JETS & TRU-TRIP 40's

I just need some clarification on just what can be pulled with them. I just normally use them for spoons and harnesses. Having 6 or more lines out and pulling spoons and things just not happening I would like to change one
to a stick or crank to see if that could be working. I'm sure the DHJ's, Bay Rats, and Bandits would be out because their actions. I have plenty of floaters and shallow lures and use them off of dipsys. TT's say up to 1 oz. and Jets say up to a Kwikfish 15 (what ever that is).

Gene

Any floater/shallow diving crankbait works well. Med to deep diving baits pull against the jet and change the jet dive curve/depth or blow out due to speeds and resistance. If that makes sense.
Kwikfish shake/vibrate more than most other baits. They work pretty well for handlining. I never had much luck out on the big lakes trolling with them. Been around for a long time.
https://www.fishusa.com/product/Luhr...Lures--Size-9X
Are you having a problem running 6 or more lines?

Just like what ebijack said, shallow diving cranks/sticks will pull fine behind #40 Tru-Trips. It's all about how much pull the lure puts on the diver. I've even pulled Rattle Tots behind #40 TT's, but they will blow the diver out above about 1.8 kts.. you'll start to see the divers rolling over and coming to the surface, tangling together if not spaced out far enough, etc...
I have easily pulled (and caught well!) :
shallow bandits
all shallow husky jerks, 10's and 12's are my favorite
short-lipped bombers
suspending pro-rogues
P-10's
Ripplin' Redfin's
and so many more I don't even remember what they are!

HJ12's behind #40 Tru-Trips were about all I pulled through most of October last fall. We pulled a lot of limits in 3 hours or less that way! Simple rule - if the bait doesn't have much resistance in the water, the #40 TT can handle it. I even ran some Flicker Minnow's behind them, and at slower speeds they were fine.

But the million dollar questions is: if you have Tru-Trips, why do you still have Jets? :confused: :o Jet's make good Christmas Tree ornaments....

Ebijack, thanks for the info it's just needed to know and not having to change from a jet to dipsy if it's slow day for spoons and harnesses and put out a crank just searching for what may be working. Running big boards and 3 lines a side only happens once in awhile, usually 2 off the boards and 1 dipsy per side.

Capt. Eric, thanks for the info. I have plenty of them usually pulled off the dipsy's but needed a little more info on the Jets and TT's.
Why you ask as to having both Jets and TT's? Totally preference from a fishing partner so I keep them on board. Hell I had to through out the Jet 20's to get one partner change to the 40's.

Just for the record I often refer to us as "The Hospital Crew" and I am also the equipment manager so to speak and to keep up with the current cranks, rods and reels and so on.

Gene

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Originally Posted by Capt Eric

But the million dollar questions is: if you have Tru-Trips, why do you still have Jets? :confused: :o Jet's make good Christmas Tree ornaments....

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I had multiple jets, I made them all releasable. Many many years before TT came out. No need to upgrade to TT. :)

I hung onto my old 40 Jets for a while after the #40 TT's came out.... but they just gathered dust! There are still a few guys down west of us that use the 40 Jets, they say they can't catch 'em on #40 TT's some days - I don't understand, I'll roll right along with them catching on the TT's. I'll take a 35' lead over a 55' lead any day!

Just for sake of experimenting, try running spoons or harnesses on one side, and put a couple shallow cranks behind TT's on the side. If you see one side dominating, switch the other side out. There's a lot of mornings I start out with all kinds of crazy stuff in the water!

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Originally Posted by ebijack

I had multiple jets, I made them all releasable. Many many years before TT came out. No need to upgrade to TT. :)

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I remember those days! We tried all kinds of homemade releases for them... they ended up working great! But there's still no comparison in the dive curves between Jets and TT's!

I never found the curves to be even close on either. I ran my jets along with partners TT's. And mine would release much easier and consistent than the TT's.
But that's me.

Having spent most of my life working I finally started to make changes to my life and added fishing to it and this was only a short time ago, what I know about fishing I learned on my own. I equipped my duck boat with Big Jon mast some Scotty rod holders chose Okuma for rods and reels. I still have those and equipped my current boat with the same exceptions only rod holders are Tite-lok. I have never changed my releases still the Off Shores. I never went in on the rubber bands, I try them now and then but find them sort of a pain. The diver issue has only become an issue only a few years age when TT's came out and had to get them through Dan. I was only using the 20's at that time. When I started this inline boards had not even really taken off here on the WB. As you see I don't change much. I did add 2 dedicated combo's for dipsy use and may try TT 50's I got them with the 2 combos for dipsys. Yes Okuma reels and Shakespeare rods. So I think it's time to change my hat from NEWBIE to EQUIPMENT MGR. But to this day I still consider myself as a NEWBIE, and the question(s) I may ask. Thanks guys for the helpful answers.

