Has anyone used or made a furled leader made of braided line? If so do they float or at least will they with some kind of treatment (floatant).
Thanks.
Tig -
I have never used braided line for anything, don’t even know of what material it is made or how it is made. That said, in all the discussions on this BB about furling over the past 14 or so years, using braided line has never come up as a known or potential material. The silence on that subject probably says it all.
That being said, I see no reason why you couldn’t use it to make a furled leader, with the caveat that the material used and the way it is made might not take kindly to the furling process. The closest I can come to that possibility out of the various materials I’ve used to make furled leaders over the past 17 years, is a kevlar tippet material. As strong as kevlar is when furled properly, kevlar ( at least the version I used ) didn’t take to being furled under high stress. It is the only material I have actually broken on my jig while furling a leader - it just kind of blew up.
The question I have is why you would want to make a furled leader out of braided line, what’s the objective for what kind of fishing ?? Not really asking, but if you want to discuss that aspect of your inquiry you might get some good ideas from some of us who have been into using and making furled leaders for a long time.
John
P.S. The question whether such a leader would float gets to another topic - floating vs. submerged leaders - that has been roundly discussed on this BB in the past. There have been few advocates for submerged leaders of any kind, but a lot of folks do seem to prefer floating leaders just because that is what they learned on and are stuck to.
First of all, the kevlar material referenced above was actually tying thread, not tippet material. Senior moment.
Second, there was a BB thread a while back about Spectra braid, which might be the same or similar to Tig’s intended material.
Third, this morning on YouTube there is a video by a fellow named William B. Tedrick using Sufix 10# braid material to build a furled leader.
Tedrick’s set up, his jig, and method of furling is similar to that used by a number of folks on the BB. His video is rather long, but should be of real value to those interested in learning about furling and how to go about doing it.
John
Thanks John. I have been furling leaders for a dozen or more years. Mostly mono and nylon thread. I have used mono chord (#3?) for dry fly leaders.
I am trying to find a material that will furl tighter. A friend has furled leaders that he has bought that don’t look like any that I have ever seen in real time
or on the internet. Heavy butt section and the points at which it tapers are almost invisible. They are super tight. The ones he uses are 4.5 to 5 ft. in length. Can’t remember right now where he gets them but I will find out. He has developed a system of nymphing with them and an indicator that has proven extremely effective. Can’t give you the exact setup because I haven’t weasled it out of him yet…but I’m still trying. I know that a floating leader for nymphing doesn’t sound right but it is. I am heading to Northern Ont. this week but I will try to find the video you mentioned soon.
The braid that I have is made of Japanese UHMPE fibres - ultra high modulus polyethylene fibres extremely strong with very little to no stretch.
Thanks again
… got the better of my ignorance. So I did some reading and watched a few more YouTube videos on braided line. No reason at all that you couldn’t use it for furling leaders. And a braided line furled leader would probably float just fine with application of an appropriate floatant.
I am still curious about what you are trying to accomplish. Regarding a tighter furl - how much reduction do you favor when you furl your leaders. Way back when, when there were a bunch of folks posting and participating on this BB, it seems most talked about reducing 10%. How that became some kind of standard or norm is something that I never understood.
Personally, I have always gone for 20% reduction ( noting that I only use thread for my leaders, except a couple of nymphing leader made of fluoro which are much different in length and configuration than the thread leaders ). Greater reduction alone might account for the tighter furl that you are interested in. As to a heavy butt section, just add a few loops more for the butt section than you normally do. The combination of more loops on the butt section and 20% or more reduction might get you exactly where you want to be - or not.
If you want or need more strength and less stretch in a leader, braided line may be the way to go. But there may be alternatives to how you furl leaders ( either thread or mono ) that will produce leaders more suited to your purposes.
John
Tig -
No, this is not a sale advertisement.:roll:
Wondering how you are doing with your friend, and approaching the issue of using a floating leader for nymph fishing.
