Leadcore – Crank Control

I’ve been using leadcore a lot over the past two years and thanks to Jason and others for their input.

What I am thinking is this: Let’s say you’re dragging a crank in 20 feet of water and it takes 3 colors to get to tick the bottom. BUT the fish aren’t there. They are up six feet off the bottom and the electronics tell you so.

These fish will feed up. Sooo…doing a little math…I’d need to let out a little more than 2 colors to pull about a foot above these fish.

Certainly, a linecounter would help in this situation.

Anybody else have a technique to lock and load?

Use a linecounter it will help big time. Depends on your speed to, the faster you go the higher your crank rises.. In 20 feet of water at 2mph I figure 120 feet of lead, but you also have to factor in current speed if your on a river. Bascially its a deal where you just got play around to you find the pattern..

Yes a line counter would be better, but you can easily do it without. Pulling lead, you know there are lots of variables. I started keeping a “cheat sheet” of my go to baits, and my SOG, and where my baits hit in relation to that. Other variables like down speed, will affect that, but it is a good starting point for me.

what about using a bobber stop to mark your line….then adjust accordingly? I may have seen this done before I had line counters Make sure to take it easy when reeling in the stop though, they stay nice a snug on lead but I have seen them move under a lot of pressure.

A linecounter will get you precision and that is what it is all about!!! I have never pulled leadcore. I have linecounters now, but I have during my rowtrolling days used three methods to gain some feel for my distance.

Measure one pass of your level wind; from the front of your reel to the first eye is usually two feet(ten pulls is 20′); or use your rod length to measure;

Start with 10 pulls for easy math and go from there…

Mark

Linecounters might help, but each trolling day, even each run can be different… with or without the current (even lakes can have current), SOG, lure choice, etc can all affect depth to varying extents. Keep playing with the amount of line out until you get it dialed in and start catching. Or simply play up on the throttle for a little while. See if the fish don’t mind chasing it a little faster… You can cover more water as well as get your lure off the bottom a little more. Remember to make a mental note of you speed when the fish hit, as well as if it was on the outside rod, inside rod, or straight back if the fish hit during a turn. (outside rods = going faster, inside rods going slower during a turn). I caught walleyes up to 4.5 mph last year… They were just on a tear that day, but sometimes fast works just fine.

If you are using the linecounter, make sure all of the rods are set the same. The spools all filled to the same fill depth, the same leader length, and all the reels zeroed at the same point. If leader length varies, you might want to zero at the start of the leadcore instead of the lure attachment point.

I just tend to count colors until I hit bottom at that speed. I’ll then crank up until I’m not contacting bottom, and make a mental note that it took (for example) 4 colors to hit 21 feet at 2.5mph. If I want to raise up 5 feet, then I just reel in a color’s worth or so. Nothing overly fancy, but you can get a good idea of where your lure rides based off of using the colors. I’m not a pro, but I tend to find that counting colors might be easier than messing with the linecounters (although my leadcore reels are accudepths, which do have linecounters). If the fish tell you they don’t like it, then reel in a half color and see what happens.

for what its worth.

Mike

I personally would forget the lead and troll my superline pole and use #5 jointed shadraps and/or #7 flickersads that would put you in the stike zone! All that depth is one good cast away.

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I personally would forget the lead and troll my superline pole and use #5 jointed shadraps and/or #7 flickersads that would put you in the stike zone! All that depth is one good cast away.

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That will work, however forgetting the lead, will cost you fish. I’ve seen it happen many times.