I am thinking about making my own leaders instead of buying tapered leaders, but I can?t find a chart or instructions on how to do this. Any help would be great.
Thanks,
Travis
There are many articles here about leaders and formula but for some reason (the Castwell articles mainly) are not on this server. So until somebody can open them up, this should get you started.
When you buy a leader tying kit, you’ll get a booklet of formulas with it
For many applications this simple formula will work: 60% but section,20% transition section, 20% tippet. This turns over the fly quite efficiently. In other cases a straight piece of mono is sufficient. When fishing dry flies in a current the base formula can be modifiied by using multiple sizes of mono in the transition and switching from hard mono like Maxima in the but section to softer mono for the next two. Vary your tippet length and size as needed for the fly you are casting
My formula, in “PLAIN” English is : for 5 wgt fly line- 4’- 10# mono/fluoro, 3’- 6# mono/fluoro, 2’- 4# mono/fluoro and balance my choice tippet ( depending on conditions). AND since we’re talkin fishing and not brain surgery, I employ an infinite number of variations depending on just what I feel like doing and what materials I have at hand.
You CAN make too much of this.
Mark
Couldn’t agree less Marco
People spend hundreds, if not thousands on reels, rods, lines, flies, and fly materials
And yet the cheapest and most important part of the puzzle is the leader.
You can’t make a good presentation with with a badly constructed leader and you won’t catch many fish with a poor presentation.
I’ve tied my own leaders for about 20 years. I use my own formulas and most are variations of the 60/20/20 base. Some have a shorter butt and longer mid. Others with a longer butt and a shorter mid. Some have both hard mono and soft mono. Some just hard.
It’s not the most glamorous part of the sport, in fact it’s down right boring
But the understanding of why leaders are constructed the way they are increases your fishing IQ
I use furled leaders Jack made me and I love them, but you guys made me curious. What knot or knots are you useing to tie these sections together?
thanks,
hNt
Very good points, Dudley. I’d also add the fact that long leaders catch spooky fish and require some experience in constructing them to tie ones that will actually turn over and fish. For those fond of spring creeks or fishing still or shallow water, these can be a great tool. I’ve sat on many rocks in the middle of a river or an estuary and tied or amended one to work.
Just adding tippet isn’t allways the answer.
Charlie
Dudley.
Et tu Brute? :>)
Mark
PS: Your counterstatement nothwithstanding, I stand by my opinion. BUT, I do agree wholeheartedly that the leader etc. is “where it’s ALL at”. Everything else is vanity.
hNt -
Traditionally, the blood knot has been used to tie the sections together.
The Tie-Fast tool is great for doing what I guess would be a modified blood knot. The tool makes it fast and easy to do the knots, and from my point of view when tying my own knotted tapered leaders, it made keeping the sections close to the formula lengths possible. I had the dickens of a time trying to do the blood knot thing and keep the length of the sections close to the formulas.
Haven’t even considered tying one of those leaders since I started furling my own. Gave away all the Maxima Chameleon material I had and the Tie-Fast tool.
John
Sorry Mark,
no offense of course, just a difference of opinion
The Dennison Blood Knot Tyer is the tool to use for leader making
and I believe Frog Hair has a similar tool that comes with their leader kit.
I don’t use any jig myself, I can do it quicker by hand
thanks for all the help… i will be 90% dry fly fishing spooky fish in clear clear water.
There is a lot of leader tying info here: http://globalflyfisher.com/fishbetter/leadercalc/
Formulas, how-to’s etc.
-wayne
Thats what I use for blood knot work. Ties one in an extremely short time.
Dudley I also tie my own and agree that a good formula trumps haphazard throwing pieces of line together as far as performance goes. Very important also in getting the proper presentation, particularly on dry flies. Would you be interested in sharing formulas? If so please pm me. Thanks.
As far as the original question, it’s really not all that hard to get started. The leader tying kit sold at Cabela’s will do it. Also UV knot sense by Loon Outdoors is highly recommended for finishing the knots. A knot tying tool is favored by some but not necessary, I use one. I also tie at a desk with optimum lighting as well.
Doing an internet search of Leaders/formulas will get you a ton of info. The primary knot used to connect sections is the blood knot. Grogs Knots is a website I use to get an interactive instruction on knot tying. Also the perfection loop is needed if you want a loop to loop connection between leader and fly line. A bit of practice will have you tying good knots in no time. I have found that good flouro tippet can be used on all leaders to get optimum performance on all leaders. I have discontinued the use of mono tippet but use mono for Butt sections and some mid sections only.
Any other questions feel free to pm me.
I have contemplated this for the previous two seasons. Each time I start up and think that I will save a dime here and there by doing it myself when I run across a great sale on tapered leaders. I still have these two sites in my favorites but haven’t made a leader yet.
The previously mentioned global fly fisher site is wonderful if you really want to jump in with both feet but I liked this simplier site for my introduction into leader building: http://www.flyfishusa.com/tackle-tips/leaders/about-leaders.html
I found that Mainstay products were being discontinued last year and I bought 50 tapered leaders for about $.40 each. Yep, 40 cents not $4/e. If you are looking to save money and compare building a leader to buying a $7/e leader yes, it looks like a good deal, but places like Sierra Trading post and others often have great deals on leaders. If I bass fish in a weedy area the knotted leaders always hold more snot that the smooth tapered leader. Then I looked at buying 8 different diameters of Maxximum Chameleon and a blood knot tool plus my time and I just keep coming to the conclusion (For Me) to just buy them cheaper than retail and be happy.
I think by studing the leader formulas though that it has given me some insight into the workings of a fly rod and casting, but I just prefer to buy the things.
Probably should be just buy flies instead of making them, but I am way to far gone on that front too. Enough materials to many lifetimes with no end in site and still buying stuff. I just saw the leader building to take the same path.
Rick
One asset for me as far as building leaders of my own is the ability to later trade them to others who tie flies. Building leaders is far easier than tieing flies in my opinion. I can tie and finish 10 good leaders an hour worth 3-4 dozen flies in trade. Plus it’s similar to alot of other situations in life where items are mass produced. You can build a much higher quality leader than you can buy. Just my opinion.
Also the use of UV Knot Sense finishes the knot and no more picking up weeds, etc.
Once you find a few formulas that work for you (and thats all you really need to cover an entire gamut of line sizes and applications) you can narrow down the materials list and then a search will turn up ways to purchase them in bulk. For instance a 30m spool of maxima for leader costs around $4, which is enough to tie a season worth of leader butts for the average angler, but you can also buy 250 yd. spools for about $11 which you can then use to tie up 100’s of leaders to sell or trade.