Side planer boards?

[Larry3215]

last two

Might be a couple of weeks before I get a chance to test it out.....

[TrackerPro16]

Those look great! I have a couple Bullet Bobbers but they are not quite the same as the planer boards. Seems like letting line out 100 feet behind the boat would get enough distance away from the boat for the fish which I guess is why we use side planers?

[Larry3215]

Some fish seem to be very boat shy. You can let your line out a long ways and hope they come back from the sides or the bottom before your bait passes by, or you can go out to the sides and hope to surprise them.

I made a pop up/down flag system for the planer that was fully adjustable for line tension and used no springs, but it had issues. It was amateurish, ugly and not very sturdy. Plus, the way I did it made the planer board much more awkward to handle and bulky to store. Im sure it would have worked fine, but it was just not cool to the point where I would actually be too embarrassed to let anyone see me with it on the water.

So.. back to the drawing 'board' and no pics

I dont really think a flag system is necessary. The rod will telegraph when it pops off Im sure. It would still be cool though.....

[G-Man]

The flags are mainly for the inline units. When you are running lines using the shower curtain clip/down rigger release method, you'll see action on your rod if you install 2+ feet of line between the release and the shower curtain clip when you have a fish on and it doesn't release. Similar principle to what goes on when downrigger fishing, just be sure to keep the belly of the fishing line out of the water as much as you can.

[Larry3215]

Thanks G-Man, thats what I was thinking. im planning to add some length to the clip Im attaching to the board for that reason.

[TrackerPro16]

I have a 'Dipsy Diver' coming. Goes out to the side and down. Got it cheap enough that I'll give it a try.

[Larry3215]

I have one or two of those but havnt used them in ages. As I recall you should be able to get 10' to maybe 20' to the side easily. Watch for fish moving to the side ahead of your boat with your PS31 and you should be able to tell if thats far enough or not.

[TrackerPro16]

By watching the vids and stuff I thought you could get them pretty far out? The side planers don't look like they would get much depth?

[Larry3215]

Maybe they will go further than Im remembering - or I was doing it wrong

Using a side planer carries your line to the side but the planer stays on top all the time. Its up to you to select a bait/lure that dives to the depth you choose. As far as depth, its really no different than letting your line straight out the back. If your existing lure is running 10 ft deep with 50 ft of line out the back, it will still run 10 ft deep if you let 50 ft of line out before you connect to the side planer. It will just be way off to the side instead of out the back.

[TrackerPro16]

Got the #1 Dipsy Diver and tried it today. Report should be popping up soon. On the 'max' setting of 3.5 it really did not seem like it went off to the side all that much. Did not take the electric toys so it is hard to say for sure. I was just going by line angle. I did catch 3 fish though! The 'release' part did not 'pop' out on any of them even though I 'exercised' it a bunch before using it and had the adjustment screw backed completely off. Hard to say if it was a factor in the fish catching or if the bite was just 'on' . Might have done just as well without it. It certainly puts a LOT of weight on the line.