making your own leader

"daytripper" wrote...
rw wrote:
Ernie wrote:
Hi rw,
I am not familiar with the Fish Pimp, but if Bruiser is
using one they must be good.

I'm sure the basic design is familiar to you, Ernie. It's a roughly
oblong float with a longitudinal slot, filled with a piece of flexible
tube. You pull on the ends of the tube and slip the leader in behind it.

The crucial advantage of the Fish Pimp (unfortunate name), compared to
similar designs I've seen, is that the float is very, very light. It not
only floats more weight, but it's more sensitive to takes (although
maybe not as sensitive as yarn).

BTW, I'd like to see a new design of knotless leaders. They would have a
more radically tapered cross section, down to "tippet size in about 3
ft. A very long tippet helps reduce drag when nymphing, and it's not
really all that bad to cast if you switch to dry flies.

A couple of decades ago Maxima had a line of 9' 6x knotless tapered leaders
with a stout but short butt quickly tapering down to around a 4x tippet
diameter, followed by a couple of yards of 5.5-6x. These were and remain the
wispiest of tapers I ever fished.

Back then, before I ever experimented with the Dark Side of wet flies, they
were only good for casting classic Catskill dries never larger than a 12 and
presented on near windless days.

And "cocked wing wind-up" was almost always fatal.

I don't even know if Maxima still sells tapered leaders, but your description
sounds like a dead match...

I haven't seen any Maxima tapered leaders, but I like Maxima Chameleon for tying
up leaders for just the reasons you mention - the presentation with a dry is
second to none, IMLE. I don't go any smaller than their 5X tippet because of the
reduced strength compared to other brands. Maxima 5X is rated at 3.0 lbs
compared to 3.8 for most others, but their 5X is VERY wispy.
--
TL,
Tim
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http://css.sbcma.com/timj