Quick and dirty homemade disc retriever

[Essington]

While playing yesterday, a friend shanked his drive really bad and it landed about 50' out in the lake. This is a glacial fed lake that never really warms up, and we didn't really feel like going for a swim in the frigid waters. There are no disc golf stores around, so just going out and buying a Golden Retriever wasn't really an option. The solution was to buy a 4' stick of 1/8 ready rod and bend it into a similar type of tool:







Ingredients:

4' of 1/8" steel rod ($3.29)
couple strips of gorilla (duct) tape (had that)
some dacron kite line (any reasonably strong string would work)

I just bent the rod into this shape, taped the ends down, and tied the kite line on. The whole process took about 5 minutes, and it got the disc on the first try!

It is not nearly as nice as the golden retriever, but three dollars and change and five minutes sure beats $25 + shipping and waiting for a week.

 

[Viper124]

I'm intrigued. How easily does it store?

 

[solomon.trenton]

noy like the retriever

 

[Essington]

I'm intrigued. How easily does it store?

Yeah, like I said, it is no Golden Retriever. It is always that size. You could drop it in your disc bag and use it as another divider I guess.

 

[Mike C]

I like that idea. I might do that. My friend just lost my retriever and I don't feel like paying for another one at the moment since the local water hazards will be frozen before too long.

 

[kpc2004]

I like that idea. I might do that. My friend just lost my retriever and I don't feel like paying for another one at the moment since the local water hazards will be frozen before too long.

if your friend lost it then maybe he should be the one paying for a new one...


cool idea with the home made one, im suprised you fished the disc out of the middle of a lake though

 

[chain-addicted]

Sweet. I'm fixin' to make me one and go troll Winthrop Lake.

 

[Mike C]

if your friend lost it then maybe he should be the one paying for a new one...

We found it so I can't complain. Pulled out over 30 discs with it while we had it too.

 

[craftsman]

I like that idea. I might do that. My friend just lost my retriever and I don't feel like paying for another one at the moment since the local water hazards will be frozen before too long.

Lol... Did you attempt to say, "hold on to the end of the rope"?

 

[Mike C]

I had tied a length of paracord to the longer piece of rope I already attached to it and the knot came undone somehow as he was fishing out a disc. Nothing he could of done. My fault for tying a crappy knot I guess.

 

[solomon.trenton]

you failed at boy scouts i presume

 

[AJ_86]

That's why you should not tie the two ropes together, but use something twice as long as them combined. That's what I'm going to do.

 

[phayes]

How do these work? Do you just flip the thing out there and retrieve it, hoping a disc bites? My local hazard has about a foot of mud before bottom, would this still skim that top?... the discs rarely sink into the mud itself..

 

[LoPan12]

How did you manage to get a disc 50 feet out? Lots of attempts? Just chuck and pull?

 

[Essington]

How did you manage to get a disc 50 feet out? Lots of attempts? Just chuck and pull?

Sailboat! We just motored to the location of the disc, chucked the retriever in the water and dragged it to the disc. No need to get wet at all.

Though in hindsight, it'd probably have been less of a hassle to use a canoe than to motor from the marina.

 

[Essington]

How do these work? Do you just flip the thing out there and retrieve it, hoping a disc bites? My local hazard has about a foot of mud before bottom, would this still skim that top?... the discs rarely sink into the mud itself..

The idea is that, if you can see the disc, you toss the thing past it, and drag the rope over the disc. the disc will get caught in the square base, and you can drag and / or lift it out of the water.

 

[Essington]

That's why you should not tie the two ropes together, but use something twice as long as them combined. That's what I'm going to do.

That's just plain crap, use a sheet bend backed up by a couple of half hitches, you'll be good to go.

... Or, if you can't tie good knots, tie lots of knots!

 

[bhuff]

Thats what they say..."Tie a knot or Tie a lot"

 

[JSurmann]

I enjoyed looking at your quick and dirty idea.

 

[AJ_86]

That's just plain crap, use a sheet bend backed up by a couple of half hitches, you'll be good to go.

... Or, if you can't tie good knots, tie lots of knots!

And shorten the overall length. I have rope that is more than twice as long as provided by the golden retriever.

Why not use it instead?