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I nearly always used a 13mm or a 15mm with a size 4 although now I'm a home roller they seem to vary in size so will use a size 4 for whatever size I pull out the tub 😂 I use a size 4 trig hammer xt btw which is a pretty big hook. I wouldn't worry mate will be fine.

" On a side note, I read in this thread about yellows for commons. Well, I nearly always fished yellows as my hi viz hookbait and nearly always caught mirrors. " Well that's blown that theory then , emmcee , Just don't tell Kev. as he's after a big Common ! . 😁

When i first started out carp fishing i met a bloke on a lake i fished in the Colne valley. If I recall, it was before the hi viz hookbaits were all the rage was about but they were starting to appear more and more in the shops. Anyway, this bloke was a margin fisher, made his own bait but all in pellet shape. His hookbait though was always a hi viz pellet so he could see it better in the margin. He'd catch a few fish but he saw that the hi viz hookbait would be ignored mostly when one or two carp were on his spot but readily taken when 3 or more were feeding. I think most would agree that carp are easier to catch when they are competing with each other. He wanted to catch though when they weren't competing. One day i watched him bait a spot with his homemade pellet and slip in a hi viz one as well, the difference being the hi viz one was a freebie and his hookbait was a match the hatch (clever angling I thought to myself). His catch rate more or less trebled by making that change. When he couldn't get a margin swim he'd fish pva bags in open water and fill the bag with his pellet and one "decoy " hi viz pellet and he caught plenty. On a side note, I read in this thread about yellows for commons. Well, I nearly always fished yellows as my hi viz hookbait and nearly always caught mirrors.

Over thinking imo. Crack on. Personally prefer bigger baits but I have used PJPU 13mm with size 4s in the past and caught, on a fairly tricky water too.

Hi, Is a size 4 Korda Choddy hook on a hinge rig too big for a 14mm pop up? There's no issues with the pop ups I'd like to use, they're super buoyant. I've previously fished this rig with a 16mm hook baits so using these 14mm ers makes the hook looks a bit too big! Am I overthinking this and the set up I intend to use is good to whack out in the pond? Thanks

No one ever said it was? So not quite sure what your entire point is. also to answer point 2. The big common from a club pit has been caught on SHB multiple times over. It’s a club ticket. Plenty of day ticket and easily accessible venues amongst the catches. Can’t understand the point you are trying to make about venues tbh. Makes no odds on if they are effective or not. People might look at the fish and go “I’d love to catch that I’ll try get a ticket”. But no one goes “SHB is catching those fish, I’ll get a ticket so I can use it on that venue”

It's easy to make a food bait, you just need to look deeper. Put just one in the right spot as in 'patrol' route, natural food bed, it gives the signals, you get an investigation. SHB have a winning formula, I've already stated I had good success with one type, this was fished solo too, I'm impressed, however the other 2 I tried produced jack [censored], in the same spots. Such is life. I have knowledge of great attraction ingredients, no boasting, you all can find them if you think about it.

Ok slightly different way to play it then go to your bank and ask them to do a charge back to your card give them the reason and they may well refund you and take it up with NGT afterwards. or let them have it on their instaxfacebook page….

Just my thoughts, didn't realise this thread was started so long ago and now has sparked to life again! As for the 'company' involved: 1. Can't deny any of the carp pics posted elsewhereare very impressive. 2. Are those venues actually available to the 'average' angler?... I very much dought it 3. Can you question the blokes comittment in early days? Deff not as I believe he had some great catches from the Thames. 4. He provided some valuable 'insights' into tiger nut, maize and other stuff preparation. However, should a certain company appear to have so much influence, on say, another forum? I don't think so. It appears this company are now planning to ditch the web site in the coming months and sell direct to shops instead, probably an economic consideration? Anyway, just my personal view.... I don't need to say this to the long standing members on here, but no one will convince me a so called wonder bait will ever be replacement for location and hard work on any venue, Sorry, mini rant over 👍

To answer both questions at the same time. @framey Yes purchased directly from them, I believe shipped direct ex factory. @elmoputney When I buy bulk spools of line I normally expect it to have 2 ends not 4. Funnily enough this happened once with Berkeley who instantly refunded me and despatched a replacement which I took to be great service. When I tried to bring attention to this latest problem I first went to the contact us section of the website and the way the page behaved when I hit send just felt as if nothing had happened so after 5 days without any response or acknowledgement I emailed direct from my email and again after a week still no response, Last attempts via phone with full mailbox constant response has soured my opinion with the company. Cheers Ian

Targeted ads, I'm quite tempted by the cat!Although I can't see any l8nk on how to get my hands on it??? Weird

Why do you want to complain about the line?

