brighton_carper

One was in my own margins and the other was at about 40 yards.

Not full on slack, but I tend to leave a little slack so the leadcore can settle into the bottom.

I haven't just been done, I've been double done. Don't worry, would never dream of glueing the bead on, that would be a death rig, plain and simple.

Last night I was fishing helicopter rigs. I banked an 11lb'er at about midnight, then in the night I had a couple of what I thought were line bites, 2 or 3 bleeps up, 2 or 3 bleeps down, then nothing. When I woke up and checked everything this morning, I noticed that one of my rigs had definitely moved, and another one ended up in a snag. When I reeled in, I noticed on both rods that the top bead on the helicopter rig had been pulled up so it was running lose on the line, allowing the hook link to move up and down. Were the carp are using the weight of the lead to throw the hooks without giving a proper indication on my bite alarms? And if so, I might be better switching to running rigs? It's just that most of the fish in my lake are over 20lbs, but this season all I keep catching are the 10-12lbers. I'm wondering if the bigger fish have just got a bit smarter. What do you think?

Check out the Gardner suspender controller. IMHO it's the best way of surface fishing. No line on the water to spook the fish, perfect presentation.

What happend to my reply? So where do you fish? I'm off Mon to Wed next week. My carping plans have gone out of the window with all the spawning, so it looks like I'll turn it into a Tenching session, or go after bit Cats somewhee.

No worries, and I know exactly what you mean. The only two "latest things" that I've ever bought, that lived up to expectations are this PVA system and The Spomb.

Ok Woodchester, here goes. Well, basically, unlike so much stuff that's flogged to us poor tackle sluts, it works exactly the way it's supposed to, pretty much every time. I stopped using the old solid pva bags because I couldn't get then tightly packed and sealed, so they would sometimes unglue, and come off during the cast. This has never happened with the Rapide system. It's just so simple. First you attach a bag to the scoop, then you add your rig and fiil the bag. Once you've done that, you give the whole thing a good twist, to make it solid. Then you lick or dampen the outside edge of the bag, where it is held by the scoop. Once you've done that you just fold it back on itself, by sliding the scoop down over the filled bag, then press the dampened edge against the bag. Solid every time.

If you're getting into solid PVA you should check out the Fox Rapide PVA system. It's brilliant, and so much easier to get a solid, secure bag for casting.

Top angling mate. I'm doing my first france trip in September, and I'll already getting excited about it.

If you are losing fish to hookpulls, then the first thing I would change is the rig and hair length, they probably aren't long enough. Also an Inline lead fishing running, may well not be running at all. The nose of the lead may have pushed the hooklink swivel into the lakebed, or even the lead had dug in far enough so that it couldn't run on a take. edited for typo I try to avoid that happening by putting little beads inbetween the lead and the swivel.

Not sure I agree with previous post. I use fluorocarbon mainline because it is invisible in water. It has more elasticity than braid, but less than mono. It is also extremely abrasion resistant. I use braided hook links because they are softer and more flexible than fluorocarbon, giving a better presentation, in my humble opinion.

That's brilliant mate, thanks.

Thanks, Looks like a bit of midweek experimentation at a local runs water might be in order. So, if I was using a submerged float, what distance would you have between hook and float. Someone said 30cm, but that’s like a ruler length. I would have thought with that short length it might spook the fish?

Would I definitely need a submerged float? In my slightly confused mind i was thinking of just using floating line and setting it up as you would with a marker float.

Hi All, just looking for a bit of advice on adjustable Zig-rigs. How the rigs should be put together and how they should be fished. Cheers T

I always use PVA mesh with helicopter rigs, in fact, I wouldn’t use them without. Obviously there’s no point in sticking the lead, hook link and everything into a PVA bag, but I find that a bit of PVA mesh stuffed with a few tasty offerings, attached to the hook, stops any danger of the rig tangling when casting, and puts a little pile of bait right where you want it.