sherman brown

I have never seen those before i'll have to put that sight in my favorites. I want to try them next yr as i'm not going this yr.

you can run fixed or free on your rigger. but I would recommend using fixed for walleye. I have never tried it but may give it a try. walleye usually school close to the same depth so having both lures in the strike zone would be better. I would use a swivel and bead a few feet above the bottom lure to keep the slider from going down to the bottom one. I guess a cloths pin would work to fix the slider. but I would get a bag of small electric alligator clips then get auto vacuum hose just a little small than the jaws on the clips. then push the hose over the jaws and cut it off. drop the ball 5' or 10' hook the swivel of the slider to your line and clip it on with the alligator clip. but a slider will run about half way down. if your catching fish down 40 to 50 feet the slider would only be down 20 to 25 feet. but a fixed slider would be very close to the depth your getting fish. I think a 6 or 7 foot 20# fluro leader is all you need.

I would highly recommend going out on a charter that runs divers. I started out with 2 days on the same charter before I went on my own. it was the best money I ever spent on fishing. I didnt know anything about running dipsies. but after the 2 days I was able to run 3 per side with a tangle here and there. by the end of the 1st day we was running things with the help of the charter caption. he set the divers on the 2nd day then we did the rest. 1 I use a 6' to 7' 20# fluro leader. 2 if I get a fish on an outside rod I move to the middle of the boat and wait while keeping the line tight until the fish comes over the inside lines then start reeling it in. 3 if you get a fish that don't release the diver the rod should be back farther than normal. if the fish trips the diver it will either be pulled back more or less than normal. but sometimes its really hard to tell. if a small white perch gets on the only way you can tell is by watching the ends of the rods for small jerks on the rod tip. its a lot of work but unless you use the lite bite slide diver which has a lure tension adjustment on them you should check for small fish or missing worms on harnesses often. you'll learn how often to check them. I could go on all day about using divers but its not practical. one thing I will say is the dreamweaver deeper diver is much better than the dipsy and is the same as the dipsy with the ring on but it doesn't use a ring. the dipsy rings are a pain because they keep coming off. I use the lite bite slide diver now which has rings but they don't come off. I also use it like a dipsy and don't use the slide part. but I would never give up the lite bite feature. it has 2 adjustments 1 for the rod and 1 for the lure tension. I set it very loose so it trips on most very small fish.

what size and which reels??

I would recommend anyone take a charter out on erie at least once before going out on there own. I was fishing the western basin when a guy I worked with bought a boat from a erie charter caption. part of the deal was to take him out on the central basin. I had been wanting to try the central basin. but I knew nothing about fishing it. so when I got asked to go on this trip I was all over it. I had never even seen a dipsy up close. the capt used 3 dipsies on each side and we had a great time. by the time we was about 3/4 of the day the captain was just laying back and we was doing everything. learnt a lot that day but just not ready yet to go on my own. so I got a trip together where part of us went up thurs and chartered him again for fri. then the rest of the crew came up fri after they got off work. I thought that I was ready for erie's central basin. we headed out sat morning but was only out so far and the boat had already used almost half of our gas. so we turned around and went in. bought 4 gas cans and stored them under the bow and headed out again. but we hadn't checked the weather. it was rough out there so we went back in. so we didnt get to fish on that trip. but bought another boat with a larger gas tank. but the point here is I knew enough to run 3 divers on each side because of the charter we fished with. I still fish the central basin and can get by. I still learn something new just about every trip. but I can fish now. if you've never fished erie I say take a charter out. what you learn is priceless.

check around on the net and see if you have any boat salvage yards close to you.

there is a simple way to see if your getting power to your plugs. remove a plug wire hold it about 1/8" from the block and have someone crank the motor. if its getting power the spark will just from the wire to the block. the throttle position sensor could be bad. it shuts the motor down for just a second while its going into gear. or the sensor could be bad. this would cause it not to start. another way to see if its getting a spark would be to get a can of starting fluid spray some down the carb then crank the motor over. if it starts its a fuel problem. if it doesn't at least you know it not getting power to the plug.

I guess thats why mine wont pump if it doesn't have oil pressure. once the engine stops so does the pump.

are you making sure the choke is working. motors are extreamely cold natured if the choke isn't working. I have a 5.7 mercruiser. I don't think it would start before it run the battery down without the choke. make sure its working when you try starting your motor.