A couple weeks ago I happened across a very old thread, while looking for some other information, which included some thoughts from one of the really good furlers on this BB at the time. He suggested furling to 30% reduction to improve the stiffness of even a thread furled leader. I haven’t tried it because I much prefer the most supple leader I can make, but it might be something that will work for you.
On the subject of thread furled leaders being used for nymph fishing, yesterday I was fishing one of my “standard” thread furled leaders with about 4’ of 4X tippet to a large salmonfly dry fly with a couple small nymphs ( t.c.t.k. and later a flashback PT ) dropped with another 4’ or so of 4X. That rig worked just fine with my fast action 9’ for 4 wt rod. My thread leaders don’t float, by intention and design - they submerge, but will not sink even a small dry fly. For example, after I was done nymphing yesterday, I tied on a size 16 mahogany dun emerger pattern fished on the surface dry and caught several fish with that set up.
Anyway, just thought I would pass along the information for you or anyone else happening across this thread interested in the subject.
John
Thanks John. I am finding that the braided line having no stretch tends to become somewhat loose after furling. I believe it is the stretch factor in a material that keeps the leader tightly furled. As for size of leader and butt section I know pretty much how to alter them. It’s the shape and tightness of the butt section that is different than anything I have seen. I probably need to get another look at the actual leader. I am pretty sure that he will order one for me when he orders some new ones. Thanks again for the time and info. I’ll try to keep this thread updated if any changes.
Tig (and John)
I have been furling leaders for 15 years since I met Kathy Scott a a fly fishing convention. Since then, I have been looking for the perfect material for furling. I tried braid line but it is bulky and tends to loosen. I now use Berkley’s Nanofil (2-8 lb)for my leaders. Its not a braid but made of “Dyneema” fibers. It has a very thin diameter but has no stretch. The line has very little mass to aid in turnover. I have found that building a 5 ft leader using Kathy Scott’s method works great with the NanofiI but modifications are needed from the Kathy Scott method. First I use 15% - 20% reduction. I let furled legs wrapped around each other but l not let the wrapped 2 legs unwind. I keep the leader tight by spraying the wrapped legs with a polyurathane clear coat while still under tension. I am not an materials engineer, but I think the polyurathane dissolves or rearranges some of the fibers and allows the leader to retain the tension after it dries. The tension is very important because it provides the resistance for turning over the fly. Adding 2-5ft of your favorite tippet material provides enough suppleness for dry flies. The good qualities of a Nanofil leader is 1) it floats 2) it last forever 3) it has great turn-over 4) super strong 5) not weakened by wind knots. The down side is that Nanofil runs $20 for 150 yards. I .use the leader for nymphing, dies, and streamers. I make leaders from 1wt to 10 wt. by modifying the # of wraps and the diameter of the line (2lb-8lb). I doubt this is how Tig’s friend’s leader is made since I have never seen a commercial leader made this way but it sounds like something similar. Good luck in your leader journey. I ended my leader journey 5 years ago.
… for joining and advancing the discussion. I went back and looked at some old posts on furling, and ran across a thread you started about ten years ago on using different materials. That was in the heyday of participation on the Furling forum with all kinds of interesting input from a good variety of BB members.
Anyway, I learned furling from a fellow in Idaho Falls who used an old rope making machine to teach a class on furling. His method was / is quite different from Kathy’s. I ended up designing my own furling jig based on his approach, which was rather a vexing process but was also quite rewarding in the end.
I did review Kathy’s video a good number of years ago and found her method rather cumbersome, especially compared to the method I learned. Several other BB members use a method very similar to the one that I adopted, some of whom furl commercially. Kudus to Kathy for what she contributed to the general awareness of furled leaders and getting a lot of folks started, but also to others who brought alternatives to the discussion.
All that as background to saying it is difficult for me to understand some of the technique you describe in your post. Folks who do use Kathy’s method will likely understand them quite readily.
