I've fished tip ups religiously for a long time. Like to leave them out all night when sleeping on the ice and use the strike sensor pager system to notify if flags pop. Hands down, the best set up is the traditional wooden Beaver Dam tip up with 2 round foam hole covers on each tip up. I've used polar, frabil wooden, frabil round, polar round, polar popups (look like a little rocket), the new frabil straight line (complete junk). The 2 foam hole covers work for two reasons (1) double the insulation (2) Gets the tip up off the ice if the snow is blowing and prevents snow buildup from jamming the flag. All of these other tip ups work when the weather is nice but the beaver dam setups will work when its bitter cold. The lube they put in the shaft (sounds terrible) does not get gummed up when it gets ice build-up on it. They are a little on the spendy side (I think around $40 apiece) but are well worth the money. Plus, they have a longer shaft to keep the spool in the hole, unlike some of the other models. I put two of these out this past Saturday in the wind and cold and did not have to skim them once (partially because we kept pulling fish through the hole), ran them from around 2pm till about 8pm and it was ridiculously cold and windy. Hope this helps....nice website (first post).
