Back in January of 2008, I shared both my excitement and extreme disappointment regarding an at that time, new bait from Lucky Craft. It was a full sized big bait, the Real California Supreme 200. I was excited about this bait because finally we had a realistic big bait from a major manufacturer, available in good numbers, at a price that at that time, was way more affordable than anything else of similar quality on the market. Extreme disappointment came when after one cast, only two thirds of the bait made it back to the boat.

Enter ICAST 2009 where we met, for the first time, Lucky Craft USA president Minoru Segaua. Minoru saw me inspecting the Real California Supreme’s hinges and raced across the booth to tell me he had fixed the joints. He was so emphatic about this point, he literally took the display sample used to show buyers and handed it to me insisting I take it home to test. When I tried to put it back down on the table, he picked it up and put it back in my hand. This bait was all clear, with no finish, and it was easy to see the pins that served as half of the joints had been modified so the tail ends were now much longer making it virtually impossible for them to pinch and pull out.

I tried it out on Lake Toho several days later and again at Clear Lake and the California Delta and sure enough, the bait held up. But since there was no finish on the bait, I had little confidence I was going to hook up with something to really test the bait out. I sent an email note to Minoru and to Roy Gray, Western Region Sales Representative for Lucky Craft USA, telling them I agree the bait has been fixed and that I’ll get to work on a follow up review to announce this issue has been addressed. Surprisingly, A few days later, I received baits with actual finishes to them in the mail. Here’s the result.

No, this is not intended as the follow up review, but simply a prelude to that event and an announcement that more is to come. Suffice it to say, for now, Lucky Craft has totally restored my faith in this product and the scales of my love hate relationship with this company are beginning to tip over on the positive side. Now I have another new bait to put to through the paces and I can’t wait to toss this bait for some green backs in 2010.

You may already be aware that the annual Southern California event held by Angler’s Marine, the Bass-A-Thon, is not being held this year. Last year was TackleTour’s first trip to that event and we were all prepped and ready to go again when we were informed in late August that it had been cancelled. Needless to say, we were disappointed.

But where one event is cancelled, the opportunity for another to rise and perhaps take its place arises, and that is exactly what is happening. That’s right, the folks at MonsterFishingTackle.com and Marine Unlimited have gotten together to create the inaugural Northern California equivelant of the Bass-A-Thon and have dubbed it, Bass Jam ‘09!

Following in the tradition of the former Southern California event, Bass Jam ‘09 already has confirmed several big bait manufacturers including Black Dog Baits, JSJ Baits, Rago Baits, Mattlures, AC Plugs, Tylure, and many more yet to be announced. Confirmed seminars will be held by the likes of Brent Ehrler, Ish Monroe, Cody Meyer, Jerry Rago, Bub Tosh, and Aaron Coleman, and this list is also not yet complete.

The event will be held at the future home of Outdoor Pro Shop and Monster Fishing Tackle at 412 Houser Street, Cotati, CA 94931. The dates are November 14-15, 2009. For more information on this event, visit http://www.bassjam09.com/.

In the meantime, you can be sure the TT boys are packing their bags in preparation to cover the event. See you there!

Lamiglas enters the value rod wars with an all new, made in the USA value line of rods… that’s right. While other manufacturers are headed overseas to stay competitive, Lamiglas is upping the ante by producing rods at the $100 price point built entirely within the United States.

Want more info? We’ll check them out at ICAST, but for now, all I know is there will be 3 spinning rods and about 7 casting rods all priced between $99 – $109 AND I have is this photo to share:

Lamiglas has always been one of my favorite domestic rod companies so I’m pretty excited about this new line of rods. Stay tuned for more during our ICAST 2009 coverage.

Wood.

I don’t know what it is about wood cranks, but they’ve always held a certain favor with me over their plastic counterparts. Sure you get more consistency from bait to bait and better casting performance with plastic baits – and a lot of times you can save some money with them too, but the idea of fishing something someone has hand carved and painted for you just holds a different appeal. It’s similar to my affinity for the finely detailed and crafted JDM fishing rods I suppose.

