New Equipement Put to the test this Year

[RIROCKHOUND]

Nothing new. I bought zero gear for the first time ever. Not a plug, bucktail, or tin. Other than 100 150lb swivels, 100 6/0 hooks and 1 spool of 80lb mono.


Other than the need to replace a few plugs, few eyes on reels and terminal tackle, I feel like I finally have most of my gear the way I want it. Need new waders next year though....

[TheSurfcaster]

1.) Daiwa Samurai braid on my VS 250

2.) Local Hooker custom 1 pc. rod from Goose Hummock

3.) GLoomis IMX 10'6 Surf Series

4.) Daiwa Saltist 4500 w/ Samurai braid

[iamskippy]

Originally Posted by TheSurfcaster

1.)
2.) Local Hooker

[Tagger]

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).. 30# plugging line .. Stuff looks like hell ,,all grayed out and fluffy but that's when it's well broken in ..

[goosefish]

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.

[Rockfish9]

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..