Eyefull

You can also right click on your photo, then open with microsoft picture viewer. Click on Picture in drop down menu, click resize, then choose 640 x 480, save and done.

A boat like that deserves lots of really nice rods:thumb:

This is my annual video of submitted photos from customers, along with our own mayhem. Lots of board members, see how many you can pick out. Next season, I am thinking about a bloopers video along with the regular one. So much needless suffering and fish death at the hands of my customers using my rods:lol: The video isn't 100% complete, still adding some more video clips from Don's boat along with some great hawgasaurous Lake Erie walleye aboard CJ Baker's Puddlejumper Charters. I'll post the finished product when it is complete. Sorry, couldn't wait.

Congrats on the new used boat. Your in the right place to scratch that itch.

I am putting together a copper combo deal for the Grand Rapids show. It will consist of a 6'6" Gator Glass rod with large diam. stainless boat rod guides in a spiral wrap, and have my bulletproof handle with aluminum reel seat. I will fill an Okuma Convector 55L with backer, leader and Blood Run Copper and install it for $205.

Planning on stopping to see and hang out with you guys Saturday morning. Can I get the rigger rods back? Why don't you just hang on to the MXH board rods, merry late Christmas.

You can do them in an evening, they will be dry by morning, ready to use after 24 hours.

Sure is:D

Caught a few large kings this year, but this fish was the seasons highlight. Right at 10#'s after being in cooler for whole day. Whats better than catching a fish like this, catching several in the same day. Fished with CJ Baker(Puddlejumper Charters) down in Lake Erie this October. We caught six just like that fish in one day along with a box full of 6-8 pounders!! A few fish went on the wall that day. this fish came on a Silver Streak UV spoon behind a slide diver

Bob, I would be happy to help talk you through the process of adding gimbles to your rods if you choose to go that way. It isn't hard if you follow a couple simple steps. The gimbles are pretty cheap ($1 for graphite, $5 for aluminum), then all you need is some fiberglass mesh tape and some rod epoxy. The only negative to the gimbles is that while fighting fish, they tend to dig into your stomach, and after a long day of hot board rod action, you will have a sore spot the next morning LOL! Tony Childs Eyefull Custom Rods

I haven't seen a torpedo tip. It does sound like a version I messed around with. I used a standard Neptune roller tip and wrapped two 6mm sic single foot guides on the tips tube leading into the roller. It worked to keep the line in the roller, but the roller itself became an issue. It had tiny screws from the outside of the frame, through the bearing that caught the wire when putting lines out with any smidgeon of slack. Yep, the ringlock guides are tough to knock the insert out of. Actually, lots of the hardloy, aluminum oxide, and standard ceramic rings are larger in diameter and work nice for copper. You just have to get them in a frame tough enough for big lake fishing. Copper isn't abrasive, so any material works, just needs to be large radius for the knots and swivels.

Oh, while I am on the preaching podium and we're talking about line guides, lets talk about copper rod guides. I hear lots of conversation and advice about "using large guides" for copper. The myth is that you need very large guides to pass the knots. In reality, any guide larger than 8mm will pass any copper knot size and diameter wise, unless they're my knots lol. Copper knots and other line to line terminal knots hang up and catch guide rings from the blunt edge of the knot, running into the short radius of the guide ring surface. The guides are plenty big enough diameter to pass the knot, it is just the sharp radius of the guide ring meeting up with the blunt edge of the knot under load. More important than looking at the diameter of the guide rings, is making sure your copper rods have guides rings with a large radius to the rings on the edges. Thin guide rings with tight radius will be much more prone to catching knots than fat ones with large radius edges. Back to sniffing glue:eek:

Yeah, I have messed around with all the tips from time to time. The twilly is the most commonly requested and it does the job fine. It is also the fugliest. The Aftco swivel tip is somewhat effective, however as the rod tip section twists over (like all guides on top rods do) the wire easily slides out of the roller and grinds the frame, just like all other roller tips. It has a SIC line guide after the roller that minimizes the effect, but still happens. Lately, I have been just using a SN tip for most builds. The difference in line twist between all of the common wire tips is almost not measurable. Keeping the line tight at all times and trimming a few feet of curly wire off periodically is more productive than a $50 tip. I haven't physically seen a Saltist wire rod yet. Kind of curious to see what kind of guides are on it. Yep the SNII's are about $5 per guide my cost. Just looked up the Saltist rods, they have the SIC (Silicon Carbide) guides. Those rods are designed for wireline striper fishing (like most of the off the shelf wire rods) out east and are trolled flatlining bunker spoons and such. That is the issue with most of our Great Lakes trolling rods. The rod manufactureres just cut and paste saltwater trolling rod specs instead of doing actual research and designing task specific rods for freswater trolling. The saltwater market dwarfs our little niche, so spending much R&D dollars just doesn't make much sense to them. Not saying that they don't try to match our needs with task specific rods (copper, core, divers etc....), they just don't put much time, money, and effort into it. Those guides (SIC's) have been around for quite a while and like I said earlier will handle wire for short term or in a pinch periodically. For dedicated, daily wire diver duty, they will eventually groove. Our wire rods pulling mag divers catch hell from the boats rocking. With that sea saw action and the drag of the diver, it acts like a bandsaw on guide rings. The wire is constantly being pulled back and forth a little under heavy load all day long.

