"furled" leaders

laid up for a week now by a couple surgeries, I've been browsing and ran
across ads for "furled" leaders

OF COURSE, the ads promise these will change my life, and guarantee I make
100% accurate casts, truly brilliant presentations, EVERY time g

I tried "braided" leaders many years ago and didn't find them worth the $
and hassle,

.... are "furled" leaders just another name for the same thing?

..... care to relate any "furling" experiences you may have?




...... bored as I am ?

Larry L wrote:
laid up for a week now by a couple surgeries, I've been browsing and ran
across ads for "furled" leaders

Bummer. Try Budweiser and grapefruit juice (not together). I
believe in the healing power of Budweiser and grapefruit juice.
It may not be standard medicine but it's always worked for me.

OF COURSE, the ads promise these will change my life, and guarantee I make
100% accurate casts, truly brilliant presentations, EVERY time g

I tried "braided" leaders many years ago and didn't find them worth the $
and hassle,

... are "furled" leaders just another name for the same thing?

.... care to relate any "furling" experiences you may have?

Tried 'em, didn't like 'em. Furled leaders make a hell of a
splash that negates whatever "delicate presentation" advantage
they allegedly provide.

..... bored as I am ?

The guy who was really bored is whoever decided to "furl" leaders
in the first place.

--
Ken Fortenberry

"Ken Fortenberry" wrote

The guy who was really bored is whoever decided to "furl" leaders
in the first place.



looking at the instructions on making one ..... I'd say you are right
.....bored when he started, likely half mad by the time he finished

Larry L wrote:

looking at the instructions on making one ..... I'd say you are right
....bored when he started, likely half mad by the time he finished

It's not as hard as it looks. I do mine with an old "eggbeater"
hand-drill and simply twist each leg until it shortens enough so that
when it's transferred to the nail it is kept taut. Pick up the two legs
together and reverse the direction of the drill. As you rotate the
drill you will feel the leader start to relax and lengthen. If you go
too far it will start to tighten up again. Simply reverse it for a
couple of turns; when you have the right amount of twist it will simply
lay out flat.

Maybe I'm crazy, but after the first couple of tries, I started to
enjoy myself. I'd put on some music, set the board on my workbench and
in about 30 minutes I'd have a leader.

So it looks like I'm the only ROFFian who admits to using a furled
leader (much less making them). I got a similar reaction when I first
asked about them a while back.


Chuck Vance (who figured they'd at least have some adherents
among the bamboo and silk "crowd")

"Conan the Librarian" wrote

So it looks like I'm the only ROFFian who admits to using a furled
leader (much less making them). I got a similar reaction when I first
asked about them a while back.



I'd like to try one made with UniThread ( but not bad enough to try and make
it :-) but the only ones I see for sale are made of nylon. I seem to be in
constant search for better leader solutions. I fish mainly flat looking,
but actually very complex, water where any added limpness in the leader is a
bonus. But the fish have very narrow feeding lanes so accuracy is
essential, and I'm targeting large fish in weedy water so frail tippets are
a waste of time. On such water, casting distance isn't usually needed and
two pieces of tackle ... the fly and the leader ... are the difference
between success and none .... I'd far prefer to fish a 'crappy POS rod' than
a poor leader on my 'adopted home waters'

I'm pretty happy with my current choices ... i.e. a slightly modified
packaged tapered leader, tippet ring, and longish fairly heavy tippet. But
I can't help wondering if a furled leader would add accuracy to a similar
long tippet package ... and maybe some suppleness to boot

"Larry L" wrote in
:


"Conan the Librarian" wrote

So it looks like I'm the only ROFFian who admits to using a furled
leader (much less making them). I got a similar reaction when I
first asked about them a while back.



I'd like to try one made with UniThread ( but not bad enough to try
and make it :-) but the only ones I see for sale are made of nylon.
I seem to be in constant search for better leader solutions. I fish
mainly flat looking, but actually very complex, water where any added
limpness in the leader is a bonus. But the fish have very narrow
feeding lanes so accuracy is essential, and I'm targeting large fish
in weedy water so frail tippets are a waste of time. On such water,
casting distance isn't usually needed and two pieces of tackle ... the
fly and the leader ... are the difference between success and none
.... I'd far prefer to fish a 'crappy POS rod' than a poor leader on
my 'adopted home waters'

I'm pretty happy with my current choices ... i.e. a slightly modified
packaged tapered leader, tippet ring, and longish fairly heavy tippet.
But I can't help wondering if a furled leader would add accuracy to
a similar long tippet package ... and maybe some suppleness to boot




I'm always shooting for lower profile leaders to promote a dead drift.
My guess would be that the furled leader would be a disaster for sub
surface work.

