zmk1962

Hi KC, coming out of Port Jackson Brown's is 40km SE, and you travel almost directly over 12mile. So I do often stop around 12mile to see if I can sound some bait balls or other activity. To return via Peak it would add 20-25km to the trip. It's on the cards one day but I just have not done it as yet. Cheers Z

Guys... as much as I like this debate it is somewhat removed from @DerekD's OP. ... perhaps start a separate topic in the bar about Oz's immigration policy and the repercussions ... Derek's topic at least had something to do with Fishing and belonged in a fishing chat. Derek, I'm sure there are several if not many FR's who share your problem and I know that you said you are"..,over it and give up" . But where these is a problem there is opportunity. FR is a collection of like minded people. Is there a way that the FR community can form an FR group (by location or suburb) that can negotiate a better storage deal, or collectively (say 3-4FR's) hire a yard or something where they share costs and facilities that would solve their problem. After all we are like minded ... just putting it out there. Cheers Zoran

Hey Raiders, a quick short report. The Sydney rains subsided (finally) and the offshore conditions calmed - Wayno and I had a free Thursday so Browns it was. We hit Ermo boat ramp around 630am (no Mr Asia - guess it was too warm for him at 8C), and were well on our way by 7am. Conditions through the Harbour and offshore were spectacularly smooth - once at the heads a 40min 55kmh trip to Browns - my fastest in memory. At Browns found the water Temp 18C, and surprisingly the drift was W-E at 1.8-2.0kmh. Quite a few boats there and more to arrive through the morning. We ran the 15HP Aux in slow reverse and held spot at our chosen mark - usual bait, squid, salted pillies. I also added a glow stick shoved into the body of the lumo plastic squids. Here's a few pictures: By 1030am the count was 3 - Wayno, 0 - Zoran-oh ohhh ! But the gods shined on me and I managed to pull up the horse of the day - to take the total count to 4. We ended the day at 1130am, bagged out - so raced back to Sydney heads for a flattie drift which produced zero. Sinker tally - 5 donated to the deep - two taken on the way down - sharp tug tug and then no weight - all bait coming up intact - what takes a 2kg steel sinker on the way down at around 200-300m ???? One sinker lost with the horse tangling both lines and cutting off the braid on one. Cheers Zoran

Yes, caught them before and around the size in the photo they are very good eating .. the only problem with eating them is they do have a high mercury content and the weekly recommended limit for me (about 70kg) is only 150-175g .... so eat in moderation. AND...... the way they were making short work of the hooked fish and the fin we saw around the boat implied they were a "tad" bigger ... Cheers Zoran

Hey Donna. Absolutely no need to apologize! The site is fantastic. I’ll bite my tongue regarding how I feel about hackers. I found that if I look at my profile and search for My posts it shows a subset. However if I play with the search filters and invert the search to show oldest post first many old posts show up that did not show up previously. I suspect the missing posts may still be there but the metadata associated with that post and used by the search engine may have been corrupted. This would also explain why Google finds some FR posts that our search engine doesn’t- google may have cached a previous search and has a direct link to the post. Anyway I’m sure a more IT literate person could make more sense of it. Perhaps there is a way to rescan/rebuild the metadata. cheers Zoran

Suggest you PM @antonywardle ... from memory he had a few welds done recently. Cheers Zoran

For some reason i have found slimies hard to find consistently (maybe it’s the weight !!!!) - but honestly lately I have not been live bait fishing much lately. It’s been pretty much flatties or deep dropping for me. Not sure why really 🤔. cheers Zoran

@blaxland I’m 100% with @King chaser on his interpretation. When using the 6hook set up I do not put bait on any hooks - but I have found a dab of SP attractant on a few of the jigs improves the bite rate. cheers Zoran

Like others posted above I find a heavy sinker helps with reducing tangles in the sabiki jigs when you get 2-3 or more fish hooked up. If I’m not using sabiki jigs then I do as you describe - little if any weight. cheers Zoran

I have seen a landbased fisherman using 6hook sabiki rigs - he was fishing in the Sumida River Hakozaki Tokyo. However, he used a sabiki purpose build rod of about 12ft length - these rods have no guides - the are like a fibreglass tube and the sabiki jig slides inside. The line emerges from the tube near the baitcaster reel. He was casting a good distance with this set up. Since seeing that, I have gone the whole hog and invested in two sabiki bait rods. I tie a snap swivel at the bottom of the 6 hook sabiki rigs. The snap swivel clips onto a plastic ring - I then wind the whole 6hook jig into the rod (up to the plastic ring) for storage and transport. when fishing we attach a sinker to the snap swivel and drop over the side. It has solved my tangle issues. Agree with the use of a heavy sinker !!!! Cheers Zoran

