I am not anti braid. In fact I tend to use braid on one side and steel on the other because of the layout of the rigger mounts on my boat (pretty far forward) and I have a nasty tendency to turn a little tight at times in the nasty Sooke current. When on the kicker the main is down for use as a rudder and on occasion the rigger cable on that side will go up over and behind the prop and hang there. If it’s steel cable you bring up the main and lift it off with the boat hook. If it’s braid and gets anywhere near the sharp not running prop blades it cuts off.
Braid is stronger, wears better and lasts longer than steel but cuts easily. Braid is not effected by a bad boat electrical charge but neither does it gain from a good one as steel does. Braid adds more to blow back than steel.
For really deep fishing, steel is far better because it tends to be thinner than braid and because steel adds several pounds of weight which does make a difference for countering blowback when fishing really deep.
Certainly not anti regular speed riggers. I run them at times as well as the HP’s. I would say the reg speeds are a little more reliable but Scotty has been working hard on the HP design and have made some improvements over the first generation so I think it is very close now. The HP’s are less forgiving than the Reg’s. If you are not careful with the green button when you are past the stops and redo your connections on occasion you will lose balls as they put a lot more stress on the gear with all that power, especially if you jam the terminal rigger gear into the pulley.
I will sometimes put a HP on one side for me and a Reg speed on the other side for people not use to HP’s. If you are only fishing 20 to 65 feet or so there is not a lot of advantage to the HP unless you are in some high cost derby and the bite comes on for a short time, or you have a double header of large ones and want the riggers out of the way asap, then I guess every second counts.
I am out to the Scotty Factory frequently and they tell me that the reg speed rigger is designed for a max ball weight of 15lbs and the HP a max weight of 20 lbs. If you insist on going over spec. I think there is more leeway with the HP than there is with the Reg speed. In fact slowing the HP down a little makes it more user error forgiving. Sure you can put more weight on but the reg speed Scotty is a slug at 15 or more and slow at 10lbs, although if you use braid I guess you lose the extra weight of the cable which may help a little. Going heavy on a rigger not designed for it is going to cause excess wear and more frequent failures, the logic of that is inescapable. It does not mean you can’t do it.
Once you are use to the HP’s you won’t go back especially for fishing deep and there is not much difference in purchase cost. If your down 250 feet on a Reg speed you feel like you have time to go to the galley and make lunch but on the high speed you look up and its up. The only thing to be careful with is that HPs draw a lot more amps. I run duel batteries and a kicker with an 11 amp charging system and have never come close to having a problem.