Did you buy direct from them ?

Still unable to get through to NGT by phone or email. Trying to get a reason to go down that way and knock on the door. (Or maybe trading standards might concentrate their minds on communicating with people that have paid them for things). Cheers Ian

yep, got my account banned on there during the scamdemic time, though i had no interest in shb at that time, i remember him really having a go at peeps big time for not getting jabbed, quite a few got banned for being so called conspirloons ..fast forward today and the truth is finally coming out, even in the msm.....

Yep that does it. Think it was crayfish meal so same thing. Very light ingredient! to be fair they good alternative ingredients to make pop ups with basemix! Take some testing on inclusion levels though.

It will almost certainly be krill/shrimp meal. I've heard a few cases of this. Very buoyant stuff!

I think, it will all depend on the base mix ingredients. a one egg mix rather than a bigger mix could easily determine that for you. Looks like nick has said the same lol 👍👍

And that's what catches, confidence in the bait. Do I use SHB? No, not because they don't work, simply I have confidence in my homemade Garlic Spice thingamajigs. There are others I use, again I have confidence in them, RH Monster Crab and Fluoro Yellow Nutty Bait. Annoyingly others I really rated are no longer made, or have changed. @greekskii mentioned Lego heads, I have used plastic corn over Vitalin and had 6 carp within an hour, although I no longer use plastic baits.

That's where I used 50% base mix and 50% sodium caseinate to have a matching pop-up to the base mix. The base mixes I used that ratio with were New Concepts Mariner mix and Nutrabaits The Biollix, which were both fairly heavy base mixes. Usual procedure was make a 4egg mix of normal baits. While the base mix was out I would put around 1eggs worth of powder to one side for the bit for pop-ups and I would sieve the base mix to get rid of larger lumps and then add the same amount volume of sodium caseinate. So if I had 1 measuring cup of base mix, I would add 1 cup of caseinate. One egg in a bowl, add the required flavours/liquids if using any at 1/4 of what 4eggs took then mix as per normal. I usually had enough pop-up mix left over for another 1 eggs worth of pop-ups. A mate did the same when he used Enervite for his pop-ups, and that must be sieved!

I feel like I've heard that story before somewhere. Could you find out what it was and what level please 😂

Heard of 50kg pop ups that went on a trip to France with some mates once 😂😂 can’t remember which ingredient did it though.

I use SHB pretty much exclusively for pop ups nowadays. Caught plenty. Probably would have caught a proportion of those on another brands pop ups. Do I believe they’ve caught me fish that I may not have caught on a different hookbaits? I’d say maybe a few. But I’ll never know. Have I blanked on them? Yes. Down to the baits? Probably not, my decisions on location, rigs, baiting approach, etc at fault. you’ll catch a carp on a lego head in the right place. You’ll blank using an all singing all dancing hookbait in the wrong place. I’d choose SHB above any other pop up though. As Yonny said it’s a confidence thing. Plenty of options priced similarly with much less to them. I’ve looked at making my own, similar but obviously not comparable as I don’t know his process in and out. I’m talking cork chunk pop ups with a curing process of my own. Doable but I don’t have the time. IMO buy with confidence but they aren’t a miracle worker.

Thanks Nick what I meant when I asked was what % would I need when adding to my basemix to make a matching pop up? I know it's not going to be exact and basemix dependant I was just looking to see if I could make a food bait pop up with it. AI isn't perfect but it can be a good tool, I've made loads of basemixes from scratch with it just for fun and I would be happy using some of them.

Cor, don't do Ai, it grabs information that is frequently incorrect, lol. Joking aside, it does get facts wrong sometimes, basically double check using another source, preferably not Google based, as Google can have an agenda. (Don't get me started on that one!) I was using sodium caseinate to make buoyant pop-ups so 50% base mix and 50% sodium caseinate was right for me, I wanted the buoyancy. As an ingredient in a base mix 10% is probably the maximum. I know that a few people have overdone it unintentionally in a finished bait and had floating freebies. I preferred calcium caseinate in any of my standard base mixes, more to do with cost as sodium caseinate is about 10% more expensive. As a specific ingredient in hookbaits it was bearable.