shade

I use G1's as well, not skipped a beat at all. I could improve them, but not with anything like those new ones. Think they need to look at their marketing team and bang a few heads! Oh, and funnily enough, I'm a carp fishing welder as well!

I posted this pic up somewhere on here before, but I like to use the reverse combi rig shown in this pic, especially if the water seems to fish well using 'normal' chod rigs.

I've settled on Drennan Continental boilie hooks for bottom baits.

That suggests to me that the loops are equally as strong as the line, or stronger, and it pulled apart due to stretch?

lol. I like to critically balance my pop ups so they only just sink. The 'sinker' gives it a good start, then a bit of putty moulded around it and then pick bits off until the whole lot sinks as slowly as possible, especially in the colder months.

I always used to use a small shot and mould the putty around it, with braided hooklinks, and never had a problem. Nowadays I use a Korda (shock horror. lol) medium sinker and mould the putty around that. They work a treat and you can slide them up or down to alter your pop up height.

Have you looked at the 'Mahin' knot? It's an ideal knot for joining heavy leaders to thinner mainline / braid.

I actually like playing with rigs, trying to think through why it would, or wouldn't work and what materials would work best to tie it up. My one and only fish landed from my 'main' water this year came to a version of the reverse combi link. I used about 7" of Supernova from the swivel, then 1.5" of 25lb Mouthtrap, curved severely, with the hook mounted chod style, fished with a pop up and the putty put over the joining knot. I think that once the fish took it into it's mouth it just couldn't get rid of it?? The fish was absolutely nailed! Obviously, I've been using said rig on one rod ever since, along with a knotless knot bottom bait and a snowman on the other two, all to no avail!

Quite why the proper line aligner works as well as it does is one of those carp fishing things that may never be fully understood. I still use it for all my pre-tied snowman / bottom bait rigs, and have done since about 1995. It must come down to the 'flip'. Try it yourself. The knotless knot works very well, but every now and then it will not flip and catch. The line aligner flips every time, if tied correctly. If I tie my rig up at home it's always a line aligner, on the bank it's a knotless knot.