Making Texas rigs ?

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RUGER

RUGER

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A couple of the first lessons we learned last year were:
1) Two railroad spikes welded together get HEAVY when you fill a bag of decoys.
2) One railroad spike is PLENTY of weight for a decoy.
3) Texas rigs are THE WAY to go, ESPECIALLY if you are "mobile hunting".
4) Texas rigs are expensive.


Soooooo,
I was wondering where is the best (cheapest) place to buy the components (cord and crimps) to build your own texas rigs?
The weights I ain't too worried about, I know lead is high and I figure a dixie cup and some sac-crete will work just fine.

I just know there has to be a cheaper way to make them than buying them already made.
 
I put a small d-ring on the weight end of my decoy line and just clip it to a wire loop in a dixie cup of concrete as I put them out. Its cheap and works out pretty well.
 
I'm going away from texas rigs. We did the DIY texas rigs with crimps and lead weights. We just can't get the crimps to hold all season. After re-rigging twice, im over it until I'm rich and can afford to buy the pre made ones. They are however, significantly easier to deploy and pick up, but not easy to transport in that form (especially if it's 7 or 8 dozen). Anyway, it's my opinion that it's not worth it unless you have the "manufactured" ones and a lot of room in your boat.
 
THe weights is what would be a pain the most to me.

400lb mono aint too hard to find, and the crips hold better with a touch of gorilla glue on them.

Biggest expense by far are the weights.
 
I use the Husqvarna weedeater line. Buy my crimps at lowes. I use the copper electric ground crimps.
This is how I made my anchors.

Pour Quikrete in a bucket.


Mix it up pretty thin.
 
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Put the bent wire in and twist it.



Made these in half a bag.


These ended up weighing about 4 oz and held up great. They was in the water about 80 days straight and look just as good as the day I made them. I can make 400 anchors for $7
 
Looks very similar to what I use, but I bought the small 4 oz plastic dixie cups at wal-mart. They weigh a little over 4 oz, and I just clip a small d ring into the loops and it is tied to my decoy lines(I use #60 nylon twine). The d rings were fairly cheap on Amazon.
 
callemquacktn,
I thought about the same thing.
I figured the wire would rust though.
You didn't see that at all?
 
Store bought rigs are a little crazy on price ruger. I've started melting down lead into bank sinkers...have to have the eye to tie the line onto. I use Original Tanglefree by the way. It's green. I run the line thru the decoy keel hole and make a loop at the end and crimp it together using the Avery cord crimps. So the decoy will slide up and down the line not the weight. Works very well and much cheaper. You can get 500 ft of tanglefree for about $35 and the crimps come in 150 pks for about $10. So recap....tie your line to bank sinker....run other end of line thru keel hole and then make loop and crimp.
 
DCOOK223":wuo0rhvd said:
I'm going away from texas rigs. We did the DIY texas rigs with crimps and lead weights. We just can't get the crimps to hold all season. After re-rigging twice, im over it until I'm rich and can afford to buy the pre made ones. They are however, significantly easier to deploy and pick up, but not easy to transport in that form (especially if it's 7 or 8 dozen). Anyway, it's my opinion that it's not worth it unless you have the "manufactured" ones and a lot of room in your boat.
Click to expand...
What kind of line were you using?
 
tnduckhunter":1pnio60k said:
DCOOK223":1pnio60k said:
I'm going away from texas rigs. We did the DIY texas rigs with crimps and lead weights. We just can't get the crimps to hold all season. After re-rigging twice, im over it until I'm rich and can afford to buy the pre made ones. They are however, significantly easier to deploy and pick up, but not easy to transport in that form (especially if it's 7 or 8 dozen). Anyway, it's my opinion that it's not worth it unless you have the "manufactured" ones and a lot of room in your boat.
Click to expand...
What kind of line were you using?
Click to expand...
It was a kit. Kind of like weedeater line
 
I get on Ebay and buy a kit that is a saltwater kit. It's 400 lb clear mono and comes with the correct size crimps. I also buy some heavy duty snap swivels that I use to attach to my keel on the decoy. I can make dozens of the rigs for abiut $30. I also our my own weights but you can buy them cheap on ebay.
 
Hawk":2f4hgzct said:
http://www.snlcorp.com/SNL/Other/DuckDecoyKit.aspx
Click to expand...

This is the best advice in the whole thread. I didn't buy the pre cut lines because I wanted some longer and some shorter so I bought a the line un cut. Great people to deal with as well.
Went on a hunt out in texas about 10 or more years ago and saw this set up for the first time. Came home and re rigged all my deks.
 
I ordered 200 of the precut from them yesterday. They'll work fine for the fields i hunt mostly.

I have about a dozen or so that i will leave with LONG lines.

But for the most part, even if im hunting in flooded timber, 4 ft is gonna be plenty long, enough. Heck, if a decoy is floating at 4 foot, then a 5'5 guy is over his waders for sure!

Also found some cheap weights on ebay. It was 24 bucks TYD for 50 i believe. That'll be a good start.
 

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