My First Bait Cast Rod

[CNY Tim]

Well I just got back from 1 1/2 hours of casting and detangling and casting and detangling., well you get the picture.. And after about 45 min. or so of tweaking this and that and getting a feel for the rod which even being a medium is pretty stiff and I think I got the semi hang of it. The last 1/2 hour or so I was making some progress so much so that while practicing a 14" largemouth whacked my rattle trap right by the dock, that was pretty cool.

Will see what happens tomorrow. I am not holding my breath, LOL

[hanson]

Sounds like a good time Tim!

I just switched all of my catfish rods up to baitcasters this spring and couldn't be happier. I love them now!

The biggest thing is getting the spool tension right. Too loose, and the spool will spin faster than the line can get off the reel and thats when you get a little birdsnest, or professional overrun as we like to call it.

Better off to start with the spool tension a little tight. You won't be able to cast as far but once you get the hang of it, you can start to back the tension off and you'll be good to go.

Have a good one!

[CNY Tim]

The first 1/2 hour was brutal Chris, and I was fortunate enough to get nests out, two of em were doozies but the more tweaking and casting I did the better I got. As Dark Cloud would say I'm pretty bad with distances, yards to be exact but by the end of my session today I was casting as far as my spinning cranks and that's enough progress for me right now. I have 10lb. test fireline on it which is probably not the best line for a beginner to learn on. But I wanted to go directly to the walleye set up. 1/2 o.z. rattletraps and fireline which is essentially what I bought the rod for anyway. CNY Frank suggested I start with mono for my training sessions and I was iniatally going to put on some 12 lb. Flexline mono but I stopped spooling mono when I got about 15 cranks in and said the heck with it and slapped the entire spool of fireline on and still had plenty of room to spare on the spool when I finished. This the first time I have tried the new fireline and it is so much easier to tie knots with, blood knots and trilene knots were a cinche with there new formula. Yep your right on about the spool tension slight adjustments for me prior to the last 1/2 hour got me right where I wanted to be.

You have a good one too sir!