On 15 Jun 2005 14:24:38 -0700, "riverman" wrote:


But when I did use 7x, I found that my knots were always a weak spot:
I'd touch the grass on a backcast, and the tippet would snap off at the
hook, or I'd be false casting, and the whole front end would break off
at the leader. I didn't fully appreciate how easily a 7x tippet burns
when tying knots: even now I tend to hold my tippet underwater or in my
mouth when I tighten, and I do it very gently. Its healthy to be
paranoid about burning your knots.

Okay, this makes me feel a lot better. A couple of times I was
wondering where the &&*%# my fly went.

I also found that I was wrapping the line around my finger to get a
grip on it when I was tightening it, sometimes even pinching it a
little against my fingernail, and that was weakening it. If your
midtippet breaks are about 6 inches from the knot, I bet that's what's
happening.


Since I've heard about how darn fragile the stuff is, I'm convinced I
was doing a lot of other stuff to weaken it , too!

Anyway, take Tim Js advice; don't fish 7x until you've figured out
everything else, as you probably aren't advanced enough to be using it.
That level of stealth in the tippet is probably being undone by a
thousand other things.


That's advice I'm going to heed.

HTH, and good luck.

It does, and thanks.