Hole-cutters are marvelous tools - indispensable for mounting gauges. But what do you do when you need to make a just a bit larger? We saw this tip in the August 2006 issue of Boating Magazine: Simply use two hole cutters on your mandrel. Mount the larger one first, then add another cutter that is the same diameter as the existing hole. The inner cutter will keep the outer cutter centered.

May, June and July saw a couple of magazines ( Big Game Fishing Journal, Pacific Coast Sportfishing) feature articles on making a small boat fish better offshore. We were excited, to say the least, until we read the articles.

They were great issues, but we forgot that to most people, a "small" offshore boat is 21'. Sheesh...

Still, there was some good info in the articles, although many of the points have already been discussed here. We recommend that you take a look at the May/June 2006 issue of BG Fishing Journal, and the July 2006 issue of PCS. Some of the more interesting points:

Big Game Journal, May/June 2006:

"Making Your Small Boat Fish Big" by Captain Jim Freda,
Captain Freda adjusts his speed "by ear". That is - when he finds a speed where he is getting strikes, he adjusts his speed to reproduce the sound of the motor, rather than trying to match a tach or throttle setting.

"8 Steps to Make Your Boat Bigger" by Captain Tred Barta
Capt. Barta is a controversial character, to say the least. A lot of people disagree with what he has to say. But he had one bit of philosophical advice in this article that I really liked: "Success in bluewater fishing is all about believing in yourself and not changing techniques like your underwear."

Pacific Coast Sportfishing, July 2006

"Tricked Out Trailerables" by Bill DePriest
A number of points already covered here, such as outriggers/downriggers, more rod holders, larger bait tank. One nice touch was a set of tuna tubes for the transom of the boat, fabricated from PVC pipe and plumbed into the livewell system. A nice touch for a billfisherman. The author also replaced his ice chest with a soft-sided kill bag, which he felt was easier to clean out, and more convenient to store.

Do you have reels with graphite sideplates that are looking a bit faded from the sun? Try wiping them down with a rag with WD-40. The WD-40 restores the color. This tip came from the folks at Shimano.

Took a solo trip out to the 302 bank, which is around 35 miles offshore from San Diego. Weather was fine, only a light SW breeze, high overcast, but the swell was up: 4-5 feet, 9 second period. A good rough water test.

The engine ran fine for the most part, but the "Low Oil" alarm started going off occasionally. We couldn't consistently reproduce the problem. Sometimes it happened hitting the bottom of a swell, other times it happened when the boat rolled slightly to starboard when going over a big swell. Sunset Marine said to bring it it for a look. It will be a warranty repair. Recall that this problem appeared a while back, and seemed to disappear after a software update. But this was the first time we had been out in pretty rough water in a since the update. Disappointing, but they suspect a faulty pressure sensor.

The Simrad AP12R worked fine all day. We had it on most of the day (we ran a total of around 83 miles) without a problem. We did take it out of Auto mode whenever we hooked a fish (see notes in our autopilot article).

Fishing was slow on the 302, so we headed back in and fished the Coronados. The bonito were hungry! Dragging a green/gold Yo-zuri Hydromag was almost a guaranteed hit within 5 minutes. The fish were all fairly large, too - the smallest was 6 lbs, the largest 8 lbs. Tried fishing on the fly, with slim results (2 fish, although the largest of the day was on the fly). For some reason we could not get the fish to stay up on top, even chumming with live anchovies and a frozen chum bucket. This fish hit a small green/white FPF fly, fished deep on a leadcore shooting head.

WD-40 "No Mess Pen" WD-40 has been a standard lubricant for fishermen for decades. We recently ran into this applicator pen at a local Home Depot store. It's turned out to be a handy way to lube things without the mess of using the traditional spray can or hand sprayer. For more info, click HERE for the WD-40 website.

Made a trip out of Mission Bay to test the motor and AP, and sneak in some fishing. Total trip distance: 73.7 miles The motor ran fine, 18.1 gallons of gas used (4.1 MPG), approx. 1 quart oil (72:1 gas:oil ratio). No idling issues.

Got a bit of a scare in the morning when we first tried to start the motor - it took 3 tries to start the motor. At first, we thought it was an engine problem, then we realized we had forgotten to prime the fuel line. So. . . in fact, the engine managed to prime itself and start after three tries. After that, the engine started immediately every time.

The Simrad AP12R autopilot did not malfunction, despite being on all day. We thought we noticed a bit of a drift to port when in auto mode, but nothing we would swear to. Oh well, maybe next time.

The fishing was good for small-to-keeper size Pacific barracuda, but not much else. We used the Butterfly jigs to can a few, used our fly rod for the rest. We also hooked what we suspect was a Black Sea Bass on the Butterfly jig, but we managed to pull the hook(s) out after about 15 minutes. One of the downsides of 50lb test Spectra.

When we got home, we removed the fuel-water seperator filter to check things out. No water in the fuel, and the filter top was bright metal, no rust. We did see a small amount of pale sediment when we emptied the filter into a bowl. We think is normal fuel crud, but we'll go by Sunset Marine to have them confirm it's OK.