Recent content by AlanT

Yep, I made the mistake of buying a couple of ABU 7000i C3 CT MAG HS. Nothing I could do to make them run smoothly consigned to the junk drawer, Chinese junk. Could have bought Penns but I already had some quality big pit reels that I used for carp fishing and was used to using braid on fixed...

The copies fall apart pretty quickly apparently. A now deceased member on the other place did a big write up about them. Using mine reel down so it's operated by my left hand. Never used a mono casting leader with braid, just 30lb mainline and 80lb braided leader over clean ground. Had to go...

The cheap copies suffer wear on the capstan and fall apart. Get the real thing. I install mine with the capstan level with the spool lip and as close to the spool as possible to eliminate snatch. If you get slippage then you can either tighten your spool up or put two of three wraps of line...

Been using their snood clips for lighter lures and lead clips for heavier ones for years with no problems.Not much to hang up in weed either.

Even working a fly over sandy beaches will eventually blunt your hook. Number of options here, Clousers dressed correctly will fish hook point upwards make sure most of the material is tied on the bottom of the hook, you can even use plastic eyes if you want a lighter fly. Think cheapo plastic...

Thanks VB. Have some Sunslickers in just that colour but I will confine myself to daylight until I find my way around. Will stick a few plugs in just in case. Be good to get back there again.

Off up there next week I hope. Any info on lure types and colours for the main straits area would be most welcome. Some starter locations and tides would be even nicer but I won't push that one. Cheers

Couple of coats of hard car polish with no silicon in it, work it into the rings as well. Seen the brown gunk under the wraps on shop bought rods but never on one I have built. When you remove the wraps then you can see where the finish has not penetrated all the way through and the rings are...

Open surf beaches I doubt it makes any difference bites tend to be pretty fast but I often used rolling leads as well. Fishing peeler in a shallow gulley on a rising tide and the bites can be a bit cute and I did better with running paternoster with a light lead. Did even better when a local...

Simple running paternoster for bass. Double clipped down paternoster for pin whiting, all I ever catch, up and over Pennel for larger fish baits for catching pins two at a time :(

If the surfs up then you want a sinker, floating lines get thrown all over the place plus they will pick up more weed if there is any around. I did many trips out to Cape Cod and never rigged up with a floater once. The bigger the surf the faster the sinker but a fast intermediate is my normal...

I always do best in those conditions by casting directly into the wind and try to cast under the wind. I don't bother casting backwards usually a headwind will straighten out your backcast quite nicely but the wind does tend to drive your backcast downwards, just turn your head and watch it...

Large diamond plate made by Eze Lap for my filleting knives still going strong after 20 odd years. Give them a strop afterwards to clean off any burr remaining and burnish the edge. Fishmongers are far more fussy about how sharp their knives are than a butcher and they don't use what are sold as...

You should be able to hand throw a lure of that size further than 10 yards. The rod you are using wont load for an average caster with a lure that light but it will still act as a lever so I would have thought 30-40 yards should be possible in calm conditions.

You can't cast a standard Redgill very far without some weight which would depend on how far you want to cast and how deep you want to fish. Salmon spinning was often a Devon minnow on a fixed paternoster which let you fish the lure around slower and hang it in various areas. In the US they...