of Lines and Rods

On Jan 27, 5:42*am, "Opus--Mark H. Bowen"
wrote:
"riverman" wrote in message

...





Is there some clever way to identify line weights?

I seem to have amassed a selection of lines, but I have no idea what
weight most of them are. This is because my primary rod for several
years was a handmade rod that was "in the 4 or 5 wt range", so I ended
up trying out and accumulating a selection of 4 and 5 wt DT lines,
some sink tips, all in different brands.

Now I own a bonafide 4wt (8 ft) and a 5wt (9 ft), so rather than buy
new lines, I'd like to figure out what goes with what. I've tried
casting them with the different rods, but unfortunately my casting is
so mediocre, I really can't tell the difference. The only one that
casts REALLY well is the 5 wt that came with the 5wt rod.

But my instincts tell me that there should be a significant difference
between a 4 wt 8-ft and a 5 wt 9-ft, so I think the problem is
psychological....since I'm not certain the line fits the rod, I don't
have the confidence casting. So I'd really like to figure out the line
weight, rather than toss 5 or 6 perfectly good lines and buy new ones.

--riverman

I found this. I have never tried it myself.

Standard line weights listed on this page:http://www.flyfishusa.com/lines/choose-line-home.html

Mark- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Well, I tried it. Interesting experience. First, I weighed out
precisely 30m of my new 5 wt line, and discovered that it was just at
the very top of the 5wt range (8.6-9.5 g). That accounted for why it
cast on the 5wt rod so nicely...since I prefer shorter casts, a
heavier line will load the rod with less line out.

Then I weighed a new 4 wt line (same model: SA Mastery Series Trout
taper), and guess what? It also weighed out precisely at the top of
the 4wt range (7.4-8.2g). So at least I'm comfortably sure that this
particular model is weighted on the heavy side.

Then I went after the unknown lines. One of them that seemed to cast
fairly similar on both my 4wt and 5 wt rods weighed 8.8g, which put it
at the lower end of the 5 wts (kind of right between a 4wt and a 5wt
if you prefer heavier lines). Duh...that made sense.

Another, that I thought was a 5wt, but seemed to cast OK on my 6-7 wt
rod turned out to weigh 10.5g, which made it a middle-of-the-road 6
wt. The line I had been using on the 6-7 wt rod turned out to be a
middle-of-the-road 7 wt, which again made sense, and explained why I
felt that the 6wt line was a bit light for the rod.

I hvaen't made any headway on the sink-tip lines. That's for later.

Anyway, I've now made some labels for the lines and marked them as 5+
or 5-, for example, to distinguish the ones that are weighed heavy or
light for different situations.

So the weighing process is pretty good...far from exact, but for this
boy, it sure made a lot of things make sense.

--riverman