Who's using knotted tapered leaders?

[dudley]

I probably should add that you should never step-down more than .003" at a time. .002" is best.

So the lighter the tippet, the more graduations you need.

Then there's the line power transference
A 6wt line will need more graduations than a 3wt line, because the power of the thicker line needs to step down more sizes than the thinner line,
? Does that make sense?

So
A 9' leader for an 8wt or better line, that ends in a tippet of 16#- 20# test would only need three sections.
A 9' leader for a 6wt line that ends in a tippet of 5x is going to need 8 or 9 graduations
A 9' leader for a 3wt line that ends in a tippet of 5x is going to need 7-8 graduations

Okay
Now ya got 3-4 fairly long graduations in the butt. Each one slightly shorter that the one before it
Then another 4 or 5 short graduations for the mid.
Then your 20" tippet

Let's put together the 60%,20%,20%, 9', 5x for a mid weight rod (5,6,7)

30" -.021
18" -.019
12" -.017
5" - .015
5" - .013
5" - .011
5" - .009
20" -.006

That's ideal
Probably more trouble than I would go through for pan fish.
You can skip a graduation or two (or three) along the line, as long as you don't step down more than. .003" at a time




Then again.... sometimes I just use straight mono