DOWNRIGGERS AND WALLEYE

This was the year I was going to concentrate on learning the ins and outs of trolling for walleye.  Outfitted my reels with leadcore, printed dive curves of dipseys and the lures I use, and just trying to get the whole hang of this thing.  Results have been ok.  Not tons of eyes, but i've never needed alot of fish to keep me happy, catching enough though that I want to be out there trolling every day.  I have yet to catch a walleye on my downriggers.  Usually running shallow divers, spoons, and meat on the riggers, but just pick up alot of panfish and junk,  everything but an eye.  Ready to bag even putting out the riggers, buy my buddy swears by them.  I haven't seen it, not even on his boat when we're out trolling.  Is there anyone out there that is successful with catching walleye on downriggers?  If so, could you offer some tips?  Thanks.

Always keep your baits above the fish. Take into account that the lure you're using will dive to a certain depth and add that to the total depth of your downrigger placement depth. Example: fish are marked at 22ft. Using a shallow diving crank that goes down to 3 or 5 feet. Set your rigger at 16ft if there's not a lot of current. With a lot of drawback, you will have to set it deeper as it will ride higher in the water column. Or use a heavier ball.

Bogey likes to get them WAY back, lol  my arm was sore after reelin' in a couple pig eyes...

dang fresh, if you're running deep divers like the 800s off of a downrigger, your releases must be really tight!

Back in the hay days,I did way better on dipsy's set on 3 150-175 back and ran boards a lot with wire and mono) You can't go by my numbers because you have to get the bait (lure a the depth the fish are) I really did well on riggers at the end on the season,I put the ball down right on the bottom and run them any where from 30- 75 foot back and drag spoons .Also ran a three ways with a deep driver on the bottom(5 foot lead) and a light flutter spoon on top with a 3 foot lead flat lining or off the boards. One other deadly trick is a slider off the rigger,use a good quality snap 5 foot lead and a lighter spoon or I guess a harness with meat would work,set your rigger at the depth you want,snap the slider to your rigger line,it will find the belly of your rigger rod. say you set your rigger at 50- 60 feet the slider will run 25-30 down,only draw back is the (sometimes tangle at net time,but it does put exta eyes in the box. There is not a method of deep water eye or salmon fishing I have not done. One of the wildest things was the 1 lb drop ball release at Olcott. The big lake has several of my 1lb lead ball on bottom.lol