Drifting Speed Concern

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Blaugrana

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With my 228, I learned that with the full enclosures up and a little wind, my boat moves way too fast to properly drift for Fluke. I then removed the enclosures thinking it would help, but the hardtop still seems to cause an odd drifting direction and pace. Although there was a significant improvement after removing the enclosures, the drift was still annoying as all lines went out the back and not the side.

Has anyone encountered this? What did you do to compensate for this?

I am thinking about buying a drift sock to hang off my bow to adjust my drift a bit. Curious if there are any drift sock recommendations or what else some have done to address this.
 
I'm surprised that you can't stay somewhat sideways. I've not encountered that with hardtops and enclosures.
Other than cutting the wheel hard to the wind there's not much you can do.. You can raise the motor. It is the pivot point since its lowest in the water.
That will help but it will be in your way...unless you have a bracket, in which case it was already in your way ;)

I'm not a fan of the drift sock. Unless you make really long drifts...like miles...its a pain to pull in and put out
I have one from years ago. Tried seriously to use it fluking with my old 20 ft boat. The consensus on the boat was to nix it.

In a big wind we just go to heavier weights. sometimes use the engine in reverse to slow down
 
Im a fan of the drift sock in my 208 - yes it is a little bit of work, and sometimes you still need 8 oz, but it does make a little difference, and if it means catching opposed to not catching, Im all in
 
I definitely need to test out different factors before going with a drift sock. I was happy the difference that removing the enclosures made but now need to figure out how to drift sideways in my boat.

Saturday was the first day that I was able to stay in a drift for an extended period of time even with other boats around.

My plan is to try positioning the boat different ways with the wind, engine turned one way vs the other, etc

I’m not talking even about strong winds. Saturday was about 8-12WSW but still had our lines going off the back.
 
I built a drift sock with supplies from an army/navy store including a12’ parachute. Allowed me to mooch for Salmon and stay in the bait ball for extended periods. An added plus is being able to use a 1-2oz weight with lines up and down. Other boats fishing with me fly by me, fishing 5-6oz. Worth its weight in gold in my opinion.
 
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Cut the bow rail and put a trolling motor on lol
 
Two line drift socks are a lot easier to retrieve but a bit of a pain to deploy. The second line allows you to pull it ans collapse the chute making is easy to haul in.

If you are macho, I have seem 5 gallon pails used as drift socks. On a smaller hull they do work but are really hard to retrieve:)
 
I pull drift socks off the stern eyes for catfish to slow my wind driven drift. I have 3 different pairs of socks I have pulled in the past. I just bought another pair that have the dump cord and I can adjust how much water they catch. Hope to eliminate the multiple pairs and just use this one set. For Walleye in Lake Erie, I tie off to the front cleats and run big motor just bumped into gear, again 2 socks which helps control the bow from wandering. I don't fish off the side, always have the spread off the rear, so don't know if any of this will help. I also fish majority of the time with enclosure up and it does affect the speed, especially my wind driven drift for catfish on Santee.

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' Dump chord'.. I couldn't think of the name...
 
amamola said:
I definitely need to test out different factors before going with a drift sock. I was happy the difference that removing the enclosures made but now need to figure out how to drift sideways in my boat.

Saturday was the first day that I was able to stay in a drift for an extended period of time even with other boats around.

My plan is to try positioning the boat different ways with the wind, engine turned one way vs the other, etc

I’m not talking even about strong winds. Saturday was about 8-12WSW but still had our lines going off the back.
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At the Axel and SG reefs there can be a strong current running north or south that you don't see that messes with what you expect the wind drift to be.
 
Ky Grady said:
I pull drift socks off the stern eyes for catfish to slow my wind driven drift. I have 3 different pairs of socks I have pulled in the past. I just bought another pair that have the dump cord and I can adjust how much water they catch. Hope to eliminate the multiple pairs and just use this one set. For Walleye in Lake Erie, I tie off to the front cleats and run big motor just bumped into gear, again 2 socks which helps control the bow from wandering. I don't fish off the side, always have the spread off the rear, so don't know if any of this will help. I also fish majority of the time with enclosure up and it does affect the speed, especially my wind driven drift for catfish on Santee.

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Thats some assortment there. What’s the size of each of them and impact they have on your drift?
 
I'll have to measure later, had the 3 sets for ever, used on my previous boats before the 228. The blues laying on the ground are 6 footers with dump cord, just bought them, handmade down in South Carolina, they have 10 footers also, but to big for my needs. Haven't used them yet, fall fishing trip in October will be first use. I'll have my others in the truck just incase I can't figure out the settings for the opening on these. Little bit of a learning curve with these, the others, you just throw them in and go, no adjustment. Size I use really depends on the wind. Harder it's blowing, bigger socks. A light breeze, I have a harness made up to pull a single, dead center, to keep the boat straight.

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Do you get the socks down to a specific depth? The reason I ask is an old fisherman uses a drogue but gets it down about 50 feet. He says he catches more halibut using the drogue.
 
No Bail said:
Do you get the socks down to a specific depth? The reason I ask is an old fisherman uses a drogue but gets it down about 50 feet. He says he catches more halibut using the drogue.
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No, all of mine have a float and a weight sewn in opposite of each other to help open them up. They will sometimes sink down a little, but for the most part, they will stay just under the surface. Length of rope dictates how far down they go also. For what I do, I need to be able to see them in order to bring the fish in around them. If they were deeper, I'd be tangled up in the rope trying to land the fish.

If you look at this pic, you can just see one of the blues behind the boat, right side of the motor.

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Sorry to state the obvious but have you turned the wheel all the way one way or another? My solution is a 9.9 kicker with a tiller so I have ultimate drift control and also do a lot of slow trolling if the wind and tide really dies.
 
Yep...tried that. Part of me think it’s the combination of wind direction and tide I am fishing at....today was the best yet with me doing the usual, But the lines went more to the side...still going to the stern but at least I could say they were off the port side
 
My 226 drifts straight bow down-wind under all conditions. It's a characteristic of the SV2 hull although the cabin is also a factor. I use a single drift sock with a dump line to get down to 1 mph under most conditions where I would still want to be out fishing.

It's funny, but the old style hulls would drift sideways very nicely and are great for drifting for fluke, etc. I got my first 1975 204 specifically for drifting the Race at the end of Long Island Sound. That hull along with Whalers and Thunderbird tri-hulls were just about the only ones that would reliably drift sideways in the current.
 
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