Hey Kawika, I'm a bit of a tinkerer myself. Love making up rigs, experimenting, building bits and pieces. Looks like you did a good job of the rod holder, where's the padding for the family jewels, or does the cross bar spead the load enough?

Nice bit of home made work there. On a seperate note, you said you were starting to get into jigging over there in Hawaii. Have you had any success? and what sort of fish do you get?

Check out the everything jigging forum as theres a few handy tips in there for techniques and what jigs to use and when. Its only just getting started up and there should be some new content coming soon now that our sambo jigging has just fired up.
http://fishwrecked.com/forum/75

Cheers,
Adam

G'Day Andy Mac and Adam,

The foam portion of the crossbar rests right on the user's trouser belt and seems to work fairly well, although I don't use it for more than a few hours at a time.

There's three areas of jigging that I've tried with varying degrees of success in Hawaii.

The first type is at the FADS (Fish Aggregation Device's) which are ~15-25 miles away from Hilo, Hawaii (which is on the East side of the island of Hawaii, the southeastern most island in the state). Although a number of fishermen use diamond jigs and other shapes at the FADS, David Itano introduced another device which I've found useful. Basically it's a several foot long rod with swivels at each end and a weight in the middle. One swivel is attached to the main line and a ~5-6' length of fluorocarbon leader goes on the other. A 1/0 Mustad 7766 tarpon hook completes the basic rig. The hook is "baited" with plastic lures or strips filled with glitter, locally called scroungers. I'd be happy show pics of the setup if anyone wants. The rig is free falled to depth where the fish are and brought up with great sweeps of the long rod and spinning reel. I've caught dozens of 10-20# yellow fin tuna this way and the occasional caranx near shore.

The second type is near shore bottome fishing, using a 15-20# test line with 4-6 dropper loops, small Mustad 7766 hooks (size 6-8) and smaller scroungers. This system works extremely well for 1-3# caranx, goatfish and wrasses. I use it in 50-200' water depths at the drop-offs near Hilo. Again, if anyone is interested I can post some pics. At least you could use the catch for bait...(^-^)

The last type is why I'm so interested in this jigging group. I want to try to target fish in the 10-30# range with metal jigs, high speed reels and jigging rods. As we speak, I'm gearing up to try this approach. There are a number of "mackeral stations" every few miles along the drop-offs where caranx, tuna and wahoo (locally called ono) hang out. I must say the the videos on this site have been particularly inspirational in this regard! I really wish I could get down there for a few rod bending sessions.

how about the ulua? ;) ;)

from a practical point of view, you might want to do something about the gimbal 'cup'. it might be too deep for you to place your rod in, while rushing, if you are 'short stroking' and then hook up. also, i might guess that it might 'roll' up and down.

just some input. gimbal belt is very important in figting fish, and avoiding a rod to the kidneys.... must be a reason why i was foolish enough to part with 9800 Yen just for a good one.

Pump iron to drop iron!

Hi Kasey,

Small ulua will be one of my target species. The ones less than 15-20# are very good eating. Here my lovely wife Helen demo's a small white ulua in our kitchen.

www.ukuleles.com/Jigging/HelenUlua.jpg

The gimbal cup isn't too deep for the spinning rod I'm using. And since the rod butt is in the gimbal when I'm doing the long stroke jigging, there's no issue regarding rushing to put the rod in place. The rig does rotate around its long axis but I find that convenient rather than a problem. The rig is more or less firmly buckled so it doesn't ride up and down when I'm using it. I suppose everyone likes their own creations... ;) 9800 yen does sound pretty reasonable though.

For the short jigging style, I'm hoping to use the underarm approach for holding the rod butt until there's a strike. I'm a little concerned about rod rash on my ribs and upper arm and am thinking about putting a short section of soft black foam hot water pipe insulation for padding. We'll see if it's really a problem or not when I get started.

That sounds like an interesting rig you mentioned in your second post. Some pics would be great to get a full understanding of how they work.

Cheers,
Adam

Hullo Kawika,
A word of warning.
Jigging WILL get you hooked into some seriously BIG fish, whether you 'want' them or not!
I jigged without using my butt pad and it just cost me over $3500 for the repair job!
I'm no slouch and have a black belt and a box of chamionship medals to prove it, but the rod butt kick in the lower region nothing could prepare me for.
I've now got a purpose designed jigging belt from Seven Seas and wear it all the time - its superb and comes highly recommended.
Have fun and hang on.

=) =)

i see you valued your kidneys at more than 9800 Yen too, ey? ;)

Pump iron to drop iron!

Yeh Kasey......but its my fishing future and my wedding tackle I was really concerned about.
So was my wife, she likes fish!

I prefer home made fishing rods, not only are they much cheaper but they have almost the same use and features compared to buying new ones that are too expensive. I really like your post and thanks for the share! I really love fishing and traveling to places like hawaii.