Leaders?

I use a blood knot for building leaders and little else. Given the strength and ease of tying of a triple surgeons knot, why use a blood knot?
 
afishinado wrote:
I use a blood knot for building leaders and little else. Given the strength and ease of tying of a triple surgeons knot, why use a blood knot?
Click to expand...

I find blood knots easier.
 
Sorry for the delay guys - haven't checked this section for a few days.
Anyway, the leader that I now use was posted on the FFP site about 3-4 years ago.
I was kinda interested in it, and asked the poster why he uses the stren instead of regular fly fishing tippet. He said that was it was simply a lot more economical. And it's good stuff to boot. And he actually sent me one of his leaders to try - thanks again RBF.
I do like it better than the Harvey leader. So, I got all the required materiels, and started tying them.
If you guys want it, I'll post the formula
 
Why a triple surgeon?
on braid -yes but otherwise do you really need a triple ?
 
As sandfly said, it's stronger and lays straighter than a double.
 
Not arguing but curious how you improve on 100% which is what the regular surgeons knot is rated with mono -
I just tied a double and triple in 20 pound mono-they lay the same.
Maybe lighter would be different.

I use the regular surgeons all the time in salt-unaware of it before I moved.
Braid to mono needs a triple to keep it from slipping.
 
dryflyguy I would like to see the formula to give it a try I us the Harvey Leader formula so I would like to compare them. And I can see how it would save money.

Justin
 
I've been buying the ones they make at FFP for year. I have never had a problem with them!

PaulG
 
PaulG wrote:
I've been buying the ones they make at FFP for year. I have never had a problem with them!

PaulG
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Agreed. Their dry fly leaders are especially good. I tie my own using the formulas from their little yellow leader book - that book is worth it's weight in gold.
 
jpittman:

This is a dryfly leader that ends up at 11-12 feet long, and uses a 3 ' butt section of Orvis Hy Flote leader materiel

orvis hyflote .019 - 36"
stren lo-vis .016 - 24"
" .014 - 18"
" .012 - 12"
" .009 - 6"
" .008 - 20"
5x tippet - 30"


The original formula called for 5x flourocarbon tippet at the end, but I've been using 5x Orvis surper strong, which is still my favorite
 
Good deal..I'm going to copy this down and give it a try..

Thanks..

hey have you ever figured out the savings? would you say 50% less?
 
Thanks for the formula I will get the material and tye some. Do you have any good nymph formula's that you us the Stren with. Again thanks a lot Justin
 
heres a formula , streight 4lb fluoro off the fly line for subsurface , factory tapered for anything on the surface ...hehehe
i keep it simple.
 
sundrunk wrote:
Good deal..I'm going to copy this down and give it a try..

Thanks..

hey have you ever figured out the savings? would you say 50% less?
Click to expand...

The only way that I can honestly see this saving money, is if you tie an awful lot of leaders. The hyflote and spools of stren each cost around $5 if I remember correctly now. So, I shelled out around $30 to get the stuff to tie this leader. But one of my buddies - who likes the leader also - split the cost with me. And we just pass the kit back and forth to each other when we need to tie leaders. Which I do maybe only once or twice a year.
We started this 3-4 years ago now, so we've definitely got our money's worth out of it - especially compared to buying leaders. And still have a lifetime supply of the materiel, or as long as the stuff stays good, I guess.

However, I really think that the main feature of this leader is the hy-flote butt section. If you guys already have leader materiel for the other sections, I would use it.
I needed new stuff when I started tying these leaders anyway.
And decided to try the stren
 
For $20-$30 bucks i have a whole leader kit , an old plano tackle box , it's made up mostly of maxima but there is some orvis in there too but no stren , in all my fishing endeavors i've never found stren brand stuff to be anything but trouble it twists , kinks and dry rots , even on spinning gear i'd rather use something other than stren.
 
jpittman80 wrote:
Thanks for the formula I will get the material and tye some. Do you have any good nymph formula's that you us the Stren with. Again thanks a lot Justin
Click to expand...

For highsticking I use 36" of Amnesia (thanks HA, that stuff rocks), barrell swivel then a straight length of tippet from 5-6'. I usually use 4x flouro, but I'll throw on mono also, I don't think the fish care either way.

I agree with Osprey about stren, it's crap.
 
Gonna add some amnesia and some orvis hy-float to my arsenal , in my kit i also keep a small tape rule , nail clippers and razor blades , and a pair of magnifying reading glasses , manilla coin envelopes and a sharpie felt tip pen. When i first started tying my own leaders i used small peices of tape to hold the coiled leader together , don't do this 'cause the goo from the tape sticks to the leader material and will mess you up later , found the best way is just to coil around 3 or 4 fingers from tippet end to butt and then wrap the looped butt end around three times at the end , here is the formula for a basic 6' leader , this leader can be adjusted here and there by adding some material or by getting rid of some , like clipping the butt end or adding tippet , really from this base leader you can adjust to cover just about any fishing we have here in Pa i start by tying a surgeons loop in the butt end for loop to loop connection and i don't count the length of the loop in the overall length , 15"......017 , 13".....015 , 11".....012 , 10".....010 , 10".....009 , 24".....007
 
I don't normally chime in on gear topics but I thought I would on this one.

I'm of the old school in that, while I build my own leaders, I use the standard formula of 60% butt, 20% mid- and 20% tippet sections, with some slight altering in lengthening the tippet when I see fit.

I tie one leader to fish dries and nymphs and I call it a vari-colored leader since it incorporates brightly colored sections of mono for strike indication.

Vari-colored leader formula as follows:

26" .018" (20 lb.) fluorescent clear blue Stren
22" .016" (17 lb.) fluorescent clear blue Stren
16" .014" (14 lb.) fluorescent gold Stren
12" .013" (12 lb.) fluorescent clear blue Stren
10" .011" (10 lb.) fluorescent gold Stren
8" .009" your choice mono
8" .007" your choice mono
36" your choice mono

For 4X don't change anything except add desired length of .007" for tippet. For lighter tippet, add 8" lengths to step down, by .002" diameter sections, to desired tippet diameter.

I've been using this vari-colored leader since the 1970's. The idea of bringing this material into the leader formula is something I CAN NOT claim. The formula, however, is mine.

I use the %-age formula because it allows me to tie leaders to use for all conditions, an example of which would include a short leader to turn over dries for small streams.

Dave R.
 
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