In the midst of our Year of the Crank coverage on TackleTour, we have quite a list of baits we hope to write up this year. Among those baits is a custom made wood crank out of North Carolina crafted by a fellow by the name of Kelly Barefoot. Custom Lures Unlimited is the name of his company and among his collection of products is a new crank, the Ikon, something that has been in development for over five years.

The detailing of this crank is extraordinary and those who appreciate this kind of craftsmanship will be drawn in quite easily. Barefoot follows up this intricately carved blank with equally intricate and intriguing finishes – finishes that the customer is afforded the opportunity to custom tweak and specify. Try that with Lucky Craft.

The baits aren’t cheap, but considering the labor involved, they’re not outrageous either. With a list price of $25 for a standard color and just $5 more for a custom finish, the Ikon is a bait worth some serious consideration.

I’ve been waiting to get back on a shallow crank bite out on the Delta or up at Clear Lake so I can put these baits through the wringer, but the weather has been crazily inconsistent this Spring in Northern California, so success has been somewhat difficult to come by not to mention time on the water. And guess what? Summer is just around the corner.

For now, it’s back in the test bait box for my collection of Ikons, but I thought I’d get the word out sooner for a bait that’s showing a lot of promise so far. Wood cranks will continue to hold a special place with me and the Ikon is going to get an extended opportunity to stay on my good side.

About a month ago, I reported my on the water experience with the hollow braid to fluoro topshot technique shown to us by Dean Yoshizumi. Since that time, I’ve received a few inquiries as to other product options for this technique since the hollow braid from Toray is cost prohibitive for many.

With a bit of research, I was able to find that Izorline and Western Filament (makers of Tuf Line) also produce a hollow braid product and when I contacted them, they were more than happy to send in some spools for me to try out. Here’s my experience with these products:

Western Filament makes “Tuf Line Guide’s Choice” hollow braid and it’s available in 40lb test and up. The sizes that will interest freshwater fishermen are the 40lb (0.28mm) and 60lb (0.33mm). Unfortunately, these two sizes are very tough to find online and are probably best sourced through your local tackle shop. 80lb was all I could find online and it sells for roughly $220 a 1200 yard spool.

I was most excited about the 40lb product because of its small diameter and the potential to use it for 5 – 12 pound test as Terry Battisti asked me about after my initial blog. Well, unfortunately, the product is so thin, it’s tough to get the threading needle into it. I went so far as to try something smaller, a sewing needle, and even with that, I was unable to get through more than one inch of line before having difficulties with the needle poking through or the line fraying. I’m just not skilled enough in this technique to make it work.

Fortunately, the 60lb was much easier to work with and after a little practice, I was able to thread this stuff rather easily. For the sake of it, I tried some 0.25mm line in the 60lb hollow and threaded through about 3 feet into the hollow braid, but it pulled out with about 6 pounds of pressure on the line. I then tried 0.30mm line through about the same length into the hollow braid and this pulled out with about 10 pounds of pressure on the line. Next up was a 0.32mm line and this held good and strong, so this seems to be the lower diameter threshold for leader material in the 60lb. For those paying attention, this diameter equates to 14lb Sunline Shooter. The other two lines were 8lb and 10lb Yozuri Hybrid respectively.

For the above tests, I threaded the leader line through the hollow and did not tie a nail knot. I wanted to see how well the line held without the nail not in place. Once it held without the knot, then I knew it we had a good mechanical connection between the leader material and hollow braid.

I repeated the tests with the Izorline product which is called Brutally Strong. Their website states the smallest pound test this product is available in hollow is 80lbs, but I was able to get it in 60lb. Perhaps their website is not up to date. Note that “Brutally Strong” is available down to 12lb test, but this is a solid braid (also available in 20, 30, 50, 65, and 80) – so be sure, if you see this product on the store shelves or are ordering it, to specify you want the hollow. Again, all I could find online was the 80lb product and this was available in 1200 yard spools for $160 on a quick search.