Ebijack, I have no intentions on acquiring any Kwikfish it seems quite funny I could not find any weight info on them and any place I have seen them were on tables at garage sales for 50 cents.

Capt. Eric, having the TT 50's is making me want to try them out and I'm pretty sure I cannot run them off the boards. Hey!!All I can say is "I hav'um".

Because of current health issues my boat partner has asked me to mark the boxes as to how to, with what, and when every thing should be used. I could only laugh.

Gene

Gene, if you use your tattle flags for what they were designed for. I believe you are missing out not using #32 rubberbands. Just a few seconds to adjust perfectly to any bait you are going to run. Springs can not be adjusted anywhere near as close. You can set each flag to move even with just a piece of grass dragging on a hook. Or tight enough, a 3 oz weight will not move that flag with a deep diving crank until a fish plays/takes the bait. This is from back early 2000's? Clip a small"V" where the top hole on each board is. That locks the rubberband into any amount of tension you set. Easy peasy.
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$7 for 1lb bag. Enough for you and everyone you know for the next 10 yrs.
Just look around, if in stock you can get nice size bags for $1

Limited to 4 photos.....:rolleyes: Back to the Offshore boards,
Around 2006 I dropped the rear back side eyelet to the same location the eyelet from the from side was removed. Not straight back like factory. Which helped the Offshore boards run much better. New for 2016 Offshore lowered the rear eyelet location to help the boards run better.
Here was one of my jet 40's using the black Offshore clip.
https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/6...923/ILvZ8q.jpg

In my boat, I stopped running jets, dipsey's, inlines etc. I found 90% of the time I didn't need to carry/use all that stuff. One smaller box of weights upto 4oz's. And a bag with the 6 to 10oz weights. Enough to cover the water column using upto 10 rods. No need to run 200, 300+ ft of line out. I'm lazy.
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A short 7" dropper is all that is needed. I started with around 15". Everything can stay attached to the rods and put into lockers. Faster setup/take down. You only have to unclip the weights, hook the snap swivel to a rod eye. No tangles. Friends that run small boards and 12 plus rods on their boats have switched to this system for ease of use. And cheap. Painting the weights helps. You/others know exactly what rod has what weight.
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Just something to think about.

We run 40tt behind offshore board with the flags, they do take a few small adjustments on the older boards to do this, the new flags that have the holes help alot, we were able to drop the rubber bands after installing the new design flags.

I don't change the location of my boards or rotate them, the outside board stays the outside, middle the stay middle, so when a fish comes in it goes back out straight out the back then it swings back into place once tightened up. But in doing it this way it makes it hard to use weights unless in deeper waters cause in shallower water it will find the bottom b4 the boards gets far enough back to reach it potion. This if running spoons or harness causes issues. I like tadpoles too but ran into the same problem. Same thing cam happen with any weighted system if running near bottom even on a turn, the inside stuff will drop depth and the outside will rise...not so much a bad thing till the spoon plug's up with muscle shells or you rip the worm off the harness........maybe the dropper depth helps keep this from happening compared to a snap weight system. But I can also see with that dropper hanging down ad lines pass over each othe it could cause it to get into each other.

Most important thing is there are several methos that do work, play around, figure out which one works best for your own liking and fishing styles, they have issues, they all have good points

Thanks Ebijack for all the great illustration and info you gave.Seams like you figured out how to modify your equipment to improve its function before the manufactures produced it.We have been using the size #32 rubber bands on our inline boards for last 5yrs.Think they work much better than the original springs which come with the boards.I do like how you cut that V into the front of the board to change tension on the flag.That is something I will have to do also to my boards.I did not even know/notice that Offshore lowered rear eyelet in their newer boards to run better.Thanks for sharing that tip.Will be lowering that eyelet also.Looking forward to seeing how those two modifications you pointed out will help us run our boards better.
We frequently use tadpoles and harnesses in the summer to fish.Usually two dipseys at 3 setting and 4 inline boards.I have run into same problem with our rigs hitting bottom,or even snagging when dropping boards back or making turns in shallower water or rocky bottom.Guess that will happen when you have weight pulling your lures down.That is an advantage tru trips and cranks have,is they float when slow down.Weight/sinkers sink when slowing down.i just have to be more attentive to the depth or rocky bottom when putting lines out.Usually when running two boards per side,the leads will eventually be running pretty close in length.So I can switch up inside with outside board when letting them out.That way I can put the clicker on when putting out the board and that speeds up the lure so less likely to sink too far.As far as making turns,i would speed up some and make wider turns,to prevent them sinking too far.But,if bottom not rocky,sometimes lure dropping or just sitting on bottom can trigger a strike.
We were trolling on Chickinole Reef back in October 2016 and were finding some active fish in 19fow.They were bigger than we had been catching previously,but was not catching as fast as wanted.Only color Bandit that was catching was Firetiger.I wanted to put out a worm harness out to see if would work.I tried several weights to try and get to desired depth,but nothing worked.Was lucky I didn't get a snag and lose everything.After thinking about it,I decided buy some TruTrip 30 to use in that situation.I had used TT40 on inline board and I feel they pull too hard and I didn't need to be too deep anyway.Unfortunately I did not get to use the TT30 last season.Looking forward to seeing how they work in shallow water.