Scott

Larry L wrote:

I'd like to try one made with UniThread ( but not bad enough to try and make
it :-) but the only ones I see for sale are made of nylon. I seem to be in
constant search for better leader solutions. I fish mainly flat looking,
but actually very complex, water where any added limpness in the leader is a
bonus. But the fish have very narrow feeding lanes so accuracy is
essential, and I'm targeting large fish in weedy water so frail tippets are
a waste of time. On such water, casting distance isn't usually needed and
two pieces of tackle ... the fly and the leader ... are the difference
between success and none .... I'd far prefer to fish a 'crappy POS rod' than
a poor leader on my 'adopted home waters'

I'm pretty happy with my current choices ... i.e. a slightly modified
packaged tapered leader, tippet ring, and longish fairly heavy tippet. But
I can't help wondering if a furled leader would add accuracy to a similar
long tippet package ... and maybe some suppleness to boot

I'll tell you what. I'll look through my stuff and see if I have an
extra furled leader that you can have. If not, when I get some extra
time I'll make one up for you.

Given what you describe, I'm guessing you are fishing about a 5-wt.,
no? A furled leader made of 6/0 Unithread should probably fill that
bill. Do you have any color preferences?

Disclaimer: I have not used mine on heavy fish, so I make no claim
as to how it will hold up. I expect it should be fine, but do not take
responsibility for any lost fish. :-)


Chuck Vance

"Larry L" wrote in message
...
SNIP
I'm pretty happy with my current choices ... i.e. a slightly modified
packaged tapered leader, tippet ring, and longish fairly heavy tippet.
But
I can't help wondering if a furled leader would add accuracy to a similar
long tippet package ... and maybe some suppleness to boot



It would help turnover a little, but it will not make you any more accurate
per se. I have quite a few such leaders. They are marvelous on grass!

Depending on materials and construction, they all suffer from various
disadvantages on water.

TL
MC

"Conan the Librarian" wrote in message
...
Larry L wrote:

It's not as hard as it looks. I do mine with an old "eggbeater"
hand-drill and simply twist each leg until it shortens enough so that
when it's transferred to the nail it is kept taut. Pick up the two legs
together and reverse the direction of the drill.

I hung mine from a hook in the ceiling with a weight on it and let it
self-equilibrate. I used a cordless drill and a watch to run the parts one
way then the whole shbang the other. There used to be a really good
dissertation on making them on the Bamboo rodmakers list serv. (Claude
Freener (sp) I think wrote it)


Maybe I'm crazy, but after the first couple of tries, I started to
enjoy myself. I'd put on some music, set the board on my workbench and
in about 30 minutes I'd have a leader.

They are fun to make- and they are fun to fish with, for a while. I seem to
remember that they wern't too great for nymphing, and really bad if it was
cold enought to ice up the guides. But boy are they supple and soft
landing. They do spray- so you have to false cast somewhere else if your on
flat enough water to matter. I tried soaking mine in shoe waterproofing
silicone and couldn't tell that it made any difference. They waterlog
pretty quickly, then they either have to be dried out or changed. I made
mine with 6/0 uni for my 6wt. I also used it on my 4 wt. I seem to
remember that I hade a couple of occasions where they broke a few inches
above the tippet (I used a loop to loop connection I think) - snagged a fly
on a backcast sort of thing- could never figure out why the leader broke and
not the tippet.

i was thinking of trying it with a kevlar tying thread someday :-)

So it looks like I'm the only ROFFian who admits to using a furled
leader (much less making them). I got a similar reaction when I first
asked about them a while back.


Chuck Vance (who figured they'd at least have some adherents
among the bamboo and silk "crowd")

Larry L wrote:

laid up for a week now by a couple surgeries, I've been browsing and ran
across ads for "furled" leaders

OF COURSE, the ads promise these will change my life, and guarantee I make
100% accurate casts, truly brilliant presentations, EVERY time g

I tried "braided" leaders many years ago and didn't find them worth the $
and hassle,

... are "furled" leaders just another name for the same thing?

.... care to relate any "furling" experiences you may have?

..... bored as I am ?

I share Ken's sentiment. I tried them last summer on a 'dry' only section for

their supposed superior quality. They quickly soak unless you constantly use

mucelin and cause spray that scared the fish away. And they didnt layout any better

than the leaders I tie following some of the formulas you can find online. Right

now I use a formula that was in an article about the various disciplines in

competition casting. That one lays out prefectly and also lets you hover the fly

better in a false cast to check that you have the right distance.