Tests yielded the same results as with the Western Filament Tuf Line Guide’s Choice though it seemed this line was easier to work with initially. However, I’ve heard that Western Filament makes the Izorline hollow braid product – I offer that as an unconfirmed bit of information.

Now a quick note about the nail knot. Someone had recommended to me that you don’t really need the nail knot and you can achieve the same results with a drop of soft bait glue. The key here is to thread the leader into at least two feet of the hollow. After getting the allowable diameters figured out above, I tried this technique and while it seemed hold, what I found was you have to be VERY careful with the soft bait glue as I had a couple of occasions where a drop or two landed on the leader material and the line broke right there on my tests. While it can be a pain to tie, I think the nail knot is the safer method.

Do you really need it? Yes, you do. What happens to the sometimes, when the line is wound back up into your reel is the hollow braid will relax and when this happens, the connection to your leader material is lost. When that’s gone, your leader will pull out with very little effort. The nail knot tied right at the end of the hollow braid prevents the braid from relaxing and sliding down the leader.

At least this is the case when trying to use as low diameter as possible with the hollow braid. Things are probably different with a much thicker leader material hence the popularity of using a 20lb fluorocarbon leader instead.

So, bottom line is there are some alternatives out there though they may be a little difficult to source. According to their website, the Izorline product is available in 50, 100, 300, 500, 750 yard spools and up. Likewise, the Tuf Line Guide’s Choice comes in 150, 300, 1200 and 2500 yard spools, so if you can find a store from which to order either product, there could be some cost savings to be had.

For now, I have each product spooled up on two different Daiwa Steez 103HL reels with that 14lb Sunline Shooter leader and hope to get some on the water time with each before long.

At TackleTour, we do our best to stay on top of the latest tackle trends, acquire product, fish it, and report back our findings in the form of a review.

The Spro BBZ-1 Shad was introduced to us in May of 2008

Almost a year ago in May, we got our first look at Bill Siementel’s latest bait, the Spro, 4″ BBZ-1 Shad. We were pretty excited about this compact little bait that featured a big bait swagger.

The Spro BBZ-1 Shad is available in three ROF’s – Floating, Slow Sinking, Fast Sinking

Then a couple of months later in July, just before ICAST, we found out about a similarly sized product from TruTungsten that featured their innovative adjustable weight system, the 4″ Tru-Life swimbait.

The Tru-Tungsten Tru-Life 4″ bait features the same adjustable weight system and two hooks per bait.

Can you say shootout?

I was more than prepared for a full blown shootout

In the Fall of 2008, Reaction Strike got in touch with us with their interpretation of this same concept and once again, it was game on in the “swimbait” market.

We were made aware of the Reaction Strike product during the fall of 2008

I’ve gone back and forth in my mind about doing individual reviews versus a full blown shootout between these three manufacturers’ product and had pretty much decided to go full blown shootout.

The profile of these baits has garnered a lot of attention as well.

Then of course, we declared 2008 as “The Year of the Crank” on TackleTour. Normally that would not affect anything but the interesting thing I found is the more I fished cranks, the less I saw the purpose behind these little 4″ big baits.

The joints have good movement.

They all seem to share a similar issue in that unless you are retrieving them painstakingly slow, no matter their rate of fall, they will all rise in the water column. The fast sinks are better about staying down than the slow sinks, but they will all still rise if you’re not careful.

Their gill bait is even more intriguing.

Reaction Strike has a solution for this dilemma with their little big baits by offering a billed version. So then, is it still a “swimbait” or is it a crank?

And now they make one with a bill.. is it a crankbait or swimbait… a hybrid?

The term “hybrid” comes to mind… something that is a mix of two or more things but neither one or the other. You’re usually making compromises when choosing to go with something that is a hybrid.

Of the three baits, these two are most similar.

Long story short? I’m having a hard time wanting to fish these products. I’ve thrown them a few times and each time, I find myself either tying on a billed or lipless crank when wanting to stay small or tying on a traditional big bait when wanting something that “swims”.

