J-Doc

I do and I use my factory Interstate batteries. No problems and I can troll 2.5mph all day if I want. 24v so two batteries.

It's a highly pressured lake and tons of boat traffic. It's often a mystery on weekends. You usually fish during the week. It's better when there is less pressure.

I want a way to add a GPS puck to my Terrova. Then it would do anything I wanted out of it.

I appreciate that. Hope the 188 has met your expectations and surprised you to perform better than you thought it would. Mine has.

Sorry. I meant "one" and must have mistyped and phone changed word. Fat finger syndrome.

Yep. I put a picture of a Flicker shad on it. Works every time.

I trolled iPhone about 10" once. Totally surprised me.

A) welcome back B ) I'm jealous C) Sounds like a great morning to me

There is no way to fix or upgrade the older Terrova or add an additional external GPS puck or anything right? You just have to buy a while new trolling motor right?

You sir are going to cost me money talking like that. I also have an RT188. And thst is precisely what i want. Accuracy in a 20mph wind. What shaft length did you get?

Being an online researcher......i feel your pain. Learned my lesson. Don't rely on individual reviews. Take the consensus and treat it as gospel. The average is the majority usually. There's always extremes in any product or experience. You NEED to experience both brands in person in a similar application. See if your dealer can set you up with a rest drive using one of each or similar motors. After I got mine, I was not all that impressed and had buyer remorse. I mainly wanted the GPS accuracy and mine won't even stay on a recorded track accurately.

I would trade a 1yr old Fortrex and a 2yr old Terrova in on an Ultrex if I thought it would work. But I honestly do not want to spend anymore money on my rig. I don't use it often enough to justify it and I know it's not going to be a "fish catcher". It's just going to make me happier about sitting in one spot. One less excuse I can use for not catching them.

I would say that is substantially better than mine then. I can't stay within 5ft on a calm day under 5mph winds.

How accurate is the spot lock feature? My Terrova will roam around generally a 10-20ft radius, not the 5ft it is advertised with. I've researched and spoken to Minn Kota about my issues and they just want me to ship it to them. They say the unit needs to be as far away from ferrous metal as possible. Hey dudes.......the trolling motor mount use ferrous metal! So mine is most accurate when I raise the shaft to get the head as far away from the mount as possible. But I have a 48" shaft (that's what my Fortrex was) and so I cannot get it very high or it's out of the water when I stand on the back deck or in choppy water. If I had a 60" shaft, "maybe" I could get a 10ft tight radius. My boat hull is shallow and is very susceptible to wind drift so that's another factor. The trolling motor tends to over-correct.

I'm telling ya, if go look at an Xi5 in a saltwater series if in were you. The spot lock and tracking ability is much better than Terrova. My Terrova wonders and roams often. Accuracy is 5 times better on Motorguide from everything I've read. Hate that in had to be stubborn and stuck with my preference of Minnkota over Motorguide.

Oh okay I read it backwards. Mono is out producing braid. That confirms my suspicion about vibration transfer of boat noise. If using rod holders, the boat could transfer all sorts of noise through the braided line. I once got in my pool to see how loud jig rattles are u see water, spin website blades, crankbaits, etc. While I know I looked like a lunatic, I was amazed at how loud the sounds were underwater. Magnified noise because water is denser than air. No, I would not waste time adding a leader. Some do when using lead core line for trolling which is a definite yes and absolute necessity. At least a 20-30ft leader on lead core but I have never used it.

3 to 1 should tell you a few things. Eliminate variables. Color of bait? Size bait? Different hooks? Both use same connection to bait (one used a barrel swivel one did not)? Etc. If truly same setup at the bait, eliminate rod action being different. Is one lighter than the other in bait action? Minor difference but could impact action of bait and vibration bait gives off slightly. Just enough to make a difference. Probably not but worth considering. Mono floats, braid sinks some when wet so not apples to apples. My guess is braid is out performing mono because it's diving deeper and possibly has better action. Mono stretches so the rod action is more subtle when it's 100ft + behind a boat vs braid doesn't matter. Same at 5ft or 150ft (roughly speaking). Switch to flourocarbon and that "should" improve further over braid and mono as well. Remember stretching to tin cans together with a string tied between them and talking to each other as a kid? Braid does the same thing. I've heard jig rattles before when using 10lb braid. All that boat noise, talking, etc can transfer some limited vibration back to your bait and in the water.

I get 3-4 wot. And like 6-8 between 30-40. But I've got almost half the motor. And I'm impressed my Merc gets that good really. So you're doing pretty well with that motor on that rig. You should get an integrated monitor that gives you engine hours, actual rpm, mpg, etc with all that money you're burning. Lol. It's a really nice feature. Wish I had one.

Considering you have the boat I'll probably get next time......i have boat envy. Lol Can't wait for an outing. Especially a striper run. I'll even throw the net if you want.

Oh and a rig that big, I'd get the 112lb trolling motor for sure without blinking. Not that you need the power (you kinda do) but it's so you can run at less power to drain batteries slower. The new Ultrex is supposed to be better than Terrova on spot lock. I would investigate that thoroughly before buying one. Otherwise I'd say try Motorguide because of having better spot lock capacity only. Not durability.

This beast needs a bimini with rod holders. Very curious how it rides. You'll have to show me one day. My advice on the break-in is to fill it up with gas and follow the manual to the letter. Then launch at PC, drive to the dam and back and then down to 412 bridge and back. That's what I did. I did all that in a day on one tank of gas and took breaks in between to let the motor cool down and have intermittent usage. I knocked out several hours in that one day's trip and fished a little along the way.

Sounds like a good trip to me. I haven't caught anything on a RR in a few years now so I stopped throwing them. Never know what you'll catch on them when they produce.

Based on the depth you are at, I'd say a mix of baitfish. Could be juvenile gizard shad or threadfin. Looks more like gizard because threadfin are usually 3" in length. Gizard can get up to the length of a 20oz bottle of soda.

Sounds like a good Dad to me.

Yeah he just wants to be a little kid and play. Which is normal. One thing I wish I had done was taken some toys as a back up plan. Or something to help occupy his mind a little longer. You really have to put kids on fish That a re literally almost every cast to get them hooked on it. I did that at a pond and it helped.