Rig Mechanics

[salokcinnodrog]

I was reading another thread and Levigsp came up with a great saying "if you cannot work out the mechanics of a ", this was referring to a particular set-up (actually 2) in relation to somebody's fishing.

 

Here is an absolute confession for you:

I DO NOT THINK ABOUT RIG MECHANICS!

 

Totally strange totally weird, but is it as unusual as that?

 

It may not be that unusual for a couple of reasons, people generally don't think about their fishing, or the other without thinking about it they have an understanding, do we go back to the Watercraft?

 

I watch the Carp wherever possible to find out about the way they feed (suck and blow or pick up and eat), I check hookholds and where the hook has gone in to see if anything needs to be changed. I match Hooklink materials that I think will work best to the lakebed and I play about with how I put the hook on the line in relation to the best hooking potential. i.e. I'm currently preferring a Line Aligner over a standard Knotless.

 

How much about Rig Mechanics is something that is thought about or is that also a "Natural"?

[moorsey]

Funnily enough Nick I think it may even relate to our background. Originally being from a background as an engineering draughtsman I tend to think about the mechanics of each rig.

[noknot]

Funnily enough Nick I think it may even relate to our background. Originally being from a background as an engineering draughtsman I tend to think about the mechanics of each rig.

 

I must agree Keith, as I was a was a architectural model maker for 15 years, so working with detail and lines and drawings, also AutoCAD makes me fussy about my rigs.

Having said that I only really use two types as I am confident in them and have had many Carp on them, they look simple, but the mechanics are in place and very effective, my general approach is quite methodical but not fixed, and yes Nick I think over a period of time it could become "natural" or second nature which could be seen as watercraft.

[levigsp]

Funnily enough Nick I think it may even relate to our background. Originally being from a background as an engineering draughtsman I tend to think about the mechanics of each rig.

I think you may have something there,original I trained as a engineer.

So even though I have been out of the game for many years it is second nature to think about the mechanics of my rigs.

Some people realy do stuggle to think this way and have to just copy others parrot fashion,and often at no determent to there particular fishing.

[levigsp]

Nick as you know I often fish very low stock waters and in doing so every bite is very important.

Because I live so far away from my target waters I need a head start.

My watercraft often starts before I even get on the bank of a lake.

I can honestly say that the last couple of lakes I have fished I have done so knowing the rigs would work from the off.

I workout in my head the mechanics of each type of rig,I then match this up in my head to the type of carp/feeding, this again is worked out in my head from the type of lake I am intending to fish.

Now sometimes a certain fish for one reason or another does not play ball,and you need to change things,but my last three targets have been met with a visit to the unhooking matt sooner rather than later

I put this down to forward planning

[zander1]

I am a perfectionist when it comes to detailed art/ drawing and design, I spot inperfections in everything, everything i buy, everything i do, Its a natural eye for detail. My dad is a toolmaking engineer and a damn good one at that, my uncle is a drafts-man, its in the blood.

 

I havnt been carp fishing long, and i dont know anywhere near enough about watercraft as i would like, but in general it is a work in progress and only experiance can teach me, however i maticuously map where i am fishing, i will cast (for example) so that instead of my line crossing gullys near to where my bait is, i will cast parrallel or even into the gullys so that my line is sitting as flat as possible to where i am fishing, i will change pegs to hit the same spot untill i am happy, i think about wher the carp will becoming from and how he will pick up my bait as to try and increase my chances, its not a hard water that i fish, but i want to get into the right frame of mind now so that it becomes habbit.

some times, if i am thinking about a specific problem, i will design a rig on paper first, i'll be thinking about the rigs mechanics, and then when i am happy i will tie it up to specification, and play about with it in a bowl of water, make a few changes and then use the rig, makingany changes that are needed as i "evolve" my fishing to suit. This is most likely OTT but i have convinced my self that the mechanics are important however they probably arnt. Every fine detail is taken into acount ie: the amout of hinges, the spin of the hook to get the besthook hold ect. I am convinced that a size 8-6 ssc armapoint gives me the best hooking potential and hook hold and so 90% of my rigs incorparate these hooks.

There is a good chance that i could catch similar results on a simple, no singing and dancing bells rig, but i think that the changes i make increase my potential to catch and is a huge boost in confidence.

 

I have forgotten the point of my post now and for that i appolagise, I know there was a point to what i was saying

Sorry that it is a long winded reply

 

Jack

[salokcinnodrog]

Thought I'd bring this up again as somebody tried to be a bit smart on another thread

 

Unfortunately I can't quote all 4 posts, and strangely enough I also gained qualifications in Electro-Mechanical and General Mechanical Engineering to C&G level (thats City and Guilds, not Cow and Gate Baby Milk )

 

I say I don't think about Rig Mechanics consciously, it maybe something unconscious.