I went back and read your post again. now I know it has a volvo . my mercruiser has an electric that was put in with the new motor. but it wont start pumping without oil pressure. so if it sets for a time it is a bit** to get it started. what I do is start it by priming it and keep the motor running long enough for the pump to start fueling. so it is important to know if it has electric pump? if yours has the electric pump that only starts pumping with oil pressure then try priming it by pouring about 1 or 2 ounces of gas down in the carb. and if your bold enough to keep pouring enough gas in the carb and see if it will keep running on its own after about a minute or a litte longer. but you may not have an electric or it may have an electric that doesn't need oil pressure to pump. take a gas line loose and have someone crank it over while you watch and see if its pumping gas.

i'm still guessing its not getting fuel or your getting to mush fuel. tapping the carb pretty hard with the handle of a large screwdriver might fix the problem if the needle valve is stuck. another thing that might be causing your problem is the fuel pump is bad. what motor are you running?? is it a outboard or mercruiser?? either one being bad could cause it to start up and run the gas out of the carb but once it does then it wont get any more gas causing it to die and not start back up. do you have a mechanical or a electrical?? all the mechanical fuel pumps that i've seen uses a rubber diaframe. if they teal or gets a hole in it your motor will starve for fuel.

I think I got the icom radio with built in gps. its about the middle of the pack radio. I used it out of Geneva and talked with guys as far away that I hadn't been away to before. but I also use a n9'.6" antenna. I got it off ebay when the seller had a big discount. it is the Shakespeare 5399 9.5 antenna.

if you have the old type gas line you might want to replace them. some times the old line will get stopped up from the inner lining gets stopped up from using regular gas. when the lining comes apart inside the line stopping the gas flow to the motor. what you should do is to take a small gas tank with gas and bypass the main line. hook up the portable tank and see if it will run. i

the antenna is the heart of not getting good range .just about any radio will work as long as you have a good antenna. I recommend the Shakespeare 5225 xt. they cost a little over 100.00. I forget the brand radio I bough last yr. but most of the radios the cost of the radios I checked before I bought and the cost is depending on the bells and whistles you want. I bought a new one with built in gps. and registered it through boatus.com. the one I bought off ebay was on sale for 189.00. I just wanted to get one with built in gps. and I was well pleased with the one I got.

the water separator can be cause major headaches. sounds like a fuel problem. and the water can be your problems.

just checked cabelas web site and the sealine sg lc5 reels are only 69.88 each with free shipping for any size you want. you cant beat this price.

I like to throw a couple of galeforcetackle.com walleye spoons on when running harnesses. when I have 4 people or more on the boat I run 6 divers with harnesses and 2 downriggers with spoons back about 25'. the short leads gives a better action running at harness speeds usually 1.8 to 2.0. doctor death, reverse muffin are my best colored spoons.

are you looking for trolling reels? I use daiwa sg17lca and sg17lc3b reels for erie and they serve me very well. if you want top of the line it would be tekota reels. the 17 is small light and easy to handle but big enough for erie. you can get the 17 reels off ebay for around 80.00 with free shipping. right now cabelas has a sale on the sealine lc5 reels at 75.00 to 79.00 each depending on the size you get. and I think anything over 50.00 is free shipping.

harnesses can be run with inline weights on big or little boards. I prefer divers like dipsy, dreamweaver deeper diver, or the ones I use the lite bite slide diver. I started with the dipsy but had trouble with the rings. so I switched to the deeper diver which doesn't use rings. then I read about the lite bite that has a lure tension release. I don't use the slide part of the diver just the lite bite feature. I recommend the lite bite because the lure tension can be set loose and the diver will release on small fish. I even get releases on most white perch. the next one would be the deeper diver (fishusa.com) then last would be the dipsy. the lite bite has rings but i've never had one come off. when letting out divers with harnesses you want to let them out slow (use the clicker on your reel) or they will tangle. I recommend going out on a charter that fishes with divers, or filling open seats to get as much schooling at fishing them. spoons was the hot ticket this yr trolled at 2.8 to 3.0 mph. we fished harnesses at 1.6 to 2.0 1st but catching was slow. we had heard about the spoon bite and switched to spoons. with 6 divers we had a 5 man limit in just under 5 hrs.