[Dean]

I saw some furled leader in a fly shop on Lacey Wa. last weekend and was wondering if anyone out there has had any experience with them. As they are not cheap $ 12.50 a pop, are they worth the investment?
Thank you in advance and good morning Fred.:chuckle:
Dean

 

[wrke]

Dean

I've only used them on spring creeks with small flies and delicate presentations. The first one I purchased was awful. It twisted badly and I gave up using it within an hour.

I tried some last year from another source and they seemed much, much better. They were thread construction instead of mono. They do seem to perform very well helping with drag-free floats on complex spring creek currents, but I haven't used them enough to really say I want to change over. But they look very promising.

Bill

 

[fredaevans]

Dean, long discussion on the English version of this Board

a short while back. (Same name as our Board, but they've added the letter 's' to the end of it)

There it also appeared to be a 'love-hate' relationship and some brands worked very well, others appeared to be a bit of a bust.

fae

Here's one of the better descriptions.Highlander Sat 12-Apr-03 10:26 AM
Charter member


#30683, "Furled Leaders,an insight (nylon or thread?)"
Edited on Sun 13-Apr-03 02:30 AM by Highlander

Furled Leaders (nylon or thread) The choice is yours.
Firstly what is a Furled Leader? For those that don’t know, it is simply a very thin tapered rope,multiple strands of nylon or thread are twisted & counter twisted to form a knotless tapered leader. A jig consisting of a board with dowels,a few hooks & a battery drill helps speed up the winding process, but in the main they are “hand made”
Advantages are numerous to let’s say conventional leaders.
For example braids being hollow, retain water,whilst the solid construction furled does not.Remember the "splat you get on the water with a braided leader,as your cast hits,not so with furled.They can alight your flies like thistledown.
1.Lack of memory reduces micro drag
2. Positive turnover helps accuracy
3.Gentle presentation eliminates leader slap(see above)
4.Good retention of paste floatants (Mucilin)
5. Excellent knot strength
6. Hi –visibility helps tracking flies in poor light conditions.
Etc.etc.

Why a nylon Furled Leader you might ask say against a tying thread made one. Firstly.
1.They are robust.More so than thread. Durability is paramount & a nylon one, looked after will last a few seasons hard use.Having said that so will thread.But todays fly fisher is basically a lazy B & maintenance is not generally in his agenda,so nylon it is.
2. User friendly, not prone to “wind knots”
Try & get a wind knot out from a thread made one without damaging, nigh on impossible
3. Because nylon furled leaders are like a spring, storing their energy & releasing it quickly, nylon does a better job. Tying thread has almost no such stretch
4.Tying thread, regardless of colour is opaque, this opacity can become a disadvantage sub surface.
5.Thread made leaders will have a tendency to mildew, especially if put away wet,not so with nylon.
6.A finally thread can be too stiff or too limber depending on the thread used.

Having said all this “all leaders” have disadvantages. Like any design compromises exist. The leader can snarl or tangle. especially if jerked hard from a snag.
Furled leaders are more expensive than conventional tapered leaders, but their useful ness & durability more than make up for this small shortfall.
A few small companies have produced Furled leaders made from tying silk. but none to my knowledge have explained the advantages over nylon in fact I would go so far as “none” & that includes dealers have given any info regarding their use.
There is plenty online info for those that are really interested & a quick Google search typing in “Furled Leaders” will give you access to much information.

I have used & sell the USA based Bluesky’s (www.blueskyfly.com) leaders for a few years now & as far as I know I was the first UK supplier for furled leaders of any description. I can of course make my own, including fly tying threaded ones I might add, but found it far better to import “professionally made” ones rather than my home grown efforts.
Jim Hauer,Jim Cramer & Claude Freaner have a lot to answer for
There are sites that will give you an insight into making your own, but unless you have time & patience in abundance, I would not go down that road. So I hope this little snippet of info on Furled Leaders will give you a better insight before you make your choice.
Tight Lines
PS I still use my home made tying thread for dry fly on streams,where the "little stretch" can be used to my advantage & have been since the late 90s but for my “general fly fishing” it has to be nylon furled.
Tight Lines

 

[DFix]

Also, from back when, I discovered a website describing how to make your own furled leaders; didn't seem like a terrible waste of time or material. I imagine a wordsearch would dredge something up.

