Well if you have read the What Pole? section thoroughly and understood it, you should now decided what sort of pole you want/need, how much to spend and to make sure you have your box stable with a nice leg system or indeed a new box. If you have a new pole now, well done and I hope you have made a choice YOU are happy with.

Next is the most important part of the setting up of the pole so that it is ready to go fishing. You need to fit the elastic that is correct for the fishing you are doing.

Maybe your pole came with a complete elastication kit but you do not know what each item is and there functions. Well here is a run down of everything you need/should have for the elastication of your pole.

1) (left) Elastic – Choose the size you need by using my guide below. There are also a few different materials used for elastics nowadays, but more on those later.

 

2) (Right) Connectors – These are tied onto the elastic so that you can connect your rig to the pole. Very simply there is a sleeve that you slide back revealing a hook, now hook theloop on your rig into the hook and slide the sleeve back over it. Simple!

They come in sizes to suit all elastics and now most packets in the tackle shop are clearly labeled with which elastic size is ideal for size of connector. Later I shall show you how to tie this to the elastic the RIGHT way; there are also other ways of connecting your rig to your elastic and that I will also explain later.

3) (Right) PTFE Bushes – This keeps the elastic from being chafed on the carbon at the end of the tip, this simply slides over the end of the tip(or inside it) to keep the elastic running smooth and trouble free. Two sorts are available, Internal and external, details on these a little later on.
4) (Left) Bungs – This locks the elastic in place at the other end of the desired top sections. There again are various types which I will go into further detail later on and also how to fit and tie this on correctly.
5) (Right) Diamond eye threader – to help pull the elastic through the sections.

6) Lubricant – Personally I do not use these; they are highly overpriced and instead I just dip the tip into the lake or river and pull the elastic to get elastic nice and wet. Do this a few times a day and your elastic will run smooth. There are also a few alternatives including shampoo conditioner… More on that later!

 

The right elastic for the job!
Most likely you have bought a pole that comes with at least one extra top kit or indeed you have bought more (Congratulation if you have bought more!). This will aid you in having several sizes of elastics as I have wrote above. So what size of elastics do you set in your top kits?
Well this depends on a few factors that include:

1. The size of fish you are aiming to catch
2. If the venue you fish is one where there is a lot of snags
3. River fishing requires a slightly heavier elastic if the flow is fast and furious

Fitting the right elastics for the fishing situation you are likely to encounter is crucial. It would be silly to use a very light elastic for carp fishing as any self respecting carp would stretch the elastic to its limit (also known as: Bottom the elastic out) immediately and probably snap the elastic too leaving a fish swimming around with a length of line that could possibly snag and result in a death.
So how are the elastics graded?
It starts of with a very light number one up to a mighty 22 elastic for bullying those carp.
Elastic needs to be set through the top 1, 2 or 3 sections of your pole depending on the size of the elastic you are going to use. Here is a guideline I use to determine how much elastic I need to install:

Elastic guide

Elastic	Nr. of sections	Ideal situations
1	1	Very small silver fish on canals
2	1 or 2	Small Roach, Gudgeon etc
3	2	Roach, Rudd and small Perch
4	2	Roach, Small Crucian's and small skimmer Bream
5	2	Skimmers, Good sized Roach and Perch
6	2 or 3	Roach, Skimmers, smaller Bream and Perch with occasional bonus fish
8	2 or 3	Small Bream, Tench and Carp to around 3lb
10	3	Bream, Tench and Carp to around 8lb
12	3	Bream, Tench and bigger Carp
14+	3	Carp, big bream, big tench etc

Elastics bigger than 14
Personally I don’t feel that there is any need to go higher in elastic size than this. I feel anything over a 14 is starting to get into the bullying Carp in. I have seen a few anglers (unfortunately don’t know there names) literally drag Carp in with a 20elastic, and these fish are near on double figures. It does NOT make us anglers look good in the eyes of the general public and is also another crowbar for the anti angler organizations such as the PETA in there aim of banning angling. Some anglers argue that getting them in quicker with heavier elastic and lines will mean less stress for the fish. In my opinion this is total rubbish and if they think that bringing in a fish of several pounds within 30 seconds is less stressful then I would like to see there evidence. Of course you have to decide yourself if you want to use a heavier elastic than this, but remember don’t bully the fish at the same time as not making the fight so long that it cannot recover fairly quickly.