Hi Duncan, Yup I had trouble finding my old stuff as well - seems the search engines find stuff before 2014 and after 2019... but if I narrow a search then I can locate stuff from 2017, 18 etc. Strange. Anyway... here are links with a bunch of references to different offshore flattie set ups that I use: The sinker jig: I'll summarise my "drift and drop" technique again because I could not locate the original post. Bluespot flathead prefer a sandy bottom, but like any bottom dwelling predator they like some structure - so I look for depth contour lines that are close together signifying a drop off - Flathead are also carnivores and like other fish are opportunistic feeders - they do not like to expend unnecessary energy - so they'll be lurking on the deeper side of the drop off waiting for prey to swim/drift over them. I usually mark a few spots that meet that criteria at various depths (30-40-50-60m) - because they do tend to move up and down at different times of year - not sure what makes them do this !! We then drift across these locations as drifting helps you cover more ground. One of my theories is that because flathead are carnivores, they tend to hang around in schools of roughly the same size fish - it prevents them getting eaten by their mate. So when we come across consistent hits from the pickers we keep drifting (or motor until we are another 10m deeper). We drift until we start catching the bigger models. At this point I drop the anchor - swinging on the anchor rode usually lets us pick up the bigger models that have schooled together in that gully or drop off - if the bite slows its quite easy to let out another 10-20-30m of rode and repeat. Once the bite is dead, we lift anchor 3-4m and start the drift again until we hit the bigger models. So "drift and drop". This technique evolved once I installed an anchor drum winch - prior to that I would not have considered it practical anchoring in waters 40-70m deep. But experience has shown there is a down side to this technique. Once anchored you are an easy mark for schooling jackets. So if jackets are prevalent, the only alternative is to up anchor and drift with heavier weights hoping the drift is fast enough that the jackets can't be bothered chasing your bait. Regarding rigs, we tend to use a 2 hook paternoster rig and often change sinkers to make sure we have just enough to hit bottom - 4oz when anchored. Keep the rig moving and bouncing on the bottom. We have standardised on a 10cm SP on the top hook, bait on the middle and a bottom bouncing jig at the sinker. Here's a report where it all comes together: Hope that helps. Cheers Zoran

You have a lot of boat structure under the hull, and the prop is set back from the stern - just bear in mind these structures and any turbulence created by the prop will affect your sonar operation. Ideally you want a location that has smooth (laminar) water flow so be prepared to test spots further toward the bow. Alternatively, I see two planing planks (fixed trim tabs) at the stern. They may well be good locations to mount your transducer. Cheers Zoran

Great to hear she can pursue her career and her fav hobby. Awesome. Pays to stay positive!!! cheers Zoran

Hi @Blade I will describe how I understood my 200efi to work (as that's where I have direct experience), you can cross reference with the service manual for your motor. Look in the Fuel/Oil injection section of the manual there should be a verbal description of the oil injection system design/operation. On the 200, the oil injection pump was driven by a gear shaft running off the motor crank case. So if the motor was spinning, the oil pump was pumping as long as the oil gear shaft was intact or the gears were not stripped. The oil pump was crank case driven not electric motor driven. So assuming the gear and shaft were intact the only time you would not have oil flow when the motor was running would be if the oil tank was empty of oil - hence the empty tank oil sensor. Even if the tube exiting the oil pump broke, the oil tank would be quickly emptied and you'd have the alarm go off. I agree with what @noelm said about reliability of the system. My system was very reliable over the 21 years I had my Merc. The 200 merc had an external 10L oil reservoir, feeding the smaller oil tank situated on top of the motor. The only problem I ever had with the oil system was when the cap for the oil tank on top of the motor cracked and was no longer air tight. The "system" recognised this as a low oil indicator in the top tank and continued to pump oil from the external reservoir. I had oil everywhere. It looked like a major issue but a new top cap solved it. The root cause was most probably an inexperienced me over-tightening the cap because I read somewhere that it had to be kept air-tight !!!!!!!! Also I'm also pretty sure if the system detects a NO oil situation the motor goes into a limp mode preventing you going above certain RPM. Again check your manual - I no longer have mine. Again I agree with what @noelm said. I'd also add, that if you eventually figure out how to place an inline flow sensor between the pump and the motor, you are also adding another failure point. Most of the flow sensors have some type of impeller mechanism, if that jammed or failed, it could restrict oil flow (below the calibrated rate of the pump) and you would probably do more damage to the engine as you'd be running for a much longer period of time with lower oil content then you would if it went into limp mode. Just my thoughts on the topic. Cheers Zoran.

There is certainly a lot of interest and it has been discussed. Contact Donna @mrsswordfisherman Thanks and Cheers Zoran

@Blade ask Merc as KC says you may be lucky and get someone that’s interested in helping regarding an older motor worth a shot. More often they will just refer you to a local dealer. The other thing you can try is to locate a service manual PDF for your motor and read through the fuel system section. I was able to find one Free for my previous 1999 200efi On this site. Sorry I only have the link for the 200 but play around with the url and see If you can locate one for your 90. http://www.hedges-uk.com/boat/Merc/outboards/2-stroke/2-stroke/135-150-175-200-225/MODELS%20135-150-175-200-225%201992%20and%20Newer%20%96%20135-150-150-%20XR6-150%20Magnum%20III-150%20EFI-175-175%20EFI-200-200%20EFI-150-200-225%20Pro%20Max-150-200-225%20Super%20Magnum%20.pdf Alternatively go look at a site that shows parts for your specific Year make model Motor and check the fuel system - see if there are any parts relating to oil sensor : http://www.boats.net/parts/search/MercuryMarine/0g884040/3743/parts.html Again this link is specific to my old Merc. Play with the url or the site once you open it. cheers Zoran