 

[Dean]

Thanks

Thank you one and all for the information. Looks like the jury is still out or they are to expensive to get to excited about.
Dean

 

[Green Butt]

Dean

I have used these particular furled leaders extensively. They are made up by the shop owners.
I like the long flourocarbon ones on my spey rods. They keep the fly down a liitle more than a nylon leader. With a weighted fly they are like using a mini sinktip. I also use them alot without weighted flies.
These are the only furled leaders I have ever used so can't make any comparative statements.
They are tapered. Also seems impossible to get a knot in them. I once got one wrapped up under a logjam. Was a real bear to break it. I have also had the loop on the tippet end break--but only once. It was one that had alot of use and hangups on it. However, it was easy to whip finish a new loop on it. I coated it with some super glue and am still using it.
Overall I like them. They last a long time.

 

[Bob Pauli]

Question re furled leaders

Does anyone use furled leaders with fast sinking tips? Is there any advantage with very short furled leaders vs. Maxima?

For floating lines with a 14-foot 9-weight rod, what length of furled leader have board members used?

 

[Green Butt]

Bob Pauli

I use the mentioned flourocarbon leaders on sinktips but a short version--3-4' with a short tippet added.
For floating lines the one's I use come a maximum of 12' so I use them. For extra length I would add 2 or more sections of tippet stepping down in size.
These particular leaders are not suitable for dry flies in my opinion.

 

[Grampa Spey]

Furled Leaders, Funny that you asked.

I recently bought 3 of the longer furled leaders from Greycliff Publishing (La Fontaine's place).

You can go to their site and down load or look at a PDF site for furled leaders besides the shorter ones they advertise.

The leaders are made by Fly Fisher's in Olympia, Wa..

I bought two of their long nylon furled leaders. They were classified as their light bonefish, redfish, striper, snook, in the smoke and light olive. I, also, got their FC uniform sink leader.

Last Friday, I planned to test all three on my 7136 and 7141. I had too much fun with the 7136 and the Light Olive leader and never casted my 7141 even though it was rigged and ready to go.

They say their long leader is a 15' leader which is a little miss leading. The 15' leaders are actually 134 inches long. You get the fifteen foot length by adding the tippet.

The Russian River was moving fast for this time of the year and was about 30% above normal flow. I used my Berkley FC, 6# and 8# as tippets. (Yes, Berkley fc is unpredictable).

I cast flies from La Fontaines floating flex hook grass hopper size 8 to some big simulators size 4. Also, some bead eyed bugs, size 6 to 4.

I did not put floatant on the leader. So it sank and if I pulled the line, this would sink a floating fly. Most of the time the fly floated down stream very well as I mended when needed.

Even with my Amber Optics when that Light Olive leader sunk, I could not see it in the light green water. Neither could the small mouth bass and the most agressive and hard fighting sucker fish, I have ever seen.

I used a MS 6/7 floating line with a very short 30# loop of mono, nail knotted. I then attached the big loop end of the furled leader to the mono loop and about 4' of tippet to the fishing loop of the furled leader.

This combo enabled easy double and single speys. Roll casts seemed a little harder to make. A high upstream wind came up in the last hour and the leader seemed to be more air born and fell upstream with the wind. Drove the small mouth bass nuts.

Most of the time the leader and the fly loaded the 7136. In some real shallow water downstream with the smaller La Fontaine fly, I would lift too much line on the double spey lift and swing, and I would have to wait for the fly to drift down below me before casting. This was not a problem in deeper water and heavier flies.

When a fish takes a fly into a sunken tree or brush, and you have to pull hard to break the tippet, the furled leaders look like a bunch Z's in a daisy chain. You have to attach a temporary loop of strong mono to the fishing end and put that on something and pull the Z's and sometimes loops out and release slowly. Apparently when the tippet is broken this causes this minor problem.

Since there is no give with these leaders, a poor caster like me can pop off a fly on the back cast when the d loop moves forward. The Berkley tippet really fails here in the lighter weights. The Seaguar fc seems to overcome this problem. Also, the new Orvis fc tippet is great. I was given a few feet of the 6 and 8 pound test new Mirage to try and it is great. I will be ordering some in their 100 yard spools.

The 15' furled nylon leaders cost $12.00. You should be able to get a year plus from them with proper care. The shorter 12' fc leader ( 105 ") costs 15.00.


I still have two older and shorter furled nylon and fc furled leaders that I used on single hand rods and when I first got into spey fishing.


This $39 investment in these furled leaders will save a bundle in regular leaders and tippets.

I plan to test these leaders with my 7141 this week or next week.