Building Homemade Floats

[Extreme]

Kinda crazy one here, I'll admit....here goes.....Anyone ever experiment with building homemade floats for jig fishing Salmonids? Seems I am always losing floats for a variety of reasons. Store bought floats, Cheaters, etc. can really crimp the fishing budget not to mention my 5 daughters too.
Anyway, I have tried:
1) Carving regular white styrofoam into 2" rounds and egg shapes, coloring the bottoms black with a perm. mrkr, and finally running a hole through it with a hot coat hanger wire with some success. These tend to be very light though.
Then....
2) Using Flowguard Gold CPVC plumbing fittings I had left over from a job, two ends with a 1-2" section of pipe glued together, and tight rubber bands to hold it to the line. Casts very well.
Any other ideas? BTW, if you find floats that fit the descriptions above on the river call 'em traitors....Tell 'em I miss them...
x

[ryan fish]

I have made floats out of styrofoam float tube the kids use in swimming pools.I take a plastic swizel stir,,poke through and glue.For $2.00 you can make a whole bunch.

[dummy]

wine corks work well and can be found through a home brew shop or look up cork. it is so cheap just add a couple of rubber bands or straw or split in half. also lead can be shoved into them to give them some weight. home made dinks are also cheap it is just window insulation. i understand the need for cheap floats and have made tons. but after all that i just buy them and make sure my main is lighter than my leader and i have good knots. i have also carved them out of wood they just dont meet my needs now. i like small and clear flotst. oh you know those glass fish that rest beneath clear floats man if i could only find out where they are getting those.

[Trout,myster]

Kind of "mickey mouse", but cheap and I've had mediocre success at it. Save old tool handles (shovels, hoes, brooms, etc.). These are pretty stout so a short length about 2-3 inches is all that's needed. Saw them off the handle, use a long jobber drill to drill a small hole through them, paint so you can see it and go fishing. Only problem is they usually just float and it's hard to get them to float upright.

------------------
Troutmyster

[Roeboat]

Here is the way to make ultimate dinks. Make them by the dozen for pennies. You will need a pair of vice grips, a propane torch, a coat hanger, a roll of black electrical tape, and a roll of white or red. I use the foam insulation board sold in sheets for insulating foundations. It usually comes in blue or pink (polystyrene) and you can usually get lots of scrap for free if you know someone building a house or buy a sheet, it's cheap.

Bend the coathanger to form a circle at the end slightly larger than finished diameter. Heat the coathanger with the torch and press thru the foam to cut a nice circular extrusion. If you bend an additional semisquare pattern into the hanger you can run it down a piece of wood to act as a guide for a perfectly straight cut. Cut out a dozen or two outside as the fumes can get strong. Wrap 2/3 or 3/4 of dink with black electrical tape and the upper end with white tape. Punch two holes in it with a heated nail or heat a coat hanger and go all the way thru to create a sliding dink. slip in a couple of cocktail straws to make them easier to slide line thru if you choose. I paint over the white tape with fluorescent red paint for high visibility.

Now these dinks kick butt because the added weight of the tape makes them cast extremely well (like balsa) and the tape makes them chinook proof. No more losing a dink every time you hook a chinook. I have had dinks last thru over 20 chinook. And you can make them in all sizes. When you get proficient with the torch you will find you can give the blanks a taper depending upon the heat and make very subtle dinks. Dura Dinks!

Think Dink

[Extreme]

Excellent ideas people. Thanks for the suggestions.
x