But all three are rated at 4″

So, I’m sorry to say while I’m sure these are all worthwhile products that have their time and place, I’m just not in a proper frame of fishing mind to give them a fair shake

.

And while they catch fish, personally, I can’t bring myself to fish them enough to give them each a fair shake.

My introduction to Blackwater International’s hollow braid topshotting technique came from fishing with Alan Fong almost a year ago when he debuted his Al-E-Baby swimbait. Alan had been shown this rigging method by Dean Yoshizumi from Blackwater International and was totally enamored with it.

I’m a natural skeptic to such things so while I was intrigued, I had to see how it was done myself before coming to any conclusions.

As fate would have it, shortly after that trip with Alan, my good friend, Jonah Li of Hi’s Tackle Box gave me a call and said there was someone he wanted me to meet. It was none other than Dean Yoshizumi.

Well, to make a long story short, Dean showed me the connection one day in Jonah’s store explaining to me it is a method he borrowed from his days of fishing long range tuna. I mean, if he can land two hundred plus tuna on such a setup, surely this rigging will hold up fishing for bass. I walked out with an armload full of product including the clamp stand so I could try this rigging method myself back home.

Unfortunately, my early attempts were not met with much success as I didn’t quite have all the pieces to the puzzle or the necessary patience to complete the rigging.

Fast forward to just last week out on El Novillo Lake in Mexico where Dean was on hand to provide top shots for everyone and I lept at the opportunity to try this once more. I had him fix up my Quantum Tour PT reel, a member of our 2009 high speed reel shootout, and off I went the next day to fish this setup on my Phenix Ultra MBX 707H rod.

Why even bother you ask? Well, if you’re one that prefers to use smaller than normal reels like me, yet, are fishing techniques that require higher strength line, AND don’t like the potential visibility issues braid presents, this is an almost perfect solution. You get the high capacity advantages of braid with the low visibility and abrasion resistance properties of fluoro.

Throw in the added benefit of no knots ticking through your guides on the cast and it is almost a no brainer!
But until you actually fish it and put this stuff through everyday applications, the trust in the connection and the benefits of going through all this trouble in the first place are rather obscure.

I’m here to share my epiphany of fishing this wicked setup:

1) Not only do you get the benefits from all of the above, but the white hollow braid makes an excellent strike indicator when floating on top of the water. You can literally see your line straighten out when fishing any slack line presentation. All that’s left for you to do is wind up the slack and set hook!

2) The abrasion resistance of the Toray Fluoro at 20lb test (we used the Bawo SuperHard Premium Plus at Novillo) is astounding. I cannot tell you how many times I cast my injection molded Lunker Punker Jr. through some of those dragon bushes and rather than move the boat in to retrieve the bait, I wound the bait up close to the bush and catapulted it back to the boat. Each time I expected my fluoro leader to be all messed up, but each time it came back as clean and unabraided as can be. I still can’t believe it.

3) Reconnecting a new leader is a snap. Dean pre-tied several fluoro to hollow braid leaders and once you have that hollow braid mainline on your reel, just use the simple, no knot hollow braid to hollow braid connection method to attach your new leader and voila, you are done. It is impossibly quick and easy.

http://tackletog.com/news/2009/03/19/hollow-braid-splice-connection/

4) You truly receive 100% line strength with this method because there are no knots to fail you. On several occasions, I snagged up on the bottom or in one of those submerged dragon bushes and could not get my bait out. No matter how hard I pulled with my thumb on the spool of the reel, I couldn’t break off. So, instead, I tied my hollow braid off at the boat cleat, well above where any of the fluorocarbon leader material was in the line and each time, I either straightened out the hooks or pulled up a section of brush.

While at Novillo, I ended up fishing this on all four of the high speed reel contestants and I used them all on techniques ranging from cranks to top water to jigs to soft plastics to big baits and I haven’t looked back since. It is now time to re-explore learning how to rig this myself because it has quickly become my favorite method of putting line on my reel.