The First ever Bite Alarm you had?

[Dave H]

I remember mine being a Diawa Sensor Z. It was like a Brick. it was totally useless in the rain and the dials used to freeze up. It did work in the dry . the line sensitive know though was incredible it was either go off at a 1mph breeze or not work at all if you tried adjusting it...it did look good in its day though...LOL

[wotnobivvy]

Depends what you mean by bite alarm. My first audio alarm would have beed the ratchet on the centrepin clacking away as the fish pulled. Visual, apart from the swing tip, would have been the Champagne cork falling off the line, which was held in a slit in the cork. A lump of lead wire would be wrapped around the cork, which in turn was tethered to an old meat skewer by a bit of string.

[Old geezer]

Never had an electronic alarm.

 

First was a swingtip, otherwise, my rod tip

[matt19norwich]

I guess everyones would be some form of rod tip then!

 

My first electronic one I had was bought just last year, a cheap Ron Thompson bite alarm for a mere £6 Caught loads with it. Who says you need to spend a fortune on a bit alarm? Its even fully waterproof and has proven that many times over!

 

Matt

[Dales]

Sundridge Optonics, I used them for around 20 years until I upgraded to Delkims around 6 years ago. Great alarms and I doubt many of the cheaper end roller alarms of today are much better. They still work and I some times bring one as a back up in case I have any problems with the Delkims. Sundridge used to make some top quality kit years ago and I used to have a few nice fiberglass rods made by them. I am sure they must still make some nice stuff but they are not a name I come across much anymore.

 

I used one last year with a monkey climber just for the sake of it, worked fine but the reality is my Delkims are so much better.I don't think I would ever give up my Delkims, they are awsome.

Edited February 26, 2013 by Dales

[BoldBear]

My first electronic alarms where 'Heron bite alarms' which I think came in black or white. I had two white ones.

They were always giving false alarms if you didn't have them set correctly.

 

But these simple electric buzzer alarms where a great improvement to the simple 'coin on the spool over a tin plate' alarm which we used before.

Edited February 26, 2013 by BoldBear

[tincatinca]

Good grief, this takes me back longer than I care to remember. My first alarms were Herons which were immediately painted matt black with the contacts being changed to GPO one. The emphasis then was little or no weight either on the line or around the hook but of course the consequences of this was that it did not take much to tighten the line so it slipped out from between the contacts which was a right pain at night. The contacts were adjustable but unless there was little or no wind and the water still, they were a pain to get anywhere near workable and virtually anything that clipped the line would set them off.

These were followed by a set of BJs which were very similar in terms of how they worked and it was generally not until the Optonics came on the scene and and also that weight around the hook length was not such a bad thing after all that things improved dramatically. My first Optonics were the originals which were then replaced by ones which connected to a dedicated sounder box. which in turn were eventually replaced by the Optonic XLs which I still have. When the first Delkims came out I bought a set mainly for Carp fishing both in the UK and Europe but these failed badly due to rain ingress then I discovered Good Fishing alarms which have been brilliant for many years with the only downside being the small size of the roller which can induce line skips if you have the back end of the rods high. In more recent times, have been using the Gardner ATTS alarms with 4 magnet wheels which to me are superb especially as they are heads are silent and will not transmit sound through the water. For some types of fishing I still use both the Optonics particularly when the big roller gives a distinct advantage if the back of the rods are high and the GF alarms for general fishing.

[Paul-H]

Hi

 

My first bite alarm was just the flip top of a Fairy Liquid bottle clipped on the line between the first two rings, does that count.

 

Paul

[Guest 1lastcast]

My eyes, and still going strong after all these years.

[Guest Chris Perch]

Had a set of 3 herons with sounder box (still got them but havent used them for donkeys years) then after a few sessions bought two second hand optonics then magnotonics then delkims.