion while jigging, but i have not experienced that ( i dont fish the canal as much as other places) - and i love this line for plugging.


St. Croix Legend 10.5 foot, 2-6 oz amazed by this "do it all" rod so far. have yet to put alot of time or a good fish on it yet, but it makes me a much better caster than i really am, is extremely light and responsive. a pleasure to throw all night.

bite-sized Snickers the perfect thing to stick in a PFD pocket or plug bag pocket. wrapper stays water proof, just the thing for some fast delicious calories in the middle of the night. a pick-me-up when fishing is demoralizingly slow....

New to me this year:

NB plastic: these things work
Sharp Eye swimmers: these things also work
Orvis Mirage flourocarbon: I love this stuff, so easy to tie a good knot.
Hyperflex Flow 4/3 wetsuit: very comforatable and was warm enough up until last weekend (SAT night I froze).

Korker torrents: so-so. They are comfortable but you need to walk very carefully in and on the rocks (no support). Gonna go back to high top boots for next year.

Other than a Salty's darter I bought nothing new this year.

[QUOTE=JLH;802154]Wearbars & Cabelas Ultra Light wading boots: Way way way better than strap on Korkers. I have put a lot of miles on these and they are holding up well. One of the best thing about these boots are nice and snug on the top which helps with keeping gravel and sand from getting in.

I second that... the MVP of my purchases this year... Goodbye bulky, heavy k-5000! Get online and order some wearbars damnit!

Sebiles ,, magic swimmer,,stick shad.,,,north bar plastic bottle darter.. diawa sp minno..

Chota boots .. Feel like slippers , lots of support,,go on fast ,the elastic cord system .. Little screws they give you for cleats are adequate .. might consider another cleat but worked for me all year .. my feet love em ,, way better than my simms..

That $12 dollar plastic ,floating , vice grip type , gripper from cabella's.. Like it better than my $130 boga because the gripping surface is flat and controls the fish (littleguys)better than the boga that come to a point . They tend to swing and pivot more on the boga.. No scale ,,but my eyes can't read my boga anyway ..

Hobbie Outback.. Great fishing platform ,, extremely stable ,,(except mouth of north river).. Moves pretty good ,, Raced Mac in his Revo and we stayed kneck and kneck .. (I eased up he was huffing and puffing) .. If your going to spring $$ for a Hobie definately get the turbo fins and sailing rudder ... good upgrade ..

St. Croix rods ,,.I snapped one I've had for 3 yrs. .. I shipped it back and recieved a new rod in the mail .. Can't say enough about those people .

Fireline smoke color ,, I'm back with it ... no braid issues all year ,, no wind knots , no mystery break offs (sebilles:smash:).. 30# plugging line .. Stuff looks like hell ,,all grayed out and fluffy but that's when it's well broken in ..

The screw in studs have been working well for me, though I didn't screw them in until early fall. I don't know if one set would last a season or not.

Other than that all gear is old gear for me.

I made three upgrades on the boat...

first I installed a pair of
absorbed glass mat batteries to replace the two 4 year old flooded chemistry batteries..... the absorbed glass mat charges 40% faster than flooded batteries,which is a big consideration when you mainly fish at night, or you run a bait tank for extended hours...I never had to put a charger on the house battery once this season...

second: I bought a small solar panel this season, made by sun force.. it produces a 350MA trickle charge which equates to about a 1.75 amp input based on 5 hours of sun light.. I did this mainly to aid my 40 A alternator on my outboard, most nights, the run in is not enough to recharge the batteries after a night of short stops and starts with lights, radios and other accessories on.. eventualy I needed to hook the house battery to a external charger... coupled with the new batteries, the system remained fully charged all season ( Early April until last week) for the first time since I've owned the boat ( since 1980)..

Last upgrade was a new GPS plotter/depthfinder... the new unit is a Garmin 541S... it replaced a monochrome out dated GPS thad did n ot have mapping capabilities.. I like the unit alot, it is very user friendly and is much eaiser to see with aging eyes....I cant say alot about the sounder part, I use my Lowrance as a primary and only selected the combo unit as a back up..

Hi everyone. This is a great thread!

New stuff tried this year:

Korkers Cross Currents size 15 - didnt fit properly, gave them to a friend, havent heard if they fit him yet.

Cabelas Ultra lite 2's wading boots size 15EEE - so for so good

Fish Grip - fish lipper, awesome, best tool for handling fish

30# Boga - another good tool, I use for weighing fish here and there

Darters darters darters darters - murdered fish on darters this year -
Anco Darter (sold in soco mostly), awesome darter
SS Darter
Mag Darter

7" Redfin loaded with 30 bbs, unreal fish producer this year, thanks Pat for the hookup on this

Dragon Tail lanyard - did about 150 or more trips this year and only one mega tangle, was not fun though

Rash guards - Under Armor cold gear compression tops and bottoms, really working out nicely for rash guards under 3mm wetsuit, thanks Mike for tip on the bottoms, I would have never thought they would work well




there are probably more new things for this year, but I cant remember :)

You have big feet:)

...by far, the vs 150...

Years upgrades
 

Fishing gear.
Switched over to Daiwa Saltist reels for bass rods, and LOVE them !
Planning to switch all cod reels over to Daiwa Saltist high speeds for next year. (Haven't decided on their high speed or super high speed)

Boat upgrades.
Loved having the new winter back door !

The tuna tower turned out awesome. Great being up there that high when offshore but was even more helpful inshore finding the bait..

Plans / upgrades for the boat next season

Auto pilot.
Decided on Simrad AP28, The boat is not getting launched without it ! Tired of driving on long runs ! Everyone with a downeast tells me the auto pilot can steer the boat better than you can.

Need to upgrade the transducer for the GPS/sounder up in the tower (because I installed the tower in the water I 5200 a transom mount as a shoot thru hull for this year rather than hauling out to install a thru hull.)

May upgrade the back up GPS in the house to a combo plotter/sounder with side imaging sonar. (trying to find out how well they work in a downeast boat 1st )

Going to move my outriggers and center rigger from the roof up to the tower.

Plugs

NB PLastic BDs
Diawa SP
Rapala X Rap

Really not much else. I stayed away from Sebile until late in the season so I cant comment but the above all really produced.