Thanks ST. I repacked a spool on your advice because it had indeed bound on itself (too loose when I first spooled it on). Moistening and carefully (slowly) cinching down the knots has really helped. Also, the tip of carefully setting the drag on my reels has helped greatly to reduce break-offs and my lure loss ratio has dropped considersably! MS55 --- I'm not sure I'm ready to graduate up to FC but someday Good advice though and thanks for the tips!

I use 8 lb power pro in moss green and 10 lb fluorocarbon leader (Seguar), about 3 feet. I shifted to uni knots for salt water fishing, skinny water (20 lb pp and 40 fc) and use the same uni knots in Quetico for ALL applications. Maybe a palomar knot works better, but I've never had a knot pull in 20 years of fishing and the uni is easy for me... Do keep the knot moist when tightening though! The only tip is, I use 6 wraps on the PP side and 5 on the FC side of the joining knot. With heavier FC, you can go down to 4 wraps as the line is stiffer.

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IF this is your first real effort with braid or maybe you never heard this before this little tip I learned the hard way might save you some grief?

The braid makers advise you ( at least Power Pro does) to pack you line on tight on your spool. What some people might not be aware of is how IMPORTANT it is to set your drag properly.

Everyone knows or soon learns, if your drag is tighter than your line weight it's going to break off.
With braid being so much stronger than same diameter mono people might be inclined to think as long as rod will take the load, no need to worry as much about drag setting.

IF under a load your spool can't slip a little, the braid might not break, but being so thin/strong it will BIND into itself and the next time you make a cast you'll see the difference in distance or even worse the line will come off uneven and you'll wind up with a nasty birdsnest.

I haven't had luck with the palomar knot on braid as much as I like the knot! I use an improved cinch from my fly fishing which seems to be the one knot that has held lures on my line! Certainly, I need to pull that knot snug at a much slower rate when I tie it. I've even tried that Berkeley braid knot but have had no luck with it either as things just seem to slip off of it. Might have been my tying to blame though.

I just checked and my rigs are set up with 12# and 20# fireline which I think Westwood uses. I am looking forward to hitting Wabakimi in a week or so to try some of this out.

solotripper wrote on Jul 13^th, 2016 at 1:45pm:

Indeed.

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There are a lot of great knots out there. You do a little research and you see even the so called experts don't agree which one is best but the same ones are usually mentioned as being good alternatives.

I have an issue with dexterity in my right hand from a dog bite injury that makes those knots than you have to wrap and loop almost impossible out in the field. The Palomar is the one knot I can tie under ALL conditions but it's arguably NOT the best knot for all
situations.

It all goes back to if it's working for you and your adept at it, then why change. 

solotripper wrote on Jul 13^th, 2016 at 3:23am:

I use Suffix 832 and use the Uni and Duo Uni knots almost exclusively.  I can't recall ever having a knot fail.

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Since were talking all things line, especially Braid, this might fit right in.

I've always used the Palomar Knot because it's easy to tie in a bobbing canoe or boat, but some of these other knots might be even better if you can tie them under the right conditions?

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solotripper wrote on Jul 11^th, 2016 at 5:03pm:


Good article. I bookmarked it for a good reference on lines.

I try to fish close to the bottom whether I am trolling or casting.  The exception would be trolling for trout in deep water.  Years ago I switched to braided line and would never go back to mono.  When I am fishing close to the bottom, I probably go through 20 feet of line a day due to abrasions and snags.  When trolling Rapalas I try to bounce the Rapalas off the rocks.  I recently purchased a spinning reel which holds 175 yards of 20 pound braided line.