What is apparent from your post here and in earlier discussions is that you have experience with a significant variety of materials, pursue many different species and fishing situations with a large arsenal of fly rods. Conversely, I only pursue trouts in freestone rivers in Montana and Idaho. Whereas you favor complexity, I favor simplicity. So I use the same basic thread furled leader that I first learned something like seventeen years ago. You favor floating leaders, for good reason, and I favor leaders that submerge for similar reasons. You have a lot more to contribute to a discussion of Tig’s initial question about braided line for furled leaders that float, both helping Tig and others interested in different possibilities.
The question of floating leaders and tippets vs submerged leaders and tippets had quite an airing years ago on the BB. I won’t get into that again here, but I did have a recent chuckle watching a YouTube video by a fellow who claimed to have just discovered the secret to catch more fishies fly angling with dry flies, in particular. He demonstrated the newly discovered secret with a couple underwater views showing a floating tippet and one showing a tippet submerged by adding something to help it break the surface tension and sink, both attached to a dry fly. The floating tippet caused some disruption to the surface of the water while the submerged tippet did not. He posited that the floating tippet disruption to the surface put fish off in a way that the submerged tippet did not.
Now, I don’t buy the YouTuber’s experiment because the conditions he presented don’t come close to any real world angling situations other than on perfectly still stillwater. But based on my experience over the years, using very supple thread furled leaders with very supple tippet that submerge for dry flies, I do believe that a better presentation is possible with that set up than with a stiffer leader material and floating tippet.
Thanks again for jumping in here. And the trip down memory lane on the ten year old thread you started.
John
John,
I agree with you about better presentation of a supple furled leader. My leader journey led me to an assumption that the main purpose of the first, and in my case, the only 5 ft section of the furled leader, is tapered to turn over the fly. In my view, my furled leader is only an extension of the tapered fly line. This is probably due to the fact that I am not a great caster and anything that helps me get a good loop is paramount. The suppleness I look for is in the tippet. I fish trout fish the Driftless in Wisconsin and my one leader will suit me in all my presentations. When I cast, I assume that the fish will see my 5 ft furled leader so when I cast I try to only make my tippet land close upstream. I vary my tippet for the different presentations. For small dries, I will tie on about 3 ft of 4X and tapper to 3 ft of 6X so technically I am fishing a 12 ft leader. When I nymph for trout in riffles I tie on about 3 ft of 4X and place the indicator on the leader in front of the tippet ring. The floating leader lets me know along with the indicator possible drag issues. The leader becomes a sighter when high sticking. When I throw streamers, I tie on 3X to the depth I want to fish. It is very possible that I fish all 4 ways with flies varying from size 20 to size 8 on a driftless spring creek and by varying my tippet can can accommodate how I have to fish by using only one type of leader. The convenience of not having to change my leader has a big influence on my choice of leaders. I hope this makes sense to you. My last guided trip was a drift trip on the Madison. The guide had no knowledge of “furled” leaders so he set up my rod with his preferred double indicator nymph rig. I did learn a new nymphing technique with the double indicator but it was vary similar how I nymph with my furled leader.
Thanks for your input.
caribe
… Caribe, about supple leaders and tippets. But first, note that you may well have more sophisticated fish in the Driftless area than we have out here in the west. Regardless, one of my principles for fly fishing is that I only fish for near sighted, colorblind, dumb and starving fishies. Improve the odds.
In his 1999, or thereabouts, book Wisdom of the Guides, Paul Arnold interviewed ten prominent guides from the Intermountain West and Northern Rockies. I am virtually certain it was Craig Matthews, but I gave away my copy of the book, which was gifted to me by Paul, so I can’t be positive it was Matthews, who spoke to the need for long traditional mono leaders with fine tippets when fishing dry flies. The leader had to be long and the tippet fine to overcome the dragging and / or steering effects of the stiff butt and relatively stiff mid sections of the leader on the dry fly, i.e. the negative impact on presentation inherent in the mono leaders of that era.
Fast forward, not all that many years, to the expanding universe of very supple thread furled leaders and supple tippets to improve presentation. They have been my staple for dry fly fishing since learning how to make them in 2004.
A couple experiments that I did some time ago speak to the advantages of thread furled leaders and some of the commonly held thoughts about how fish are put off by fly lines and visible leaders.
