carpepecheur

I used to call it The Spinner but then someone put a swivel on a hook and called that a spinner. Not sure what you mean by "going mainstream" I am only passing on my limited experience to anyone who might be interested. My carp fishing is quite a bit different from most on this forum. From personal tests I rate the hair 80 to 85% effective and the Bald Rig 98 to 99% effective. But that estimate is very subjective (and possibly biased) Would be interested how you get on. I would predict no missed takes.

Let us know how you get on. Yes a wafter is definitely best. The nearer you can get to neutral buoyancy the better IMHO. The rig started off as a pop up rig and evolved from there. The carp can only take one mouthful at a time so a wafter increases your chances of being included. With this rig it is still possible to hook a fish even if the boilie itself does not get past the lips. I do not think that would happen with a hair (especially a long hair as some people like to advocate using)

I may have posted older versions of this idea on here before. I have now got it down to an incredibly simple rig that anyone can tie. I have made a YouTube clip to try and explain my thinking. I apologise for the typeface used because it make L and i look the same but my font picker disappeared from the software I was using to make it. If it is still not clear how it works, simply place a cylinder (e.g.. a round cookie cutter) over the rig and gently lift the boilie. As the line tightens you will see what is happening. I may be simply re-inventing the wheel but have not found it described elsewhere.

That nice pad was 350 years old and needed a lot of work. Much smaller modern place now with definitely NO swimming pool to keep looking after. 🙂 Yes "tinker" is a good expression for me. I get a lot of stick and derision at some of my ideas but nevertheless have still appeared on Tomorrow's World and the Californian equivalent. I have posted my idea for the perfect carp rig with a boilie on the main line and no hair and been told a million reasons why it won't work. Meanwhile I continue to hit every bite. C'est la vie.

Nice shot. You get a different perspective from up there!

I apologise if I have posted some of this on here before but I thought you might like to see a little piece of recent aerial history. This is my very first aerial photo of one of the lake I fish. The shot was taken by a camera dangling below a kite. The camera was taking pictures by intervalometer and the direction was adjusted by radio control. To give an Idea of how this was done take a look at this (rather poor quality) you tube clip. I then spent a small fortune on one of the very first drones called a Mikrokopter. This had no GPS or stabilisation. You had to actually fly it by increasing and decreasing the speed of each motor. It was almost impossible to do that AND pay attention to what you were filming. Here is a clip of my very first video taken from my back yard. Eventually I bought a DJI Spark which I still use today although I would love to buy a new Mavic Mini 2. Even so it discovered my current favourite fishing spot which I keep entirely to myself. This last YouTube clip shows just how useful a drone can be.

Hours of fun and bitten fingernails ahead. Have fun. Could I suggest you take a look at Litchi software. It allows you to pre-program a route and take photos exactly where you want to. (although I have not kept up with DJI developments) It could be useful for your roofing excersise where you do not want to miss a shot. One other hopefully helpful suggestion - take a spotter with you especially early days. There's so much info coming at you it is easy to lose track of the drone.

Much safer than a pendulum cast 🙂

That's exactly what I do. I have been taking aerial photos for 15 years now. I started with a camera on a kite! Never had a test or license. It is just a case of being sensible. There aren't many drone police around (but there is always a "jobsworth" lurking). If I am going to have any people in my shots, I speak to them first and get their email address and promise to send them aerial photos of what they are doing. I have only ever had positive responses. All my neighbours have framed aerial photos of their house and there is even one of the town hall hanging behind the mayors desk (even though it is illegal to take shots within 50 metres of the place). If you have waves you will be unlikely to see much below the surface. Be careful with the return to home feature. The fail safe setting is when you hit "return to home", the drone goes up 30 metres (to avoid obstructions on return) , returns to just above the take off position, then descends. If you have launched from the bank from under trees it could cause a problem. You can change the settings. Practise practise practise before you go anywhere near water. Then, once you get out over the lake, it is squeaky bum time. However, apart from a one toner, it is about the most fun you can have outside.

Like Carpbell, I think a Deeper will give you far more information about your lake than a drone will. If you must use a drone you will need clear water, flat calm conditions and possibly a polaroid filter. If you are worried about landing on water which will definitely write off your drone, you could add some simple floats. I made a very amateur video of what I use on my ageing Spark when over a lake .

Gutted for you. They do become part of the family. My sympathies.

Or you could get a bait boat .................... ................ I'll get my hat.