 

Although I don't like hookpulls I nearly always analyse them and work out why. I have time on my hands with the fish I target, and can spend plenty of time at the lake(s), so to miss a fish or 2 does not normally worry me unduly.

I admit that I have particular favourite brands and types of hook, and very rarely use any others as I'm not a "Fashion Victim", so whatever I tie has to be able to work effectively with what I do.

 

I do test rigs out at times, although the palm and thumb test I think are crude and ineffective. Fish don't feed that way, they can't pull the hooklink away, so I don't think that they give a true representation. I feel that the fish takes in the bait, and the hook follows, then dependant on if taken back or ejected drops into the bottom lip or not. To get the bait taken back comfortably then make sure the feeding situation is right. Don't get me wrong, thats just my way of thinking.

 

When I had a series of hookpulls last year I looked to possible reasons and decided that my all braid rig was getting caught up in weed patches around the clear areas, so without thinking I tied up some Combi links, Amnesia boom to Supersilk bottom, this change immediately resulted in numbers of fish on the bank. I honestly don't know why I did it, but felt that the Stiff section would lie flat on the clear bed, and the braid would be natural in or over the top of the weed

 

The next water I went onto I had a couple of hookpulls on my standard braid rig and line aligned version, so worked out and decided that on this lake the weed and detritus was masking the hookpoint. I had also observed that the fish I was targetting was not going to accept rigs on the standard Silt/chod or a pop-up set-up.

 

A change to lift the hookpoint with my version of the 1up 1down (Mushroom) rig immediately all fish were hooked dead centre of the bottom lip.

 

When I started fishing a totally different water this year in terms of pressure and Big Fish I changed away from my basics to a sliding/revolving rig for a couple of reasons;

The fish were more pressured than most of the fish around my local waters, and I wanted a rig that would behave pretty much the same on the clay or gravel lakebed that is in the swim I have fished so far. I've not done too bad banking a few when I went onto it. Again the fish have been hooked nicely bottom lip and in a couple of occasions had hooked very deeply and were not going to come out in a month of Sundays during the fight.

 

Strangely one of the first fish I hooked was a new 30 for the water and wasn't recognised by any of the other anglers. I can't see this fish getting away with it all the time (it did actually have someones rig in the corner of its lip, which I didn't discover until I went to lift it for photos), but did my rig make a difference? I guess we never know the whole truth as we catch a fish, and we don't really know whether the new rig was the reason for it, or whether it would have come to a standard.

 

As I've said loads of times we really want to keep it as simple as possible, yet some fish just can get away with it plenty of times without us even knowing. Just about every rig gets ejected without us getting a hook-up, so a new development happens or is contrived. How often will the Lead set up make a difference to what we do?

 

Do Rig mechanics make a massive difference or do we forget to consider the other factors, how we feed, where we position our rigs?

 

Or do the whole lot have to be considered in total and in part?

[daleg2008]

A uncaught carp is an easier carp to hook in my opinion. i came up with this conclussion when i hooked a pristine 23lb common that some how evaded capture. its believed that you can tell that a carp hasn't been hooked because of the flap of skin in there mouth. some people believe that this disappears after the hook penetration wound heals. i believe this to an extent, but i think it takes a few hookings for it to deteriate. so if the carp has never been caught or the flap of the skin is large then the hook has something else to catch on. as wilfster said some carp have softer mouths because the lake is silty etc... and some have harder mouths because they feed on gravel etc... the lake im on now i can tell which carp prefer grubbing around in the silt and the ones who prefer the cleaner areas. the ones who are regular silt grubbers as i call them have jet black mouths where the silt has stained them. just something else i thought i would throw in

[nicksingleton]

For me rig mechanics are something I ponder on regularly as it is like solving a puzzle, if you know WHY something is effective then you can adjust that component to suit. For example the flip over rate of a hook is made more effective the longer the hook or tube extending the hook is, and this can be used to cover certain feeding situations where the carp is hardly moving, i.e over a tight bed of particles as an example. Also on several lakes I fish, I have seen fish near vertical when feeding and by understanding rig mechanics it is possible to increase your catch rate.

 

Then again I used to work on oil rigs for 12yrs and have a very mechanical mind also

 

New carp club called the "mechanics" anyone interested

 

[salokcinnodrog]

For me rig mechanics are something I ponder on regularly as it is like solving a puzzle, if you know WHY something is effective then you can adjust that component to suit. For example the flip over rate of a hook is made more effective the longer the hook or tube extending the hook is, and this can be used to cover certain feeding situations where the carp is hardly moving, i.e over a tight bed of particles as an example.Also on several lakes I fish, I have seen fish near vertical when feeding and by understanding rig mechanics it is possible to increase your catch rate.