In 2010, I was doing quite a bit of fishing with a Tenkara rod. One day I was fishing on the Bitterroot River, which is fairly heavily fished and isn’t known for a lot of near sighted, colorblind, dumb and starving fishies, with a light colored furled thread Tenkara line / leader with several feet of tippet. Over a few hours, I had managed to shorten the tippet and when I was about finished fishing, somehow I had it down to not much more than a foot. I saw some fish rising, so I just tied on a fly to the foot long tippet, and proceeded to catch some fishies. Hmmmmm.
One of my homebrew 11’ or so Tenkara line / leader rigs was a bright orange. One day planning to nymph on the East Fork of the Bitterroot with a big stonefly nymph, I decided to experiment with the Tenkara line / leader with the nymph tied as close to the end of the bright orange leader as I could get it. A couple inches, at most. That was the most difficult nymph rigged I ever cast - huge, slow, open overhead loops to get the fly out over the water, and then a long, slow agony waiting for all that sink resistant thread to let the nymph get down to where there might be some fish. After a half dozen fish landed, I figured the experiment had worked and went to a more “traditional” nymph rig. I think the success of that experiment was because the fish took the bright orange leader as the largest San Juan worm attractor they had ever seen, but went for the easier to swallow morsel.
Anyway, I don’t advocate for one foot long tippets off thread leaders for dries or two inch tippets off bright orange leaders for nymphing - but I do advocate for experimenting.
John
John,
Great story…I love the reference to the need to target the “near sighted, colorblind, dumb and starving fishies”. Some years ago I was fishing a winter midge hatch with my nephew. He tied on a size 18 dry with 8 inches of tippet on one of my furled leaders. He promptly placed a perfect cast and and caught a 12 inch brown on his first cast. He ended the conversation with “and what were you saying about my short tippet?” Granted, we were fishing private water in the Iowa driftless that does not get fished very often, but he still caught the fish with a 8 inch tippet. I think our fishing techniques are developed by the habits of the trout in the water we fish. Thank God for near sighted, colorblind, dumb and starving fish, otherwise I would have to lie a lot more about my fishing adventures. I like your quote…“the fish are always right”. It sums up our conversation very well.
caribe
Yes, indeed !
John
Yes, indeed.
John
Last time out, I was using an FEB Salmonfly dry to nymph with a small dropper. The dry was tied just over 3 inches from the tippet ring on a light colored thread furled leader.
So today, when I started fishing, I decided to do some of that experimenting, and fished the FEB Salmonfly as described above - 3" from the tippet ring.
Well, holy moly, first cast a small trout hit the fly. Several hits by small fishies on the pointless fly and then a solid tug by a larger fish. Over about an hour experimenting with this set up, had about eight small fish and half a dozen mature fish hit the fly. Only a few held on much longer than a few seconds, but the largest one ( looked to be in the 16-17" range ) held on for 10-15 seconds before going bye-bye.
Like I said, holy moly - whatever that actually means.
John
… to yesterday’s post about the experiment with the three inch tippet.
The temps were in the low 30’s, no wind, the shelf ice from several days ago was gone, no slush ice where I fished although there was quite a bit just a few miles upstream, fishing in a shaded area, ice in the guides constantly for the first hour or so, and the water was really cold but much lower again and running very clear. Altogether not great conditions for fishing dry flies, which made the success of the experiment even more surprising.
One of the advantages to playing tag in these conditions is that you don’t have to wet your hands and handle fish in and out of the water. My hands were cold enough even wearing gloves, which doesn’t make for great casting. But you got to do what you got to do - have some fun.
John
John
I wish you would have not shared your short tippet story. It seems like right when I think I got this furled leader stuff all figured out, the fish, once again prove me wrong. 