In all seriousness guys, I did do one trip using a game trolling rod (about 700m 80lb braid)... I managed 6 drops and retrieves before I gave up... a 4lb sinker puts a nice bend in a 15kg 5'6" rod .... so with every pump and wind I figured I retrieved about 40-50cm of line ... thats a lot of reps to just get the sinker up.... 😞 Then for many years I used an Alvey Reef King (theres some videos here of that) ... worked a treat, twin handles, 1.3m retrieve per turn ... great upper body workout to boot ... But then, I had a skiing fall and now have bursitis in my left shoulder .... so now its Tanacom 1000's all the way ! Cheers Zoran

Hi @dlvbw great catch and even better job taking the kids out - good on you. If you check my past posts I do pretty well on the offshore flatties. I switched to 6/O Suicide (pretty wide gape) ages ago. I fish these on a two dropper paternoster rig. I have found the wider gape tends to hook the bigger flatties around the corners of the mouth making it easier to remove the hooks (rather then the deep throat hookup that I got with smaller hooks). I also found that I get fewer juveniles and pickers - don't get me wrong - you will still get some (it never ceases to surprise me how a flattie whose head is just bigger than the hook can get itself caught on that hook!). I fish with an SP jerk shad (10cm) on the top hook and bait on the lower hook. I also use a sinker jig attached right at the snapper lead which has accounted for quite a few big flatties, octopus, mowies, pannies etc. I have also posted about my flattie "drift and drop" technique and the logic behind it in other posts. Cheers Zoran

In that case then double bah humbug !!! ... 2 hook rig. Cheers Z

Yup agree with that @Yowie - they are very selective. I had something on which bent the 37kg rod and made it dance all the way to the top- pulled line from the tanacom 27kg drag no probs. We thought we had a winner - wasn't a shark as the swimming was slow and powerful. Swam around boat with 8m to go and tangled with the other line ...we free spooled that ...but then the sharks took it !!!!!! Bah humbug. Not even a head left to show. Cheers Z

You have two good options to pursue. The downside to epoxy permanent fix approach is it’s much more complicated to upgrade or change. I now have a great 1kw 50/200kHz transducer but its plug fitting is not compatible with new head Units. It’s a real pita to chisel it out from the tight space where it’s fitted - but I’ve done it once before when I replaced the old hummingbird so I know it’s possible. Anyway while the system works it’s staying put. cheers Zoran

I have an Eagle (which is LEI) High-performance, low-profile 50/200 kHz Skimmer® dual-frequency transducer with built-in temp sensor. I have this transducer permanently fitted with epoxy as a shoot through hull mount which reads bottom at depths past 500m and speeds above 60kmh. It is fitted in my fg boat with no drilling of the hull. It's not so much the transducer but the manufacture of the hull that determines if you can shoot through. If the hull and the transducer mounting compound is solid fglass (epoxy), it has the same transmission as water, so no problems. If there is any wood, or air bubbles in the hull or if you try to use silicon in between the transducer and hull, it will absorb the transducer ping signal and it wont work. The best way to test, is to place your transducer inside the hull where you think it should best be, fill some water around it to remove any air bubbles (you may need to build a small wall out of something like plasticine to keep the water around the transducer), then place a wet sand bag ontop of the transducer to keep it in place as you go for a test ride. You may need to try several places to test and find your best transducer/hull location. Once you have settled on the ideal location and you are ready for the transducer fitting you can use extra eopxy on one side of the transducer to correct the 5deg hull slant. Just make sure there are NO bubbles trapped in the epoxy inbetween the transducer and hull. The above worked for my transducer - you can contact Lowrance tech support and have a chat on this topic Cheers Zoran

Hey @61 crusher, nice write up - thanks. It was a strange day at Brown's. Had all the promise, but the mako's made short work of that outlook. As I said on the boat, deep dropping is like big time gambling -- you've committed the time and energy to get there, the payback could be big, but then again you can go back empty handed. But we got one feed anyway - The mate of mine that you mentioned was @Gilbur, out on his bertie again ... he sent me this picture after getting home and stopping at the flattie grounds - he certainly outfished us - maybe too much yakking on our bout (hahaha) - you can see the gem head donated back by the makos ! Looking forward to the next session ! Some stats for the deep water guys, current was N-S about 1.7-2km/h (we had the motor engaged in reverse to hold position), water temp 16.7C. Cheers Zoran

Top report Rich. Persistence is a key factor for fishing success. Great feeds in that mixed bag and a thumper red 👍 FYI I was out Sunday whale watching and Monday again- lots of big cuttle bones floating around. cheers Zoran

I agree its in the best interest. Thanks for working this .... as disappointing as it is there will be another time. Cheers Zoran