Hey all you crappie fisherman. I am also new to this board and I like it. I love to crappie fish and make crappie sets. Me and a buddy of mine have been making 8x8 sized stake beds out of oak slabs and they stand about 4 to 5 feet tall. They are great for making stake beds out of and hold fish very well. It takes a lot of work to cut all the slabs to the size we need but when they are done they are nice. Try to make them as lite as you can so they will sink easy. We get the oak slabs from local saw mills in our area and the cost is almost nothing just labor. We are cutting the frames out of the slabs and cutting the stakes as well and use galvanized roofing nails to nail them together. We got our idea from a local crappie fisherman who is very wise to catching crappie. This guy has almost 200 sets in the lake that we fish and he is always catching very good fish. We went to his house one day and he showed us xactly how he does it. These stake beds we are making are for the large lake in our area.
I have also been making some of my own for some of the smaller strip pits that I fish. I found a very big area of southern IL. bamboo the other day and have started making some sets out of that. Take a card board box about the size of a concrete block and stand about 5 or 6 bamboo shoots in the box. Make them as tall as you want, mine are about 8 feet tall. put quick crete in the box secure the bamboo to keep them upright and let the concrete set up. Drop box and all in the lake and use more weight if needed. Instant crappie set very cheap and easy to make. Drop several boxes in one area and you have a good crappie stake bed.
I also made some from pvc and used a milk jug to hold the pvc. I take the pcv and cut it about 40 inches long or as long as you want and stick as many of them thru the milk jug. When I get done with them they look kind of like the new pvc sets you can buy from Bass Pro. Just go to their web site and check them out there sets are green. After I get done with that I fill the jug with quick crete and use more weight if needed to sink them. I have about five dollars in each pvc set.The bamboo is cheaper than the pvc and it grows along side of this country road, lots of it.
Didn't mean to ramble just wanted to share my ideas and I hope it helps.