Newbie leader question

On 11 Nov, 01:53, mdk77 wrote:
On Nov 10, 11:52 am, Dave LaCourse wrote:

What are you fishing for using 7x leader?

Like those who posted before me, I would go to a 4x or 5x leader and
then go to a smaller tippet. There is little water I have fished that
requires a 7x tippet.

Another neat little trick is to go to fluoro carbon tippet. A 5x fc
is about the same as a 6x nylon as far as strength and visibility in
the water. I carry nothing but 5x in fc tippet. I use Orvis super
strong leaders and tippet. I have used RIO a couple of times when I
left home on a trip and found myself short of leaders. No problems
with 5x RIOs.

Dave

I'm going to try fishing at Taneycomo, Mo. next year and that was
recommended. I'd never fished anything smaller than 5x and I also
fish 7.5' leaders, so the 9' was alien to me also. I thought I'd
"practice" a bit around home here with the new leaders. I caught
white bass on it locally. But the leaders had coil-memory that I
couldn't straighten out. I hated fishing with them. The 9' 7x
leaders with additional tippet seemed like fishing with spiderweb, and
on windy days. I'm fishing a 4wt DT line with this setup.

Maybe the leaders had been "on the shelf" a long time before I bought
them. I noticed that the rated "pound test" on the leader package was
less than what Rio now sells. So maybe these leaders were sitting for
years before they were purchased, and that was why they had the
permanent coil problems. It was like fishing with a "slinky" toy that
I had as a kid.

Anyway, I'm going back to my old leaders. I'll take the advice on
ROFF and go with fine tippet, but not the long 7x leaders.

If you want to remove "memory" from nylon leader, then just place it
in very hot water, and hold it straight until it cools, or place it in
cold water.

Fine nylon is more prone to retaining memory anyway. The longer it
remains coiled the more memory it retains. Also, if such coiled
leaders are kep in a warm place, or left on the dashboard of a car
etc, the memory is programmed immediately. The only way to remove it
is by heating and then cooling.

The same applies to any thermoplastic material, including fly-lines.

MC