Traditional style floats: best places to find them.

[Kevanf1]

Just to add to the above. You can still make very good use of pine in floats. Use it for the lower sections of floats to create stability such as in a stick float. In fact, many very successful stick floats have been made with the lower section being made of a wood called lignum vitae. It is the heaviest wood known to man (I think). It sinks rather than floats and is the wood that is used to make wooden crown green bowling balls. Beech is another useful wood and luckily for us can be easily purchased from places like eBay. Look for lollipop sticks.

[Scott Thompson]

Regarding using real wood (not balsa) for floats is something i'm fairly interested in, my wooden floats are for display only but the amount of people i've had asking i'll be making some this winter with the intention of using them for fishing its just the matter of getting the balance right.
Ebony in some forms can be as heavy as Lignum Vitae and there are a few woods as light as bamboo which is a common float making material.


Kevanf1 - I think that a wood float should cock quicker than a balsa one, for the same reasons wire stemed floats cock quicker than cane ones, this is something i intend to try over the next few months, I dont see why you cant make a good float from normal wood, in Hooked on Floats by Jeff Della Murathere are a few wooden floats

My thoughts are (and feel free to correct them) 2 same sized floats one balsa one wood, the wooden one will take less shot but the weight of the wood should enable it to be cast just as far, how quick it cocks will be down to where the weight is on the line underneath it but i would think the wooden float would have the edge, and a heavier float will tend to be more stable. I may make hybrids with part balsa/cork part wood but playing around is half the fun.

Maggot Drowner, your Perch bobs will need to be a size big enough to support your intended bait and the size of the fish you are likely to catch, a float for fishing a small redworm is going to be a lot smaller than one intended for a 4" live bait, i would suggest diameters of 1/2 to 3/4inch and lengths about 3/4 to 1 inch will be a good starting point.

[Bluedun]

My thoughts are (and feel free to correct them) 2 same sized floats one balsa one wood, the wooden one will take less shot but the weight of the wood should enable it to be cast just as far, how quick it cocks will be down to where the weight is on the line underneath it but i would think the wooden float would have the edge, and a heavier float will tend to be more stable. I may make hybrids with part balsa/cork part wood but playing around is half the fun.

If you took the two floats, assuming identical volumes, and shot them down, the combined weight of the float plus its shot would be the same in each case.

[Bluedun]

When you start joining different materials together to make bases, stems and inserts, it's important to consider their densities; a float with dense materials at the base will tend to "flight", dart-like, on the cast and to sit stable in the water, whereas cane antennae tend to make an unstable float which practically waves a flag at you when a lift-bite registers, but tumbles in the air when cast - meaning tangles if you go too far, too hard.
Top-heavy floats can also be a pain to cock, lying trapped in the surface film... one of the secret benefits of the sight-bob is its help in breaking the grip of surface tension. Elder pith is particularly useful here.

Absolutely. There is no benefit to using dense materials throughout or in the top of the float for this reason. I tried it before I knew better - awful to cast, don't cock.

[Bluedun]

I think it is possibly to do with material density. Balsa 'possibly' being less dense than pine? Please, somebody feel free to step in and correct me if I am wrong. Essentially, balsa is a lighter wood compared to pine when put into water. It floats better so it cocks quicker than pine. You can make floats from pine but when you cast them into the water they do take a lot longer to cock and thus you could miss bites.

I would say the smaller you can make the perch bob the better.

Balsa is certainly less dense than pine, and easy to work, which is why it is so widely used in float making. Quill and balsa - really all you need to make a decent float (maybe a bit of cane for the base, or sticks/loaded floats).

[Vole]

Cork is also pretty handy. I think it was Kevin Ashurst who raised eyebrows by carrying a few rough, unvarnished cork bodies to convert straight wagglers to bodied ones in a trice - we tend to forget that cork doesn't need to be varnished - if it did, it'd be no good for stopping up bottles.

[Nobby]

You can make some pretty good simple wagglers from pine dowel and it comes in pretty small diameters these days, just right for shaping into a bodied waggler in the style of a Zoomer that will cast like a bullet.


I'm not overy convinced of the point of partly self-weighted floats as they can roll in the air and tie quite impressive knots in your hoolkength, but for close-in shallow work, cast underarm, against a hard surface like a weir or a wall...they are brilliant because they are so strong.

[Kevanf1]

I would 'almost' be willing to put money on it that like for like floats, say one made of pine the other of balsa, the balsa will cock quicker. They will both take different amounts of shot of course but as long as the overall weight (float + shot + hooklength and bait) was the equal then you'll be fishing quicker with the balsa one. I say 'almost' willing to bet because I am not a gambling man. I am genuinely interested to hear if somebody tries this little experiment and will certainly take back my words if I am wrong

[Vole]

It rather depends how you define "fishing". The stick - the original pattern with a cane stem that just sank - was designed to sit at half-cock as soon as it hit the water, then gradually settle as the string of tiny shot sank, giving you as much time "on the drop" as possible.
With a bulk-and-tell-tale set-up, I'm sure you're right, the smaller shot-load of the pine float would take longer to cock it - if it managed at all (I remember birch dowel "stick" jobs that lay smugly flat in the surface film, carrying their full (tiny) shot load, and wouldn't sit up until lifted out and lowered carefully in, base first. Not a pattern I'll be copying in a hurry).
I'd have thought an Avon float with a very buoyant body and dense stem would cock quickest of all, and be most stable...some wire-stemmed sticks/Avons sit vertical the moment they touch down.

The length of stem below the body of a waggler is a factor that's often overlooked, but especially in the small sizes, a longer stem, which gives the shot-load more leverage, gives more positive cocking (especially with dodgy dowel stems or cane inserts!) and a more stable ride in the ripple, I believe.

[Nobby]

Try chucking a handfull of dust shot that weighs the same as 4BB and see which goes further.......


It seems x inertia + x inertia = x inertia, not 2x inertia.


Self-cocking floats have their place, but it isn't in overhead distance casting.


In the past I have made fully self-loaded floats for margin work, where the line passed through the centre of the float....totally tanglefree, for fishing right in the reeds...they even trotted quite well, but even some dustshot down the line turned into a tangle sooner or later.



Good fun until then, though........