Furled Leaders

[trout fanatic]

I have always liked using furled leaders (suckers last forever) but I was unable to make my own so I bought them from time to time. Well this morning I was browsing flyanglersonline and noticed a youtube link on how to make one. So easy a cave man could do it! I've tied up 3 so far and am very impressed. I would drop the link if I had the technical knowledge (I know, speaking of cave man ha ha). Just thought you might want to check it out.

[Gilly]

[ I would drop the link....]

Go to whatever article,story, website you want, right click on the http address at the top, left click on copy, go back to your message or new message, right click to insert, left click on paste. That should land the site that you want in your message. Post or repost and you should be good to go.

You might screw it up a few times but what the heck, once you figure it out we'll appreciate your info!

[jjtroutbum]

This one?

[trout fanatic]

Yep, that's the one. Furling leaders is a whole lot easier than dropping a link.

[3wt]

If they work great, But this instruction is not for creating furled leaders. These are twisted, not furled. Furling requires two twisted strands oppositely of eachother and allowing them to retwitst against eachother. Sounds tough to understand, but it's like how ropes are made. The two opposing twists resist eachother and prevent unravelling. This is why ropes don't unwind and why furled leaders are durable. I'm not sure these twisted leaders would achieve the same, and they provide a very limited taper option.

But if they work for ya great, but they seem like they'd be pretty basic in form and function.

[flytyer57]

If they work great, But this instruction is not for creating furled leaders. These are twisted, not furled. Furling requires two twisted strands oppositely of eachother and allowing them to retwitst against eachother. Sounds tough to understand, but it's like how ropes are made. The two opposing twists resist eachother and prevent unravelling. This is why ropes don't unwind and why furled leaders are durable. I'm not sure these twisted leaders would achieve the same, and they provide a very limited taper option.

But if they work for ya great, but they seem like they'd be pretty basic in form and function.

Would furling be like, twisting the mono tightly and then folding it in half back over itself and letting it twist together?

[fishinwrench]

The end result is the same on both faux furled, and true furled leaders. The compound seamless taper of a true furled leader doesn't have any noticable advantage over a faux furled leader in the way they roll over. Both designs do a fabulous job, of that.

The downside, for either design, is that the body of the leader rolls as tension is put on it. To understand what I'm talking about just watch the knot, or stick a small tag of tape to the tippet end and begin to put tension on the leader....you'll see the knot (or the tape) begin to spin. The more tension you apply....the more it spins. This causes three main problems that can cause you headaches and outweight the awesome way that they turn over on a cast.

#1. Twisted tippet breaks easier.

#2. If you get snagged and have to break off, the immediate recoil of the leader when the tippet breaks, will cause the whole leader to ball up into a big mess, more times than not.

#3. Heavily weighted flys (like clousers, for example) will spin, or at the least they will roll over on their sides or upside down when stripped or worked against a fast current.

I know how awesome furled leaders cast compared to standard tapered mono leaders, but in my opinion the last thing you want to be using when the fish of a lifetime is hooked, is a furled leader.

I guess it depends on which is most important to you... catching fish...or looking good trying. LOL

[Justin Spencer]

I've been making and using furled leaders for a while and have never had one break on me. I typically use 6 lb. mono, which when twisted should make it something like 12 lb. test with I'm sure some loss of strength. To that I usually attach 3X tippet and then maybe 4X if the water is real clear. I have been hung on bottom, in trees, in more trees, and can only think of once when it broke at the furled section, and that was right near the knot after using the leader for several months. They do ball up a little more than tapered but I have never had a huge problem and I lose LOTS of flies. They aren't perfect, but it is nice to be able to put a long butt section in them if you fish big flies and lots of lead. Plus if you do them yourself they cost pennies to make.

[trout fanatic]

I agree that these are actually twisted and not furled. However, at about a quarter a pop, I'm using the twisted sistah. I am taking one out on wednesday or thursday and report back on my results. I don't plan on using a twisted tippet (just the butt and mid section) the tippet will be standard. Don't know if that makes a diff or not but will let you all know.

[3wt]

Yeah, I would think that you get real benefit of furled leaders with dries, where delicacy, turnover and fly placement are real concerns - not to mention drag and mendability-and I think the compound tapers would actually start to show some benefit. I know turning over a big streamer is nice, but I think a tapered mono or flouro would be my choice there. But fishing streamers with my 3wt is a little chuck and duck anyway.

And, yes furling is letting two oposite twists untist against eachother. But you can add a lot of complexity to how it tapers, but you have to build a jig and a drill and some weight and appearently some free time and quite a bit of patience.