Many of us started furling because of Kathy Scott and we know that Parnelli has taken furled leader formulas to another level.
I thought you all might be interested in a comparison of Kathy’s original DVD formula to what Parnelli’s “Big Tapered Leader Formula” would recommend for peg spacing.
Kathy’s…18" - 42" - 66"
Parnelli’s…30" - 51" - 66"
Do with it what you will.
Oh, and I want to credit Karel Gol from the Netherlands for providing me the writable spread sheet to get these figures.
I really appreciate you posting this. I have been using Kathy’s formula from the beginning, but, I wanted a furled leader close to 7’ so I have increased Kathy’s peg distances equally to get a 7’ leader. Just to experiment with Parnelli’s formula, I increased his peg distances equally so that I could get close to a 7’ furled leader. I put screws in my board where the pegs would be so that I could quickly make up a furled leader with Parnelli’s formula and I must say that there is a big difference in the furled leader. I will try it out tomorrow on a fly rod to see what it feels like. Just casting the furled leader with your hand really is a shock. It seems to be a very powerful leader for turn-over! His formula makes the butt section of the furled leader a lot longer than Kathy’s and makes the tippet section a lot shorter. Just a hand cast test and I really like the feel of the furled leader! So far, I really like it and tomorrow I will do some yard and river casting and see what I think of it on a rod with tippet and fly attached.
Thanks, ducksterman for posting this and sharing it…
It’s interesting, isn’t it?
Two of my favorite things about furled leaders - how simple they can be, and how much you can experiment with them.
It’s counterintuitive to think that one leader would work for application, but the variety of materials and tapers, wow.
Early on, I remember Andy Sobota (who was working in Kelly Galloup’s shop) showed me his board. It had movable peg stations, and he was making butt heavy leaders for some applications and “shooting tips” for others. An experimenters dream, and he had all the variety of the West Yellowstone area to test each application. What fun.
I’ve been thinking a bit about tenkara line ideas, furled leader-lines…
Kat
The proportions I’ve been using, based on the recommendations of the fellow who taught the system I use and my own research on leader proportions, are 40% butt section, 30% mid section, and 30% tip section.
Very close to parnelli’s proportions which come out at about 45%, 32%, and 23%, if I am interpretting Duck’s original post correctly.
Those proportions, both on 10-8-6 and 14-12-10 configurations with Danville 210 make for a very “castable” ( by hand ) leader. And really turn over larger flies nicely. Warren sent me a couple of his experiments, and while I really like the one that I have tried so far, for smaller flies, it doesn’t have quite enough in the butt section to handle larger flies and windier conditions. ( Hope you don’t mind my making that comparison here, Warren. )
Also, I did furl a fly line last year, Kathy, by furling three 7’ level sections ( I think they were six or eight strands ) of fly line backing, putting very small shorb loops in both ends to loop to loop the sections together for a 21’ fly line. Add a regular furled leader, and you’re good to go. Only fished it a couple times, and with a stick, literally, not a fly rod, but it worked well enough. I think on a fly rod it would be a very interesting line for small creeks. No need for a reel.
John
John,
(Hope you don’t mind my making that comparison here, Warren.)
No problem here…I enjoy hearing from others and what did or did not work for them. This feedback lets me know which direction I need to go to improve on furled leaders. That is why I send furled leaders out to those I feel will give honest feedback to me. Furl leader making is a lot of fun and using them is even more fun. I have, in the past, sent out some experimental flies to receive honest feedback, but, I cannot say that I received much feedback which leads me to believe that either they did not work out or they were immediately cast aside and never used because the person did not like the looks of them.
This is an interesting thread and has good feedback…
While I think about it…
It seems to me that almost all folks are happy with their furled leaders…no matter the formulas…what this says to me is that they are so good that almost “anything goes”…but having said that…my feeling is that Parnelli’s formulas are probably based on good science and lead to improvement.
Warren,
I too have used Kathy’s formula for 7 ft leaders…but I think going to a 7 ft leader it would be better to go to a 3 stepdown formula rather than Kathy’s 2 stepdown…
Here’s the Big Form. for a 7 ft Kathy 2 step…
43" - 73" - 95"
I use 95" because that is the total length of my board…
Warren,
Any conclusions you want to share?
Anyone?
do those numbers mean the butt section is 10 or 14 strands, the next section is 8 or 12 strands and the final section is 6 or 10 strands??
i’m a newbie, so i dont know all this stuff 
and duckys numbers are where the pegs are positioned??
Norm,
John is using two different formulas…the numbers do indeed represent the number of strands of thread / mono /whatever…
And the numbers I gave represent the peg positions as measured from the butt end peg/hook…