Down rigger ball

[BigggCountry]

I finally decided to breakdown and get a rigger. Since I currently don't have a boat I am going to get a mini laker. I fish out of my buddies boat. My question is how heavy of a ball should I get. We troll mostly .8-2mph. Seems like the deepest we mark fish is 60 fow or so. I have never targeted fish that deep before.

 

[SilverBullets]

I believe 6lb is the max for the Mini Laker...

 

[rainORsnow1]

I believe 6lb is the max for the Mini Laker...

I believe silverbullets is correct.

The rule of thumb for me has always been 1lbs per 10 fow. So if you only wanna fish down 60' you are golden with a 6lb ball.
I use a 6lb ball on my cannons and I wish they were eights.
If I'm targeting fish at 80', which is not uncommon, I get blowback at about 1.7 mph.

Hope this helps!!

 

[SuperD]

Bar weights have proven to have far less blow back than ball weights. 6 - 8 lbs of rebar in say 1" to 1 1/4" is just a little over a foot long. Rebar being the easiest and least expensive to obtain up to Dragonflies custom SS pipes. I even made a version with a piece of galv. pipe I filled with some lead.

 

[dragonfly]

thanx Dave. he is right about the bar weights. I did make some polished solid SS 1 1/2 ones that weighted 5.2 lb for the kayak guys that run the small cannons and they fit in there rocket launchers so they aren't rolling around the bottom of the boat. dfly

 

[SilverBullets]

Bar weights have proven to have far less blow back than ball weights. 6 - 8 lbs of rebar in say 1" to 1 1/4" is just a little over a foot long. Rebar being the easiest and least expensive to obtain up to Dragonflies custom SS pipes. I even made a version with a piece of galv. pipe I filled with some lead.

How does bar compare to ball weights as far as tracking them on the FF screen?

 

[dragonfly]

my experience on my boat running a Garmin 545 on one side and a furuno 585 on the other and the digi troll 10s sounder for bottom trac the lines from the weights are much thinner than a 10 lb ball and they don't try to lock on them as bottom and I am running 4 on my boat when trolling for kokanee. dfly

 

[SuperD]

Different way of saying what Dragonfly expressed, way less screen clutter. 4 weights all separated by 5' using balls can blackout your screen! And a number of guys using balls fight with the finder reading the bottom as the depth of the ball rather than the real lake bottom. The bars eliminate that.

 

[SilverBullets]

Good info... thanks! Now, what about the difference on the screen and amount of blow-back between bars an pancakes? Also, any issues running trolls off these types of weights?

 

[dragonfly]

well short answer. I can and do when there are enough people run 8 lines off 4 downriggers and occasionally 10. two shuttle hawks off the rear ones 5'-10' down for the kids for trout with no problems as long as the fish behave but it is pushing my luck. I also run a snuber and chamberlains and would never attempt it with pinchers. the blow back is probably the same with one of my 1 1/2'' 8.4lb stick weights as a 10lb pancake as far as hook up this is how I run mine



and this is how I would hook up using pinchers

the trolls would hook to the weight eye. Dave and others that use them may do different and I would like to see how they rig if they don't run snubers and use pinchers. you can see a lot more on my posts. dfly

 

[BigggCountry]

How long do the 1 1/2 SS tubes have to be to get a 6lb weight? Do you fill them with lead? Those look awesome by the way!!! Thanks for all the info.

 

[dragonfly]

BC, right now I have just made them out of solid SS and they are 11'' long and are 5.2lbs to keep the cost down. but could make a shorter version of the lead filled ones that would be at that weight, but because of all the time and lead would be more expensive to make, and not sure if you would see much difference in performance between the two . dfly

 

[clawman]

Dragonfly;
Got the weights today and they are nicer in person than the pictures. I am still VERY impressed with the awesome service.
Thank you!!

 

[dragonfly]

thanx clawman I just can't get the setting or light right but thanx again I'm glad to help a fellow kokanee fisherman out and maybe we can actually meet someday. dfly