Tuning your crankbait

[Knot2Bad]

I have been reading several threads on this site about trolling with crankbaits. Seems like the Bandits are the most used or popular but others have other choices they use. Regardless of what crankbait you use they all need to be check to verify that they operate or run true as designed. One would think that when they purchase the baits new they are good to go but that does not appear to be the case. We have to check they prior to use by running them along the side of the boat. If they dont run true the can cause major problem like causing line twist, tangling with other trolling lines that are out and most importantly in my view they will not catch fish like they should.

Being new at this myself I was looking on this site to see if I could find anything about how to tune the baits. I didn't see much other than statement that they needed to run true and that is was important. So I searched around the internet and came across this information provided on the link below. I though tuning was simple but nothing is so simple that it can't be done wrong.

Others who have been doing this for a while can provide there opinion.Hope this helps those of you thinking about using Crankbaits ...


Crankbait Tuning Tutorial

[NIMROD]

Tune a bait a little at a time , not hard to over bend the eye and over correcting one. Thanks for posting how to.

[Knot2Bad]

Glad to NIMROD... Wish I wrote it then I would know what I'm doing. I thought the article provided details that I would not have thought of. Things like the percentage of baits that are not correct right out of the box, hook alignments needing to be looked at and changing out hooks that may not be so good. I have readed that Bandits have been reported to be good to go without needing adjustments most of the time. I always seem to be looking for bargains but sometimes you get what you pay for. A poor purchase that will not work for you is money down the drain. I just bought some Crankbaits from Academy (H2O ) and Cabelas (Bandits) as they had sales going on in their bargain basements. Cabelas still does. I will now be checking these and fixing the ones I think I can and returning them if they are way out of whack.

[bdunn3]

Great stuff! Thanks!!!