It seems there is a consensus that using a pendulum cast for carp fishing is dangerous. I would probably disagree because it allows you to get the same rod compression with a lighter weight, or more compression with the same weight, or the same range with the less effort and more control. Pablo seemed keen to get maximum range but if the pendulum technique bothers you, the next best thing to address is the drag during trajectory. There have been many suggestions as to how to reduce drag such as lead shape, line thickness or material, rod ring size and type, reel diameter etc. etc. My interest is in quantifying what changes actually make a difference. Fortunately, a technique was developed in the late 16th century by Galileo who started dropping things from the top of the leaning tower of Pisa. He proved that if you drop two externally identical weights, but with one much heavier than the other, they will hit the ground at the same time. So if you want to check if a flat pear is more aero dynamic than an Arsley bomb, simply drop them both at the same time from a high structure and see which hits the ground first. If you want to check out the drag of your rod set up, use two identical leads. One you let free fall as the control weight, the other you attach to the end of your rig attached to your line with the rod at right angles to the direction of fall and the bale arm open and let it go at the same time. Obviously the free falling lead will hit first and the amount of time behind it that the attached lead hits the ground represents the effect of drag in your tackle. You can repeat this as many times you want until you have worked out the most efficient tackle combination to reduce drag. The trouble is that this requires very precise timing to make the comparison and a stop watch is simply not good enough. The solution is simple. Using your smartphone, simply record the sound of the two leads hitting the floor. Then look at the sounds in an audio editing app. You will get a graphic visualisation of the two impacts and can measure the distance between them to 1/100th of a second. .

I'm not much of a caster but in my youth I did a bit of beach casting. I am not au fait with modern techniques but in those days there was one technique that increased the distance I could cast quite significantly. It was (and maybe still is) referred to as the pendulum cast. There are only two parameters to get max distance and that is the angle for maximum range (45 deg) and speed. The speed comes in two parts. The first depends on how you wave your arms and legs about when casting and the second is unloading the compression you have put in the rod.. A heavier lead helps you get more compression into the rod ro release when you cast but it needs more effort on your part. With the pendulum method, you swing the lead like a pendulum up and behind you before you cast then you start your cast just as the weight is swinging back down towards you. The momentum in the pendulum coming towards you makes it easier to get maximum compression into your rod, thus a greater tip speed, thus a greater distance. I just wondered if this method is current practise in UK or, if not, whether it is worth consideration.

Take him now. Collies are fast learners. Mine started at 6 months. The first time I had I had a good fish on he thought the carp was attacking me and went in after it. Now he sits and stares at my rod tips all day long. I swear he knows I have a bite before I do because his ears prick up and his body tenses. If I am away from the rod he will bark. Who needs an expensive alarm? A treat after each fish is returned maintains his interest. 😀

He certainly doesn't lack confidence. Tim Richardson on X factor

The equinox is just a single moment of the year so can have no effect at all. The seasons which follow from that event have a huge effect on fishing so could conceivably have some bearing on what type of carp you catch. IMHO whether the moon has an effect or not simply depends on how cloudy it is. Or, to put it another way, how much light is being cast on the lake during the night.

Since this thread started I have been looking again at self takes again. I tend to use my phone for a lot of photos and there is an app which you can read about here which gives you both an intervalometer so no need for fancy remote triggers BUT also exposure bracketing so you can get several shots at different exposures and choose the best one. I will be testing it this weekend.

If you have plenty of time to invest but no cash I recommend looking at CHDK This is some free software that you can load on to most cheap Canon cameras. You just save a script on your SD card then , then when you switch on your camera it starts running that script. There are plenty of free scripts to download including several intervalometers working in various ways. I bought a cheap Canon Ixus for £5 about 10 years ago and spent a weekend working on a script for self takes. All I have to do is switch it on, there are no settings to select, it just starts taking shots every 5 secs (programmable) in sets of three. One auto exposed, one a fixed amount under exposed and one a fixed amount over exposed. If I wanted, I could also take them alternately with and without flash. Even though I have more expensive equipment now, it is still my go to camera for selfies because there is nothing to go wrong.

I seem to remenber,when I made my own boilies, if you microwaved them instead of boiling them, you can turn them into wafters or pop ups depending on time they were zapped. However, you do need an understanding wife.

Australia has just announced national donut day. That is 24 hours without a single new infection in the whole country. They had to impose very severe restrictions in August but they do seem to have worked. If everyone sticks to the guidance and avoids contriving excuses for ignoring them then perhaps we can have our own donut day.

In a normal world, I would usually order stuff to my daughter's address in UK then pick it up when I visit. So I am probably not a representative case.

I am not sure if you are aware of this Reedy but your web site cannot be accessed from France. If I use a VPN and pretend I am in UK it does work so it is not a problem for me but it could affect some potential sales for you.