 

Then again I used to work on oil rigs for 12yrs and have a very mechanical mind also

 

New carp club called the "mechanics" anyone interested

 

 

As Daleg has said, a Silt feeder may need a totally different presentation to a gravel or hard bottom feeder. The curtain at the top of the mouth, the majority of carp I have caught have still had this intact, some weird places to be hooking if it has been damaged or ruined, although surface feeders and hooking in the top may be a cause

 

Thats why I say I don't think about Rig Mechanics, although I understand about lengthening the shank with tubing, and a line aligner is something I'm doing now as a matter of course. Again, you've pointed out that some fish, maybe especially fat, gutty fish may be "vertical feeders". Maybe because although I say I don't think about it, it is possibly part of the understanding of watercraft, which I may do without thinking about, or knowing why I do it.

 

Its the same with when I use Pop-ups exclusively, I prefer an out-turned eye, and the pop-up tight to the hook as I feel that I get better hookholds and hook-ups with that presentation. I do also check how the hook and pop-up sit in the margins of the water. I can't convince myself to have the hook laying on its side and the pop-up above it. That should in theory give me a better chance of a hook-up with a fish that is picking up as opposed to sucking and blowing, so the rig should really be chosen with how a fish feeds in mind.

[salokcinnodrog]

An old thread back up to the top

 

How much do magazines and the fashion rigs actually work in our fishing.?

Does using a KD rig really make that much difference over our standard knotless knotted?

 

Come to that, could a line aligner actually work when we may be losing or not even hooking fish on a knotless knotted rig?

Is switching to a KD rig the natural answer to that knotless knotted rig "failing"?

 

How many people do think about changing the hair length, the rig length, or even how we feed the swim?

Those things may totally change the effectiveness of a rig for the better (or worse).

 

The "standard" hair rig was adapted by Rod Hutchinson and Roger Smith; Hutchys Sliding or Extending hair and Roger Smiths D-rig, both progressions from their fishing at the time. Strange we still use the D-rig (always capitalised due to the "shape" of the hair attachment), yet the sliding hair is almost forgotten in the annals of history.

 

Often we change rigs for the sake of change, or fashion, we don't necessarily take the next progression of adaptation from what we already have.

Its all well and good asking what rig to use, on a forum, or reading the answers in a magazine, but they don't give or cover OUR circumstances, we need to experiment ourselves.

 

As anglers fishing we need to have an understanding or natural ability to play with mechanics, as simple as using a line aligner over a knotless knot, and as easy as changing the hair length

[zammmo]

What I have confidence in and feel comfortable with does me...

[beanz]

iv always thought each hook link set up as its own mechanics,learning these then helps to decide which set up to use in each situation, the situation needs a different understanding(watercraft)

 

now i dont think its possible to have total watercraft understanding as each sess is a learning sess. but rig mechanics are basics. like times table, you learn it ,then when needed its there ,without having to relearn it.

 

so even though thought goes into choosing,your not actually working out the mechanics(unless its a new set up to you)your trying to work out the best thing for your situation

[spreadbury]

The oft-quoted 'Palm Test' really has very little relevance, although I'll grant it's confidence-making when it 'works' and that's no bad thing.

 

The KD Rig is a definate fish-catcher and yet I've known it fail the 'Palm Test' regularly when I've tried it.

 

The problem with doing any sort of test or trying to apply mechanical principles to rigs is almost invariably that they are performed in air and not under the water. I ask everyone with an interest in 'real tests' of rigs to do the following:

 

Take the outer plastic tube that 'Funnel Web' PVA comes in (large size). Fill a bowl of water and drop a baited rig into the bowl. Now suck through the tube and watch how the bait and rig behaves! This is much more of a realistic test than any kind of assumptions drawn by 'Palm Tests' or any other 'test' performed in air rather than under the water.

 

What you'll see is that sucking draws a 'plug' of water up the tube (into the carp's mouth) carrying both rig and bait with it. There is a relationship between the weight (or buoyancy) of the hook and bait; light baits or 'wafters' behave differently.

 

If a 'strong' suck is made to a 'wafter', (simulating a carp trying to suck in what it thinks is a free, natural weight boily), vortexing and chaotic flow occurs - whereas sucking in the 'natural' boily is a more laminar flow.

 

Try it and see,

[graham1969]

What I have confidence in and feel comfortable with does me...

 

What he said........