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I see so many different carp rigs nowadays and to be honest it can be very confusing knowing which one to use or to even tie. I normally try to keep things as simple as possible and use a KD rig that is easy to tie and has given me some success over the years. I would like to add some more rigs to my armour but also not complicate things too much. What rigs do you suggest so I can catch more carp.
I fish mainly high pressure day ticket waters and I will always use my go to rig that has given me great success over the years and in fact is the rig I caught my PB carp with. It consists of a Mainline Cell boilie topped with a piece of plastic corn that I have been soaking in a pineapple flavour glug. This is tied using coated braid hooklink (Korda n-trap) with the end stripped away, with a simple knotless knot to a curve shank hook and attached to a lead clip system. I will wrap some disolvable foam around the hook before I cast to ensure the rig is tangle free. I try to keep things as simple as possible and ensure everything is presented well to give me confidence when I am fishing. If I were to use a more complex rig, I think I would lose that confidence which I feel is a large factor in catching.
I really rate the chod rig for catching carp. I like the fact that I can cast it out and know it is presented perfectly whatever I am fishing over due to the construction. I will often use this rig when carp are showing, I simply cast to showing fish and I do not need to be concerned about presentation or spooking the carp with multiple casts which gives me lots of confidence. I also think this rig is a big carp rig, I see lots of pro anglers use this and catch some monster carp. If you don't know how the rig is constructed, here are the details.
There is a long leadcore leader which the rig will slide along. Leadcore is pefect as it will pin down to the lake bed due to the weight. Check the lake you are fishing allows leadcore, I do find many fisheries ban this.
The rig itself is made of stiff monofilament with a slight curve to ensure the hook is in the best position, this normally leads to a very good hook hold when the carp takes the bait.
Attach your favourite popup boilie to allow the rig to slide up and down the leader and that is the complete rig.
I am a real fan of critically balanced hookbaits. This basically means the bait will sink very slowly and when a carp does come along to feed, the hookbait along with the hook will be the first things to go into the carps mouth and hopefully will get you a take. You just need a buoyant bait, like a pop up boilie, and then you need to counteract this with some weights or anything to weight the pop up down. This is a bit of trial and error to get the bait sinking very slowly but is totally worth that extra effort. I will attach a wide gap hook with a knotless knot and cover the eye of the hook with some plastic srink wrap to ensure the hook will turn into the carps mouth to increase the chances of a good hook hold. You can run the hook over the palm of your hand and the hook should turn into your palm, your palm essentially being the carps mouth. I have even seen ready made balanced boilies from Mainline which do look interesting but will cost you a little bit more.
Plain hair rig with uncoated soft, strong braid
And I will never even look at anything else again as I've tried it all and don't like it
My rig works for some subtle reasons which I haven't got time to go into
Notice I didn't say its ''simple'' but said plain.. It is uncluttered, but far from simple to tie. It takes me all night to tie one! (They are very precise ad, ok I cheated there, I glue it in a specific place with a weight hanging on it all night, lol)
Its very precisely tied to very exacting lengths, and I tune my hookpoint up before every cast
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