tackle questions

Ok so im still a bit hesitant of mounting a downrigger on my yak and i have a few deep six divers and my question  is how hard are divers to use in a yak?  Gonna try to use them for black mouth in the sound this spring and summer and maybe use the small one in lakes if i need to be deep for kokes. 

Redfish,

You are thinking along the right lines in my opinion. There will be drag no matter what you use; but some more than others. I just cant see myself using a downrigger on a kayak. There's just too many other things already happening on deck. One thing is I notice you have a Prowler so paddling will come into play more-so on one side of your kayak to stay straight. You should also consider a rudder if you don't have one already to help with this. To this day, I have resisted the urge to put a rudder on my Trident. I wanted to be absolutely certain I needed it, and except for trolling, I'm fine without one. Even then I've got by without it.

The divers themselves are about as simple as it gets. I would also consider using leaded line. To me that is the most optimal for my needs- especially for a kayak.

Erik

I have a Scotty Laketroller downrigger mounted on my 13' Trident, which doesn't have a rudder.  I have positioned the downrigger so the pulley and cable are only an inch or so from the side of my kayak.  The downrigger doesn't affect the steering of the Trident.  I don't need to paddle harder on the side on which the downrigger is located.

Divers, leaded line, and downriggers will all get your lure deeper than longline trolling with standard line.  When using divers and leaded line, you don't know how deep your lure is running.  An advantage of using a downrigger is that you can see the ball on your fish finder, and thus can accurately position your lure where ever you want with respect to the bottom and suspended fish.

Redfish,

You are thinking along the right lines in my opinion. There will be drag no matter what you use; but some more than others. I just cant see myself using a downrigger on a kayak. There's just too many other things already happening on deck. One thing is I notice you have a Prowler so paddling will come into play more-so on one side of your kayak to stay straight. You should also consider a rudder if you don't have one already to help with this. To this day, I have resisted the urge to put a rudder on my Trident. I wanted to be absolutely certain I needed it, and except for trolling, I'm fine without one. Even then I've got by without it.

The divers themselves are about as simple as it gets. I would also consider using leaded line. To me that is the most optimal for my needs- especially for a kayak.

Erik

+1  Simple is better. I've evolved from DR, to divers, to leadcore. Now I have 5 reels setup with leadcore from 18# to 27# and catch everything; Kokes, all trout species and all salmon on some type of leadcore setup. The only time I miss my DR is very deep trolling for Coho or Blackmouth (60+ feet and >2mph). I don't miss the extra gear on the deck.

I love my downrigger...I use a modified "pmmpete's cupholder" mount on a Scotty 1050 with a shortened boom. It's accessible and easy to use...installs and removes in seconds and it's not in my way, doesn't take up much space (the Outback has two cup holders so there's still a spot for my beer) and requires no gymnastics to operate. oh yeah, the best part is I can use pretty much any rod I want with my downrigger...I can go from deep trolling to shallow trolling to drop-shotting in seconds...with the same rod.