I’ll be making two trips to Southern Missouri over the next 60 days to fish for trout and smallies.
I bought some new fluorocarbon tippet.
I believe mono gets “old”, and should be switched out after a season.
Does fluorocarbon get old or brittle?
Only fly fishermen get old & brittle.
Fluoro if stored properly lives very long although it doesn’t stop the manufacturers from putting a freshness date on it.
BTW I have some old mono that is stored properly, ( not too hot or in bright light or sunlight) and never had an issue with it. Sometimes I think that hanging tippet dispensers are a bad idea just because your leader material is in the sun all day.
I have found that flourocarbon is very sensitive to sunlight and tends to become weak and next to useless.
I always choose a spool from the back of the shelf and keep it out of the light and it seems to last as long as there is some line left to use like that.
All the best.
Mike.
Mike:
Not to disagree but that is contrary to everything I’ve ever read on the subject regarding UV light and fluorocarbon fishing line. Could it be a heat issue or just bad fluoro?
In addition to tippets I use fluoro line on my baitcasting outfits, fishing all day out in the sun with the spools and line exposed and I never had any issues with weak line.
Just my experience…
McManus,
One of the nice things about flouro is that it DOESN’T degrade from sunlight and tends to last much longer (around 5 to 10 times as long) as equivalent diameter monofilament IN USE (not ‘stored’).
Properly stored flourocarbon should last forever. Monofilament, however, will degrade over time, even properly stored, but still will ‘last’ in this fashion for avery long time.
Heat extremes are not good for anything related to fishing, but flourocarbon lines hold up better to it than mono does.
One ‘drawback’ to flourocarbon is that it’s not as well suited for dry fly fishing due to it being much denser than mono. Thus it sinks quite readily, but this isn’t as much of an issue in the smaller diameters. It also requires closer attention during the knotting process, as it’s less forgiving due to it’s lower stretch, than mono.
Good Luck!
Buddy
I have had a spool or two become brittle and useless. I have some 13lb tippet that was breaking off like it was 6x on a trip this summer. I don’t claim to know what caused it, but bad fluoro does happen. 
I fish alot of smallmouth and use 10lb mono, tie a loop to attach to fly line and a large surgeons loop to attach streamers, just change by threading through hook eye, makes for quick changes.
smallies are definitely leader shy.
I’ll be fishing on the Niangua River (4x and 5x tippet) and in the state park–Bennett Spring (6x and 7x tippet).
Brands???
Type…tippet …line… leader???
1 Rio
1 Orvis
I’ve have had many spools of both brands. Both worked find when I got them, but went bad due to. . . well something. :shock: I can’t say it’s the brands’ fault because I just don’t know, they could’ve been exposed to something that my other spools don’t and since I didn’t exactly conduct scientific research into why I’m not ready to blame the companies that made the spools.
I have been using Seaguar Carbon Pro 100% Fluorocarbon Fishing Line for leader material for about 6 or 7 years now. I buy it in 200 yard spools and have some that is at least 6 or 7 years old or for as long as I have been using flourocarbon. I have noticed no degradation in the strength or flexability of any of the leader material I use. Believe me I do put this stuff to the test each year. Last year I landed 2 steelhead in the 20 pound range with 12 lb. flourocarbon leader material that is some of the first I purchased, as stated 6 or 7 years ago. I do nothing special when storing this stuff from season to season. It sets in a tackle bag in the garage until it is needed.
A very kind lady from Seaguar just emailed me that their fluorcarbon has a 10 year shelf life if the product is kept at room temperature.
I find that it is good practice to keep replacing leader material no matter what the shelf life of it is. All it takes is one bad spot on your leader to lose that fish of a lifetime. Leader material is cheap and as long as it is properly disposed of why try and extend its usefull life. I always start off with a fresh leader when I go out and sometimes will go through 2-3 leaders a night so I usually will go through a whole 400 yard spool of leader material in a season and don’t have enough worth storing so shelf life isn’t a concern. I have stored spools off season in the past and have had breakage problems come next season.
2 different times I had a spool of fluoro tippet go bad. One was the Rio and the other was Orvis. Both times I was well into the spool when all of a sudden I started experiencing break offs. When I switched to a new spool the breakoffs stopped. I like both of those brands. Not sure what happened?
Greg