I do like your idea for keeping the hands dry on cold days. Holding the fish is definitely overrated.
caribe
Since posting this observation regarding submerging leaders and tippets, I’ve run across two YouTube videos that commented on submerged tippets. ( I may have commented on the first one previously on this thread but I’m not inclined to check it out. )
One fellow, can’t recall who it was or the title on the video, indicated he had recently found the secret to catching more trout. He found that a floating tippet made some light reflection on the water which he thought might put off the trout, so he decided to put a bit of weight on the tippet to submerge it and discovered that that change immediately upped his take count.
Notably, Peter Charles, who has published all kinds of stuff on fly fishing over quite a long time and goes by hooked4life.ca on YouTube, indicated in one of his videos that he had observed floating tippet cause some light reflection on the water surface and found that adding a length of fluro tippet ( I think it was something like 12-24" ) which would submerge the tippet but not sink the fly, obviously eliminated the light reflection problem and increased his hook ups.
I recently broached this subject with Brian Fleschig ( spelling ) at Mad River Outfitters in Columbus OH after watching him have a very poor day on Slough Creek in YNP last fall. His video showed his floating leader clearly visible not that far from what appeared to be a rather high floating hopper pattern - lots of foam. I suggested that a low riding pattern, like the FEB Hopper, fished off a submerged tippet would likely have been a more successful rig. Brian hasn’t commented, and I doubt that he will. What came through on his video of his experience on Slough Creek was that he was more interested in selling ( rather expensive ) goodies than catching fishies.
John
… Galloup to the ( short ) list of folks who advocate adding a section of fluoro tippet to a mono leader when fishing dry flies to eliminate any reflection of light by the leader on the surface of the water near the fly.
In his eight year old youtube video on winter fishing with midges on the Madison River, Kelly makes this point, along with a number of other observations on winter fishing and fishing midges. Investing a few minutes watching Kelly’s video is an enjoyable and worthwhile way to pass some time on a winter day.
John
I noticed this thread was active again so I read it over. I had forgotten that I even posted it originally.
I read in here where John S. says he had a seniors moment and had made a mistake about something. Well I was able to get another look at the leader that I was talking about and it was not at all how I remembered it. Actually it was very simple. It is made of tying thread, Daniels 3/0 waxed mono cord. Whenever I make furled leaders on a traditional board
I always have 6 strands making up the last section where the tippet ties to. I have never figured out how to make it less than 6 (and with thread I,m not sure I would want to).
The leader in question as I stated earlier is 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 feet in length. It is made up of 6 strands for the whole length. Maybe 8 I have never taken one apart to count but the diameter size looks to be 6. There are no tapers in it. That’s why I couldn’t see any (duh). There is a strobe loop at both ends. That is the great mysterious furled leader. One thing about getting older, you learn more. If I had remembered how this leader was made in the first place we wouldn’t have all the fine discussion that has been generated by trying to figure something out that doesn’t exist.
What I have done is played around a little with this leader. I added a butt section approx 10 inches long consisting of of 11 strands. Haven’t had a lot of opportunity to use it but did like how it worked on dries ( 16 & 18 caddis).
I figured out how my friend uses them for nymphing. The 4 1/2 are the preferred length. Treating them helps. The tippet length has to be right for the depth of water (and speed of current) so that the fly is close to the bottom without getting snagged. There is a shorb loop in the leader and the tippet (flouro) is added loop to loop style. Indicator yarn is inserted in the shorb loop before the two loops are snugged up. The drawback here is that the indicator material is not adjustable.
You have to know your water or make your tippet longer so that you can trim it back to the right length after a few test drifts. If set up properly the tippet should hang almost straight down in the water under the leader. I am not certain but he might add a small amount of weight to the tippet, perhaps tungsten putty which can be easily adjusted. I am quite sure he adds no weight in the construction of his nymphs. He has been fly fishing for over 45 years and had been guiding full time
for more than 20. Still guides part time and is very successful. There is probably more to this system than I can figure out but that is the basics. Maybe not terribly new to some but he says since using it he has greatly increased his clients success.
Thanks again for all the help and research from those who responded. Sorry for the blooper but that is my favourite part of the movie.
By the way I am still playing with braided line, just have to figure out the “slippery” factor.