Full Sink vs Sinking Tip fly lines

[Prospector]

I swing flies and I fish streamers often. I’ve always used floating line all 45 years of my fly fishing existence. There are some stream where I’m not in the fish zone since my floating line causes my flies to swing just under the surface. My questions are:

- I suspect a full sinking line would require a rod with a stiff backbone. I have a 9ft 6Wt Fenwick Aetos that might be able to handle the extra muscle to get the line out without impacting the rod. Is that true?

- I also regularly use a couple 8 1/2 foot 5WT Rods that handle streamers but also size 18 dries without breaking the tippet. I love these rods for their versatility. Would I risk damaging a rod that has a wide range of light duty uses by using sinking line?

- under what circumstances do you use full sink and when do you use sinking tip?

 

[ryc72]

Before investing in a full sink line why not try polyleaders? If you aren’t tying to get too deep get a 5ft polyleader and get a 10ft polyleader for those really deep holes. This will also allow you to fish the same spool/line throughout the day.

 

[afishinado]

Prospector wrote:
I swing flies and I fish streamers often. I’ve always used floating line all 45 years of my fly fishing existence. There are some stream where I’m not in the fish zone since my floating line causes my flies to swing just under the surface. My questions are:

- I suspect a full sinking line would require a rod with a stiff backbone. I have a 9ft 6Wt Fenwick Aetos that might be able to handle the extra muscle to get the line out without impacting the rod. Is that true?

- I also regularly use a couple 8 1/2 foot 5WT Rods that handle streamers but also size 18 dries without breaking the tippet. I love these rods for their versatility. Would I risk damaging a rod that has a wide range of light duty uses by using sinking line?

- under what circumstances do you use full sink and when do you use sinking tip?

A full sink line is tough to fish in moving water where you often need to mend because of the current. Without mending your line ends up shaped like a pretzel deep in the water. Plus you will find you must strip in nearly all your line in order to recast. Fishing deep water in lakes are is where full sink lines are most useful.

A sink tip line works best to get your fly deep in moving water allowing you to mend when necessary and recast without stripping in all your line.

I agree, a polyleader is a useful tool to temporarily convert your floating lines to a sink tip without changing over your spool or entire reel or rig. A polyleader may be a little harder to cast but works fine using the right rod and properly adjusting you casting technique.

Another choice is to tie on a heavily weighted fly while using your floating line. It works fine to get you down, but you need to employ some different casting techniques such as a Belgium/Oval cast or do harm to yourself and/or maim your fishing buddy.

 

[redietz]

Prospector wrote:
There are some stream where I’m not in the fish zone since my floating line causes my flies to swing just under the surface.

If you're fishing wets, "just under the surface' is usually the fish zone. Streamers, not so much.

I agree with the suggestion of poly leaders. I carry a wallet full of them of different lengths, and different sink rates so that I can adjust for speed of the current, the depth of stream, and how well the streamer sinks on it own. That's harder to do with a fixed sink tip, and, as pointed out, a full sinking line makes mending almost impossible.

And speaking of mending, it in itself has a lot to do with how much your sinks.

 

[Thunderpole]

Iv never fished a sinking line ever just the typical wff, poly leaders are where it's at for me I got a few in my pack and use them accordingly. I'm not out there casting 50' so they work well iv also began weighting alot of my streamers with lead dumbbells whatever. It's still chuck and duck with 4"-6" streamers in the small streams I fish with my 4wt but hey it works

 

[marcq]

I use a full sinking line for streamers and in lakes. It’s a t6. They are cheap on amazon for a rio full sink. I fish it pretty much in moving water one foot or deeper. I don’t hang up often. I also find it useful in lakes fishing midges deep. 20 feet of water. A poly leader is probably a better move if you don’t have a spare reel to dedicate a full sinking line to. Wet would probably work better on a sink tip to. Full sinks cast like crap. Sink tip is much better caster.

The one reason I use a full sink instead of heavily weighted flies is that on the swing a floating line will pull your fly up. I think you get better action on the fly if it’s not a dumbbell style fly. Especially with articulated streamers. They are so bulky it’s good to have that extra depth. Puts the fly right in the fishes face.

 

[troutbert]

I like to keep things simple, so always use floating line.

And I have some heavily weighted streamers to get deep.

You can tie them with coneheads or dumb-bell eyes, and add some heavy wire to the shank also. Or tie the streamers on jig heads.

Along a stream I found a white marabou streamer tied on a jig head. I put it in my box, and put it on occasionally when the water is high. I've caught some large trout on that.

You can also add some BB shot to run a streamer deep. In Joe Humphreys book he wrote about using a "necklace" of split shot. Good term!

And doing things this way means that you don't need to buy a weighted line, carry an extra spool, swap things out, etc.

 

[Prospector]

Thanks for all of the thoughts and insight about the different options and their pros and cons. I do weight my flies quite extensively today. Basically full gamut of unweighted to heavily weighted flies plus I often used up to 3-4 BB split shot in higher water to get my flies down. So I have that part covered but I don’t like using split shot since I can’t detect strikes as well.

Based on performance characteristics that you all covered, I think I will buy a sinking tip and get some polyleaders and experiment. Should be interesting to try something new.

 

[wbranch]

I fish a lot of streamers in various rivers. Some are big, deep, and fast and others not so much. I have never used a full sinking line. Only sink tips and heads attached via the loop to loop connection. I like the Hi-D loop to loop lines only for deep salt water conditions. Stripers in deep channels and tarpon in channels opening to the sea.

All other streamer work I get done with a sinking tip - say 3" - 5" a second. I use mostly WF#7 sink tips as I find them adequate to throw flies as big as #1/0 and they still have the power to land 30" steelhead.

When preparing to cast I like to keep all of the tip and at least 6' of the floating head put of the tip top. Then one or two hauls and shoot 25' - 30' of running line.

 

[gulfgreyhound]

Teeney Sink Tip,my go to line to get flies down. Along with polly leaders and I'm good. GG

 

[timbow]

Sink tip vs full sink are really confusing terms and I’d prefer if manufacturers got away from using them. All sinking lines have a sinking “tip” followed by a either a floating or intermediate running line. Most lines that are designated as sink-tip are the variety that have a floating running line.

The comment that sinking lines aren’t good for rivers because you can’t mend them is hogwash. They belly is what gives motion to your flies and is desirable when fishing streamers or wet flies.

The problem with simply adding a poly leader is that you have not only added a hinge point to your line but you have also added a bunch of weight to the end of a line that was weighted and tapered for a specific rod weight and purpose. They work in a pinch but if you spend any amount of time finding yourself needing to get additional depth, a sink tip or full sink line is a much better choose and will cast much better.