How to Set Up a Chod Rig: A Total Fishing Tackle Rig School

What is a Chod Rig?

The Chod Rig seems to have fallen out of fashion thanks to the popularity of the Spinner Rig, but in certain situations, the Chod Rig is still a great option! Our resident angling expert Andy Grenfell takes a look at the Chod Rig and how to set it up so that you can fish effectively and safely.

I remember the first fish I caught on a Chod Rig. I was fishing a weedy estate lake that was also extremely silty, so even presenting a hook bait amongst the clear spots in the weed required a little thought. How could I prevent a popped-up bait that wasn't going to be dragged into the silt? The Answer? A Chod Rig.

I tied a few up and, before long, had both rods fishing cork ball pop-ups over a scattering of boilies on spots in the weed. That first night, I had a blistering take and landed a low thirty mirror, nailed on the Chod Rig! In that situation, the Chod Rig was the perfect way to present bait to the feeding fish. By making the rig as short as possible, I was able to present my pop-up a couple of inches off the deck and sit on top of the silt. I slid the top bead right up the leader so that the lead could bury in the silt, but the rig was still fishing effectively and critically balanced my pop-up so it fluttered down only under the weight of the leadcore.

How to Set up Chod Rigs

Here is what you need to make your Chod Rig Setup:

• 1. Leadcore leader
• 2. A tight-fitting top bead that can slide under moderate pressure when wet.
• 3. Chod Rig (ready-tied ones are great!)
• 4. Baiting needle to aid in putting the beads onto the leadcore.
• 5. Buffer sleeve/bead
• 6. Quick Clip for the lead to sit on
• Your chosen lead (use as light a lead as you can get away with to reach your target).

Firstly, on to a 4ft length of leadcore leader I thread a Nash Tackle 5mm Bead but I put the baiting needle through the side of the bead not through the pre-bored hole, this helps the bead to grip the leadcore nice and snugly, don't worry the bead can easily slide off under pressure if the fish is snagged, this bead will also stop the rig from flying up the leader and on to the mainline. Next, slide your Chod Rig onto the leader. If you are new to the Cod Rig and finding them tricky to tie then a ready-made variety will be perfect. Ready-tied rigs are, in some situations, as good as, if not better rigs you can tie yourself!

Next, we add a buffer bead, which acts as a shock absorber when playing fish and gives a nice edge for the swivel of the chod rig to sit up against.

Lastly, we need to add a quick clip to the leader and attach our chosen lead. I tend to use a Korda Heli Lead or I cut off the swivel of a normal lead to make it fit nice and neat. You then simply attach your hook bait to the rig and ensure the top bead is set to the right depth. You ideally need to set the bead 1.5 times the depth of the weed or silt you are fishing in. So if the weed is roughly 1 foot deep, you need the top bead about 2.5 feet up the leadcore.

Now, it's all very well being able to set up a Chod Rig, but there are a few things you need to do to ensure the rig is fishing as effectively as possible. You need to balance your pop-up with rig putty so that it just flutters down under the weight of the leadcore leader. Try it on the edge and add or remove putty to get it just right! The best way to master your chodding, as with any new method, is to get out there and do it. Go somewhere that you will get a few bites and refine the tactic so you know it will work, and then you can find out where you are going wrong if the bites aren’t coming or the fish are falling off on the way in, as they do tend to do with a chod. The first time I used them properly was a few years ago while fishing a pit in the Colne Valley, and I was the first angler to use the chod on that particular lake.

The results were fantastic for the first month or so, and I ended up catching a couple of fish that had been on the missing list, and also one carp that no one knew existed. If they haven’t been used before, they can be deadly, but I found that as more people used them and the fish wised up a bit, I started losing fish. I remember one night when three fell off on the bounce. One straight after I lifted into it, the other halfway in, and the last one not far from the net. No rhyme nor reason to them and no pattern at all, but I felt the losses were as a result of the hook not sliding down to the lead fast enough, so I removed the bottom bead completely, and the fish losses stopped. Slack lines - you must fish a slack line with a chod rig; if not, the leadcore will be left off the bottom, and the popped-up chod rig will be fishing about 2 feet up in the water with a very visible leadcore leader cutting through the spot!

I would hazard to say that fishing the chod is arguably one of, if not the, easiest way to fish once you have mastered setting it up. You can cast it almost anywhere; it doesn’t tangle, and it does catch a lot of fish. It’s incredibly economical as well because it is a brilliant single-bait method, and a bright-pink Signature Pop will catch fish all day long. Need to buy the bits of tackle to make the chod rig? Go take a look at our wide range today!

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