I am looking for a little help from other crawler harness fishermen. I fish Green Bay quite a bit for walleye, most often using crawler harness and the northland quick change blade clevis http://www.northlandtackle.com/Category/main.taf?cat=116 . As many of you already know, there are days a certain color well out performs other colors, and I like the versatility of the quick change clevis.

However, I have been loosing a lot of blades, at about $1 a piece, from fish. If you hook into a big sheephead or catfish, they do some serious trashing and about half the time when I get the fish in the net, my blade is gone. Is there a better product you have found to work that does not loose blades easily? I know if I go to the non-quick change clevis I will be good to go, but I loose the versatility. Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

Those are not the ideal quick change clevis you want you want the ones with the little downward nipple in them. mytacklebox.com has them under spinner components, once you see the picture you will see the different in them from what you posted a link to. Not to say you won't ever lose a blade but you won't loose to many. Last year spinner fishing about 50 days on the water just harness fishing I lost maybe 5 blades all year. I added a pic

these northland tackle ones are the ones to get. those that you showed have lost me alot of blades.
http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_77704_100010012_100000000_100010000_100-10-12

these northland tackle ones are the ones to get. those that you showed have lost me alot of blades.
http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_77704_100010012_100000000_100010000_100-10-12

I accidentall purchased those and once you get a blade on they won't come off, not enough gap, there are a couple different sizes though, I think on the Stamina or Jann's website they have a sizing chart based on the blade size.

I think the quick change clevises are over rated. I use the folded clevis, takes about 30 seconds or less to change the blade. You will NEVER lose a blade. The blade will spin better with the folded clevis at lower speeds the whole spinner will perform better. While fishing Green Bay a couple of years ago we were losing blades pretty often (size 5 -7). After talking to several of the local walleye guys who told us about not using the quick change clevises with larger blades we switched over to the folded ones and never lost a single blade. Even at home on Bull Shoals using #3-#5 blades the folded clevis works better. I think some times we get caught up in trying to fix something that ain't broke. The quick change clevis sounds good, but in reality the old folded clevis really performs better and costs less. IMHO.

i use those small ones i posted. i run from #5 to #8 blades and it can be tought to swap out a blade at times ( just bend the tab replace the blade then bend it back). when a blade color gets dialed in for the day, i can swap most of the rods to said blade and back fishing quite quickly. or when a harness gets frayed a quick snap and i put that blade onto another harness and back fishing. that's what works for me.

Some up in your neighborhood use BPS Quick Change Clevis - Model QC8 Brass clevis.

How does the BPS brass clevis work? I can't tell from the photo, but it appears you would need to string the clevis to the end of your line to make a change. Am I missing something?

It hasn't been brought up yet...Make sure that the blade is far enough from the front hook or the fish will knock the blade off when they strike it.

We use the QC clevises from Cabelas. The nice thing about QC's is that you can tie up a bunch of harnesses and store them without the blades. Then choose the blade you want when you use them. You should always check the clevis when you put the blade on as occassionlly the clevis will be backwards (too many beers while tying). We lose a few blades each year but not many. I think they sometimes pull off when a fish is thrashing around in the net since I sometimes get lucky and find them on the floor of the boat.

How does the BPS brass clevis work? I can't tell from the photo, but it appears you would need to string the clevis to the end of your line to make a change. Am I missing something?

My buddy got some of those brass ones, not worth it whatsoever.

Over the years, I have used both - and, yes, the previous quick change clevises I used did cost me quite a few blades. Granted, the folded metal clevis "probably" gives a better spin, however, I have personally found that being able to change out a blade in a matter of seconds overrides the better spin of a metal clevis. So this winter, I changed out all my metal clevis spinners to quick change. The one's I personally use are these from Lure Parts Online from Stamina:
http://lurepartsonline.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=237
Citing only personal experience, these work beautifully and I haven't lost a blade since changing to them.

I don't remember what kind of quick change clevis I use but i have not lost a single blade yet. The thing is to space it far enough from the hooks. I often have floats on my spinner rigs and on some days they just hammer the rigs with plain floats so that's when i take the blades off so it's convenient to have the quick change clevis. Some days early in the morning they will hammer a certain colored blade then the bite will die off till I swap out to a diff colored blade and the bite comes back. It's alot easier to use the quick change clevis, at least in my experience. When I and my buddy started tying rigs, he swore on those metal clevises. That was until he realized the inconvenience of trying to swap out blades and started to use the quick change although he called them "ugly" but whatever works.

http://www.hagensfish.com/2008catalog/10596Hagens81-88.pdf
The Clev'r clip. Best of both worlds. Metal quick change clevis. One of the best as far as I am concerned. I also agree with Walleye Hunter's advice.

Find one that works for you and use them. The biggest reason to use the quick change clevis on harness rigs is not versatility. The biggest reason is get the blades away from the harness while they are stored. Those blades, bouncing and flying around in storage batter the heck out of your harnesses and sometimes the line gets "nicked". A damaged harness and a big fish mean no fish. Best rule of thuimb is to never store a harness with a blade attached.

Hey Texeye
How have you been? Have you ever lost any big blades on that clevis and how are they for line wear. Look pretty cool.
Gary Parsons

I've been trying to wear that boat out. Lately it has been pulling to the north so I might just go with it. :)

As far as the clevis is concerned, I haven't run too many big blades on them so can't answer to that but I have no problem with the #3 and#4 blades. I like how easy it is to change a blade and how freely they spin. In our reservoirs your spinners take a beating but I have used them for three or four years now and that is all I use. I mostly run them on #14 fluorocarbon. They are stouter than they look and wear is the same as a folded clevis.