Research on Sinking Lines / Testing leaders / Observations

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The diagrams do not reflect the actual positions of the fly lines in the water as they are schematics. I'm sure the positions of the flies is as measured. (Some interesting surprises appear when you actually put on dive gear and get down in clear water and observe the full sink lines in action.)

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Several questions have come up on the testing of leaders. This is one from Bill Kessler:

When I was down in Big Pine last May you mentioned that you tested all of your knots for breaking strength. My understanding was that you tested the knots before and after playing big fish. I have two questions. 1) How would you describe the effects of playing a big fish for a given amount of time? 2) How do you break the knots/line? Equipment & Technique. Right now I only have a spring scale that is pretty accurate but has tremendous rebound and am looking for a better approach.

Bill....

In answer to your first question: Knots tend to weaken and/or slip when the leader is subjected to widely different tensions while fighting a fish. In general, the longer the battle, the weaker the leader becomes. This is important for obvious reasons not the least of which is the fact that the leader is at its weakest state just as the angler needs to apply the greatest amount of pressure ..... at the end of the fray.

Also: Nylon monofilament gets a bit weaker the longer it is soaked in water. (I don't think that is true of fluorocarbon.)

On testing my knots and leaders:

I don't use a scale or any other fancy tools. For a couple of years I did use Tom White's line tester..... much too big and heavy to take out on the skiff and a lot too expensive to expose to salt water.

Chatillion and other companies do make scales with stops on the marker bar so you can read the breaking strength of line after the test. They are much less expensive than the sophisticated line testers.

Now I'm interested in two things:

1.) The comparison between two or more different knots.

When doing this, I use Lefty's very simple method of tying both knots in the same piece of material. I learned from Lefty to make ten of these, then simply either pull or "shock pull" them until one breaks. (If I had done it on only one sample, it is possible that the break may have been due to the way I'd tied or tightened the knots.)

As you probably know, some knots are strong in mono and not when tied with fluorocarbon. That is a whole different subject.

Many knots which are strong when tied in either nylon mono or FC, tend to fail when used to splice the two different materials.

2.) Which of the knots or materials in my leader system is weakest.

For this, I need only to fasten one end of the leader assembly to a stationary object and pull until something gives way. I do this if ever I've made a change in the way I tie these leaders.

If I wish to compare two leader assemblies, I loop-to-loop them together and pull on both at the same time.

I do test my leaders AFTER a battle .... especially a long one. That has been a real eye opener as I began to see that some of the knots we considered close to "100% knots" including the Bimini twist turned out to be the weakest. This caused me to tie the Bimini a bit differently. The second weakest knot was the Hufnagle between the two limbs of the Bimini and the shock tippet. (Interestingly, the improved blood knot proved to be one of the strongest both before and after a battle !)

Lefty has recommended that the same brand of material be used for each segment of a hand tied tapered leader.* I think he has three reasons for this, all of which make good sense to me: 1. The strength of the knots is likely to be better. 2. Leader turnover and control are better because the mass / diameter is the same. 3. The relative stiffness of each segment is similar or the same, also leading to better control over turnover and presentation.

Of course, if the fish breaks the leader, I simply look to see where the break occurred. I'm happy if this happened in the middle of the class tippet, for obvious reasons.

In order to test the shock tippet for abrasion resistance, Jake Jordan (one of the best informed big game fly guides I have ever known) developed a method which I've never tried. He subjected materials to be compared with one another to the same tension whilst pulling them against the same abrasive material. He tested these on a line tester. After doing this, he noted big differences in the abrasion resistance between various brands of nylon mono and between different formulations of fluorocarbon even when these came from the same manufacturer. Some nylon mono's were more abrasion resistant than some fluorocarbons.

CAVEAT: ALWAYS WEAR EYE PROTECTION WHEN YOU TRY TO BREAK A BIG GAME LEADER !

* LEFTY KREH'S Ultimate Guide To Fly Fishing, p. 183, & 177- 184.

Gordy

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Additional comments on leader testing:

# I really didn't answer Bill's second question, which is how I break the leader. I have a stainless steel post on the desk in my den. I place the hook (if it remains) over this post. Then I make a few turns of the butt section of the leader around a short piece of 1" PVC pipe. I then pull on the pipe until something gives. If the hook is not there, I snell the remaining shock tippet to a brass hook and do the same. If no shock tippet, I wind the end of the leader around the post several times and place a piece of masking tape over it. I also use that tape on the hook iin case it flies off as the break occurs.

# NOT a good idea to continue to use the same leader even if it looks OK after fighting a large fish, for reasons stated above. I must admit that I have done that .... and sometimes came to regret it. Of course, I'm tempted to do that when the "bite is on" ..... which is one of several reasons that I usually carry at least two outfits ready to go in my skiff.

# Lefty uses a real line tester. This is the most accurate way determining true line tensile strength and knot strength as a percentage of line strength. Before I got to use Tom White's device, on occasion I'd use the one at the IGFA office.

# We've talked about testing leaders for strength. After designing a new leader assembly, sometimes I want to know how this leader will perform when casting a particular size and weight of fly. I'll want to know how it turns over and how it may affect presentation. Of course, I can simply rig it up and take it fishing. A "quicky" way of doing it is to rig it and before you go. Then make a few casts with the fly and leader out of the rod tip BUT NO FLY LINE OUTSIDE THE TIP TOP. If good turnover is what you are after, then this leader assembly ought to perform pretty much as the fly line does.... good loop control, smooth turnover and all.

What makes it do that ? ...... This leader will be well "balanced". By that I mean that its taper has a mass profile similar to that of a fly line taper and there are no segments interposed which have significantly greater or lower stiffness than the others. Also, that the fly is weight balanced and its weight is not way out of proportion to the leader design.

Gordy

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OBSERVATIONS

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From Peter Morse My comments in his text in bold blue italics G :

That's great information thanks Gordy.

A very good friend of mine and the man who taught me how to cast and
introduced me to the world of saltwater fly fishing, Gordon Dunlop,
pioneered fly fishing for yellowfin tuna off the east coast of
Australia. One calm clear day out off the continental shelf he
observed that when the fly line sank faster than the fly he never got
a bite from the yellowfin, they always shied away from his fly. From
then on he carried lead twist ons to wrap around the leader right in
front of the fly so the fly would always sink faster than the line.
Because drift speed varied with current and wind he thought this was
more straightforward than tying flies in a range of weights. Yellowfin
of course eat the fly on the sink or on the retrieve and its critical
to control that sink rate according to your drift.

The only time I've run across this scenario is when fly fishing with weighted crab flies for permit over a wreck. They, too, took it on the drop and were turned off by the sinking fly line descending faster than the fly.

At the other end of the spectrum, if I'm fishing with a Clouser weighted fly and suddenly need to present to a fish on top, I nip off the eyes and make the cast. G.