Seeing Is Believing.

[walleye express]

Have you ever seen or read about a certain fishing product, or for that matter any product, and simply dismissed it as looking like it might work but not really grabbing your attention.

And then sometime later you actually get to hold and look closely at this product and all kinds of bells and whistles go off. Then your reaction is "Man, these babys are sweet." This happened to me recently at Franks Great Outdoors, our local Saginaw Bay fishing emporium.

I had talked recently with Kieth Kavajecz on another board about trolling keel sinkers and attractors ahead of harnesses. I'm more interested now in such things being I'm having a TR-1 auto pilot and High Torque 8 horse Yamaha installed on the back of my Big Lake Charter Boat. Theres just to many days in the last two seasons on the Bay, when having the ability to slow way down and jump to the meat program is demanded to keep that skunk off the boat. And exploring as many Rigging options as I can, while employing these techniques has become a recent priority. Enter the new XPS-Walleye Angler Keel Trolling Weights.

These are really not new, as they came out last year I've heard. They are Shad shaped keel weights that run in front of the harness, that you simply attach your harnesses to. They are expensive little rascles, but I can see where the rewards might offset the price. Heres a picture of 6 of the 9 that I bought. Any of you guys use these last year with any success?

http://www.michigan-sportsman.com/photopost/data/500/8424IM000604-med.JPG

[chamookman]

Dan, haven't tried the keel weights yet. What I have been doing the last few Years, is take a Erie Derie (different weights and colors) remove the large single hook, replace with a sm. split ring, then add a Lindy snell swivel. Depending on the length of the leader of the harness the blade thumping 24" to 48" ahead really seems to help. Then varying the weight and the distance behind the board, the possiblitys are unlimited. Be sure to report on Your successes with the keel weights. Bob WC#253.

[walleye express]

Bob.

I think you better get your butt over to Franks. They had full cards of Erie Deries in the bargain bin for like .80 cents each. And they had quit a few in different weights when I was there.

[chamookman]

Dan - Allready loaded up at Franks on the cards of Dearies, during one of those NE Gale force wind days when I showed up at Hoyles :help: . Thanks for the "heads up". Bob WC#253.

[JJ Mac]

Haven't tried these yet but hope to. All this talk about new stuff...I'm gonna have to head down soon and get my Frank's "Fix." Captain Dan, you'll love the T-8 on the GR. Panther lift? It should have enough umph to do the job and you should be able to troll down to almost any speed. You can probably not worry about getting the trolling socks wet for while. I just put 9.9 bigfoot on my boat. I really thought about getting a T-8 and painting it black. With the new kickers as nice as they are, combined with this summer's gas prices, I expect to see a lot of larger boats getting kickers mounted.

[walleye express]

JJ.

You hit the nail right on the head. The panther mount combined with the High Torque 8 with electric power and tilt will make it very easy to use and nice for as slow as .8 trolling speeds, so Gary (Bo) Bowman tells me. And shutting off both of those 470 Merc's after I get to where I'm going, will definetly save me some gas money, especially this year. :grouphug:

Bo says the new Mother board on the TR-1 auto pilot allows you to program in zig-zags, perfect full circles in 10 degree incriments and so on. Even tie it into your GPS for routes and returns to hot spots. I'm as ancious as a new father to see how this thing is going to work on my boat. :confused: :tdo12: :evil:

[percheye]

Ive been trolling these inline weights for 2 summers now out in Saginaw bay. I only trolling harnesses with the 1 oz. Thats what in comfortable with. Some days they are the ticket. I dont know if its so much of a attracter(cant hurt i guess) but i think it gives the harness a different presentation in the waves when hooked to the boards Usually. i will run snap weights on one side and inlines on the other. Some days its pretty noticable what the fish prefer,
my 2 Cents

[walleye express]

And an appreciated 2 cents it is Percheye.

The only problem I could forsee while using these keel weights, is that the walleye might actually strike the weight instead of the crawler on the harness. :tdo12: :fish2:

[BigEyeHunter]

We used those weights alot last summer. Was very excited when they came out with the 1/2 oz over the winter. Under semi-calm conditions they work great, If you have never ran them you'll be amazed at how they cut the water. The MWT tournament on erie was won bouncing these off the top of a reef. One word of caution is because of the swing, they have not produced in rough water for us. With alittle expeiment I think you'll find them very productive.

Have also had good success running the 3 oz w/ spoons out of Ludington, for steelhead.