Thanks Bob.
Just as a note. You can run a 3oz weight attached under a #40 jet and get down around 57ft. And less line out. 2.5 to 2.7 mph. I've hit bottom in 65 ft near the line from Vermilion with that method. Just too much line out.
I just stopped using the jets and purchased swivel weights from 4oz to 10oz. I haven't had that much of a problem snagging bottom. Even over here in Brestbay. Or up at Saginawbay. But I do use swivel round/bell shaped weights. Maybe that's the difference.

Bob once you lower that rear attaching point the boards will pull 40tt better. The hew flags with the adjustment up them are well worth the 3 bucks each. Can be set supper light, when we were using them with tt40 it wasn't even half way up the tension adjustment. They wold still show them small fish and we're too stiff....had to really back them off this fall when using cranks only

Ebijack,looked at my boards yesterday and illustration of Offshore new boards.Looks like eyelet on new boards is halfway down on the front of the board.On our boards with the tattle flag that goes up and down,the eyelet is on rear of board but near top edge.To move eyelet down to middle will have to place through piece of black plastic that holds Styrofoam in place.Would you mind send photo of where eyelet placed back of board.Thanks

Itsbob, if you go to Offshore’s website, there are photos of the new boards. I moved my arms and the boards work fine when pulling try trips and weighted cranks of 2-3 ounces. When I pull cranks with no weight and spinners with 1 ounce or less and small tadpoles, the boards get pulled under very easily when a fish hits. I move my spring arms back to the top of the board for unweighted cranks,spinners, and small tadpoles.

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Originally Posted by itsbob

Ebijack,looked at my boards yesterday and illustration of Offshore new boards.Looks like eyelet on new boards is halfway down on the front of the board.On our boards with the tattle flag that goes up and down,the eyelet is on rear of board but near top edge.To move eyelet down to middle will have to place through piece of black plastic that holds Styrofoam in place.Would you mind send photo of where eyelet placed back of board.Thanks

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Easy Bob. I removed those black plastic pieces. Never found that I needed them to hold the flag for storage. You can make/cut washers out of those when making your tattle flags so the flags rotate without tightening the screw. If that makes sense.
Use a 1/16" ? drill bit. The diameter of the eyelet screw shank, smaller than the threads. Drill thru from the front side where you removed the eyelet from the front side. It's just plastic. No problems. Screw in eyelet. It should be directly opposite the original hole.
Also, if you have some crimps, #30 braid. You can eliminate the wire that pulls the rear clip/flag. I switched that a few years ago also. No more bent wires to straighten. Works as good or better.

Thanks Ebijack,think I may modify two boards and see how they work before switching them all out.I didn't really have too much of a problem with my inline boards except once in a while a board will submerge on a big fish,but that is part of the fun.

You should see a difference when running hard pulling baits/weights. And in rough water.

Was looking at Offshore website and they had an article about them lowering that eyelet and a new tattle flag.The new tattle flag has 4 holes to use different tension to spring.We use rubber bands.Do not think those new flags can help us any.

With the new flags you won't need the bands. My issue with the bands was gettingbthem light enough to shoe all the little tish, but then stiff enough to not have the flag dropping over every big wave on rough days. I was never able to get them to work well with 40tt but the new flags do.

As stated there is 4 hole, there is a blank spot between the 2 pairs of hole where it looked like a 5th should or would go but wasn't, on mine there now is, and that hole has been my favorite setting so far. So now I have 5 holes there plus 3 on the board, that's a lot of adjustment. I don't have my top hole on my board any more I nipped it to hole my rubber band when we ran them.

The other issue with my rubber bands is they would rot in a few weeks getting soft and stretched out