BS is always free and plentiful, see you there.

Length of your wire rods are totally up to your needs with your program. If you fish a wide beam boat with 3' out and downs, a 7' rod with fast action will do just fine. If you have longer out and downs, a longer rod with a fast action and rated normally in the 20-40# class will do nicely. Stiffer, faster action rods maintain their reach better than those with softer, slower blanks. Having said that, a slower action softer rod with the same 20-40# line rating will be much more forgiving during the bite/hookset and while fighting. No stretch in wire means a rod that is fast and stiff will take more finesse from the angler to seal the deal, especially when the fish gets pissed at the back of the boat. As for guides, the SIC rings will certainly take wire for a while, but will eventually get chewed up or at least scored up ugly. The newest rings from Fuji, the Silicon Nitride II rings are built for wire and have stood up to a couple of Ludington Charter boats action for their third season already with no issues. These rods are the first in and last out aboard these boats, so they have seen the action and proven to me to be as advertised. So far, no retail rod manufacturers are using the SNII guides, cost prohibitive. They run almost as much as a good set of rollers, but make for a much better fishing platform than a roller rod. I will be building myself a pair of 9' wire rods for my own use this year and they will have the SNII guides in a spiral wrap. For any custom builder, wire rods are the toughest trolling rods to perfect. The torture that the wire and mag divers put on a rod are second to none in the industry. The sawing action the boat/diver puts on the line guides with the wire is absolute brutal. That is the reason that there really isn't any great retail rods for wire. The rod manufacturers aren't going to spend that much time on details for a small market specialized rod niche. Plus, like mentioned above, an individuals fishing programs and styles has as much to do with the performance of these rods as the components themselves. You have to match the fishing style and program with the correct components to get great performance. Sorry for not giving an easy solution to the problem, that is why I lose sleep over wire rods:eek:.

Steelhead Killers!!!!!!:lol:

Six walleye rods with 20# Stealth, four with Triple Fish. The Triple Fish seems to frey more, but still no breaks or anything negative. Two 30# Stealth Braid diver rods for salmon, no problems with three years use.

Yeah that:lol:

Just finally put the Eyefull to bed for the winter. Yep, I know, very late for me. I actually had her on the water in November a couple times this year though. I was also keeping her water ready in case someone was looking to buy her and wanted a water test. I am always pleasently surprised when the gearcase lube comes out just as green and clear as it went in. I have had her since new and I am a firm believer in proper maintenance. I know guys that don't change their lower gear lube every year or fog their engines. They are usually the guys spending cash on mechanics labor instead of new gear:eek:. Now it is just changing the kicker four stroke oil in spring and new plugs. Nothing special to offer with this post, just darn lucky it got me out of the house today. Couldn't take any more big ten massacres:(. Happy New Year to all and hopefully 2011 is the best fishing yet.

PM me for a price on them. I can usually get under most box stores:thumb:.

Merry Christmas Frank and all. I need all the advantage I can get most times:D

I did a little online Christmas shopping for myself as well. I ordered 4 new walleye trolling blanks for 2011 R&D aboard the Eyefull. I also ordered a couple of American Tackle 9' one piece Viper blanks to be used for my new wireline rods. With all the parts and pieces involved, Tony did pretty well this Christmas. Will probably snag a pair of Saltist reels to hold the wire, but will have to get creative when that time comes around. Also stocking up on Reef Runners, picking up a couple every trip to town:rolleyes:. Doesn't seem to hurt so much picking up a couple at a time, by spring, I'll have a pile of them and the boss isn't any wiser. Merry Christmas to everyone from Eyefull Custom Rods!

I would too:D

Bill, be aware that many St. Croix blanks are made overseas now to, more and more all the time. No rhyme or reason, some high end and some low end. I won't tell if you don't:D. Hopefully you get a huge discount on the Sage stuff. I have built on and fished a couple of them, can't say I see any advantage over many other quality blanks at a fraction of the cost. Nothing wrong with them or against them, just didn't see any reason for them to cost $350 for just the blank. If you get a big enough discount that the price is at or around a St. Croix, now your talking:thumb:.