I know there have been several pictures of a hell-pet rig posted here.
I would suggest that you use a reel that does not disengage the level wind while casting or free spooling, this will allow you to count the number of times the level wind moves across the face of the reel and easily gauge the depth that you are running the lure.
Some folks use a Norman DD-22 in place of the Hell Bender.
These seem to be a bit less expensive:
http://www.moestackleshop.com/estore/details/4039

I tried that Hell-Pet once,I must have dragged a 10 in sand bass a mile,never knew it was on

And I've had plenty of slabbers jump right in the middle of my trolling lane after catching some fish. respect works both ways.

as for the trolling, rattle traps, shad raps and hell pets all work well for me.

If you set the drag loose and use a clicker when you get a hit it will pull drag and you will hear it. It is great to troll when you are by yourself.

I troll a lot in the middle of the day when the bite slows down. Any baitcaster will work, but a faster retrieve reel doesn't work you as much as a slower reel. I usually troll in 9-13 ft. of water and try to hit bottom occasionally. Rebel Deep Wee-R's in silver w/ black backs work best for me. The Bill Norman cranks that are rated 7- 14 ft (there are several sizes) also work. It is easier to stop and reel in when someone catches a fish. Oftentimes, the person reeling in will catch a fish,too. I catch whites, blacks, and an occasional crappie and cat.

Almost time for the famed hell/pet to make its annual appearance. Last summer i waited till the first of August to use looks like I'll be using it a lot earlier this summer.

WOW! A couple of hundred yards? That,s 600 feet. That's a bit extreme I think. Most everything I read on here folks feel that you should fish any closer than 50 feet from another boat. Trolling is done at such a slow speed that 50 feet is plenty of distance between you and an anchored fisherman. Especially if your in open water.

Use the whole quote if you are going to respond to something. Go back and READ you will see he gave her good advice.

Tex

If you troll around me, make sure you are at least 500 yards away from my boat. Anything inside of 500 yards is too close. I don't know where you read that 50' is a good distance, but that is way too close. BTW, unless you are up the river, you can only catch sandbass in open water, other than that you'd be on land

Just like there are some slabbers that don't have a clue what they are doing, there are trollers that don't have a clue what they are doing. If a slabber jumps in the middle of a spot you just trolled through, that person needs to go back to the drawing board and figure some things out. However, I have seen "lack of respect", as you call it, from both trollers and slabbers. It comes down to the nature of the person, not how they prefer to fish

Tex - not sure how or why it's any of your concern whether I use all or part of a quote. If my response pertains to only a piece of the post I typically only include that part so anyone reading it doesn't have to sort through a lot of irrellevant information. If they want the whole post they can go back and read it. You'll find that this is pretty common practice on this and many other forums. I'm sorry if it bugs you.

At your request I went back and reREAD the post (I had READ it more that once already) and I don't see that he gave any advice other than to stay at least 200 yard from anchored boats. The rest of the post was his story of an event that had happened to him. And as I stated in my post there's no need to give 600 feet to an anchored boat. 50 feet is ample at trolling speed.

SoonerDG looks like I made it my concern do you have a problem with that? If you read he gave her good advice about the hell-pet rig and set up.


Tex

To troll or to slab all have the same goal catch fish.


Tex

Happy Fishing.

Actually, yes I do have a problem with it. I'll PM you about that as the open forum is not the place for that discussion. As for the advice, only one poster mentioned the Hell-pet rig. It was BigDad. My response was to the post made by ringer1 regarding staying a couple of hundred yards from an anchored boat. (Hint: when you quote another post it shows the original poster in the grey box above the quote. You'll note the the gray box in my quote says "Originally Posted by: ringer1". This helps folks go back to find the original post.) I never mentioned anything about the hell-pet rig. I don't have any idea whether it works or not as I've not tried it. I've only just started targeting sandbass and was reading through these threads for advice. I happened to find something that I disagreed with so I posted a reply. Maybe you need to go back and READ the thread again to make sure you know what you're talking about before you make a post. Especially a challenging one.