[BigLew]

Just a follow-up word on down riggers in general.

The cannonball weights of 8 to 12 pounds is only a small part of the story. Any significant deck space could handle that. Even with a 10 pound weight plus 6 inch base plus 24 inch rigger boom, the hanging of weight would only generate 80 foot pounds of torque. What really drives the forces up is the resistance of the down rigger line plus fishing line through the water.

One way to think of it is take 100 feet of line with a diameter of one tenth of an inch. Thats one square inch frontal surface area per 10 inches of line or 1.2 inches per foot. Now take a hundred feet of that line and that is almost one square foot. Now push one square foot through water at 3-7 knots. I think you see the point, it's a LOFP. Thats a Lot Of F_____ Pressure.

If you have your weights set at 30 to 100 feet of water, (and maybe more), that is going to generate a lot of resistance to that verticle line being pulled horizontally through the water resulting in hundreds of foot pounds of torque at the outter edge of the mounting base. I'm not sure I would even know how to calculate it, but it is a lot.

Therefore, the mounting bases really need to be mounted on substantial surfaces.