With winter soon setting in and spring around the corner, lipless crank season will soon be upon us. For those of you that like lipless cranks what are your favorites? What setup or setups do you throw them with?
-Jackall TN
-Lucky Craft LV
-Xcalibur XR and XRK
-Daiwa TD vibration
I keep my colors pretty simple. Gold/black, Chrome blue, and Rayburn red or Rayburn gold.
My set up of choice is a Custom built MHX MBR 843 and a TD Fuego with 12 pound mono.
Almost all my lipless of 5/8-1 oz are either on a custom MHX CB907/braid + leader or Phenix Gen 1 Ultra MBX Classic 707MHF with co-poly.
For 1/2 - 3/4 oz, I like my Evergreen Heracles EG Swimmer 72MH Mod-fast with braid/leader.
Lighter 3/8 - 1/2 I toss with my custom GLoomis CB845/braid + leader or co-poly/fluoro on an older Evola 7'0" MF baitcast rod (with the gold cermet guides), that fishes very much like an MBR 842.5 if that power existed with GLoomis.
Reels are an OG PE Zillion, Z2020H, TD-Ito, Steez Limited with 7.9:1 brass gears, and this year I added the Steez A 7.1:1 LH, which has been a very versatile reel for lipless, topwaters and jigs/plastics.
BTW, my favs are still the OG Excalibur XR and XKR. I do well with the current Yozuri, although the OG Hardcore Vibe was a better bait.
Red Eye shads are good performers for the cost, and I want to try the Aruku Shad this spring as I hear it performs very well.
FWIW, my biggest bass ever, a Cal Delta water fed pond fish, came on a 3/4 oz Bill Lewis Rattle Trap with all chartreuse body, black back and the blue eyes with black spot around it.
The jackall TN was not on my radar til one day a guy was on my boat using it.
He was calling his shots.
it is now a permanent on my boat with a few in storage. Probably the baddest cold water trap I know
LV500 is one I throw whenever I'm out. If they made it in a silent variation, take my money.
XX EMTF is responsible for slinging it out.
LV500 is one I throw whenever I'm out. If they made it in a silent variation, take my money.
XX EMTF is responsible for slinging it out.
I’m using an X7 Extreme mission and IP79 combo
Lipless Cranks along with spinnerbaits and cranks have not been my first choice to fish any of my local lakes since I moved to SoCal. I am just having a hard time to gain confidence in these patterns when fishing these deep crystal clear reservoirs when I know other patterns will work fairly consistantly. However, the plan is to throw em more often and gain confidence in them this winter season since everybody right now is either chasing trout or slinging Milfs and Hinkles at the lake. Weapons of choice are in my case the Raid Japan Level Vibs in all 4 versions just to have different options. ( the regular, counter, silent and big) and a few MB Vibration X. All baits will be thrown on the Gladiator 611 Transporter and the Gladiator 610 Skywalker both paired with a SV light ltd TN
LV500 is one I throw whenever I'm out. If they made it in a silent variation, take my money.
XX EMTF is responsible for slinging it out.
I’m using an X7 Extreme mission and IP79 combo
Have you kept the original IP spool? I had an IP68L with ZPI bearings and the casting performance with the stock spool was just, good, but not special or on the same plane as the other Zillion Limited edition spools. I feel the standard 50th spool and 100HSA spool with same upgraded bearings did better with 5/8 oz Lipless and 100 sized walking baits.
Otherwise, I really loved that IP68L.