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Shooting heads DIY
4th section - Casting
17th chapter Casting a shooting head Where we learn a few tricks to cast better with a shooting head setup
If you are used to casting with overhead casts, the use of a
shooting head will not be strange to you. It responds a bit more aggressively and will probably
gain a bit more line speed than your usual WF line, but that's the whole idea.  This animation shows the most efficient way to cast a slow sinking or sinking shooting head. Strip a couple of times when the base of the head passes through the top eye. Make a roll cast to bring the shooting head to the surface. Let the head and a bit of running line pass through the top eye in the cast. As soon as the line touches the surface, make a single back cast and cast the shooting head and running line. In some cases one or two blind casts will aide the cast, increasing speed and distance, but excessive blind casting will rarely bring anything good. Never work out too much shooting line. This will only add length to the casting part of the line, but no weight and bring nothing but trouble. The efficiency can be highly improved with a double haul — in fact a shooting head cast is almost impossible to do without.
Notice how the cast is centered around the transition between the shooting head (red) and the running line (gray). This link will pass through the top eye under great stress several times in every cast. It has to be the sweet spot of the setup, and the head needs to cast well with just a bit of running line out of the top eye and still load the rod well with a meter or two (3-6') of the shooting head inside the top eye. Missed the intro...? This link will bring you there. |
