Great article on making your own furled leader

[UrbanFF]

Try it out if you're better with your hands than I am and let me know how it goes, feed back todate has been excellent.
http://www.hatchesmagazine.com/page/may2006/185 

[icstuff]

Why would I want one of these?

[UrbanFF]

IC do you want an answer from the cost benefits alone or rather from where and how you would fish it ?

[J-Rock]

 :shre:

[schloshd1]

IC do you want an answer from the cost benefits alone or rather from where and how you would fish it ?

Where and how would you fish these and what are differences/benefits of them vs standard hand tied tapered leaders of various lengths/tapers tied to be appropriate for the conditions/techniques that you are fishing?

[Manuel Junior]

 :shre:

[UrbanFF]

For me the most important aspect is the shock absorption qualities and protecting my tippet. When one makes comparisons to a hand tied leader this is the major difference.

[schloshd1]

Boiling hand tied mono leaders works very well for that too. The ones that I use have roughly 20% stretch to them and are a great for protecting light tippets, I fish 6X stroft when fishing dries for smallmouth and have yet to have tippet break.  I am curious to try these furled leaders though, although they seem like a lot of effort for pretty much the same result as a hand tied/boiled leader. I will try find the time to make one up before Sunday and see how they compare to the leaders that I usually fish.

Thanks for sharing the article.

[UrbanFF]

Maybe you could share your technique and recipe, how much vinegar do you use when boiling it up ?


Making the jig is painful but once that is done it is relatively simple to make the leaders. Ken one of my clients has done this and is experimenting with different materials. So far he has made up 3 using 70 thick thread, mono and gelspun with the thread being the best so far.

[schloshd1]

Maybe you could share your technique and recipe, how much vinegar do you use when boiling it up ?


Making the jig is painful but once that is done it is relatively simple to make the leaders. Ken one of my clients has done this and is experimenting with different materials. So far he has made up 3 using 70 thick thread, mono and gelspun with the thread being the best so far.

 half a cup of rice wine vinegar per 500mm mono, regardless of diameter . Salt to taste  . I'll put the formula that I use up this evening. Although there are literally hundreds to chose from on leadercalc.

Are these leaders available commercially? I know that they can be imported but are they available to buy locally?

[UrbanFF]

Not YET    just wondering if it is worth doing and also still looking at the various options available re materials.
Have the jig now so it can be done.

[schloshd1]

I would be keen to try one out. Any chance of getting your client to make one up for me to buy?

[UrbanFF]

Will ask and will revert ASAP thanks.

[schloshd1]

that would be great, thanks.

[schloshd1]

This is the formula that I use for my leaders. It's from a small article that MC Coetzer posted on Flytalk that has some brilliant info in it.

I use maxima for the boiled leader and stroft gmt for the tippet.

Leader is 90cm .42 mm , 60cm .32 mm, 30cm .30mm, 10cm .25mm, 30cm .22mm . I water knot the sections together and tie a small perfection loop in the end of the .22mm. Then I boil it for about 2 minutes. This gets rid of any memory plus gives it great stretch to protect tippets.

Tippet is 40cm 4x, 50cm 5x and if I am fishing dries I add about a meter of 6x. If I am fishing nymphs I leave out the 6x and just add more 5x for the nymping setup.

This is what I use on streams and the Vaal tribs plus for dry fly fishing on the Vaal.