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So, why doesn't everyone just use furled leaders??

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What's the lightest you can go?

With the braid I have right now I can go down to a 3wt but below that the leader gets a little stiff.

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The entire system will be $150.

 

Wow ... there goes any disadvantage to buying them. If they're as good as those who like them say ... and they last as long as the supporters say ... then one might never actually get on the plus side.

While I am sure there are some "gadget guys" who'll pay for one (use some gold paint and glitter to add that "eye appeal") ... I think most people will follow the directions of someone online and build their own furling rig for about a tenth what you're charging.

 

This is not intended to be a negative post ... but that IS a lot of money for something one can rig up with a few pieces of wood and an old rotisserie motor.

 

Not really.

 

The real advantage to furled leaders is the ability do custom tapers, stiffness and even how they float or suspend. You can even adjust the stiffness of the leader through the twist count. An off the shelf furled leader is very rarely ideal. Then if price is the issue look at a good furled leader and after 10-12 leaders the machine payed for.

 

A rotisserie motor cannot do what my system does, my machine and system is beyond anything currently available.

 

If you think I am crazy just check this out. It is just the head that you then have to hook a drill to and build a lay out board.

http://www.eclecticangler.com/production-furling-machine-v2/

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Oh, I am sure your machine is really cool. Kind of like this one ...

http://salmonliberationfront.blogspot.com/2014/04/silk-fly-line-for-just-five-dollars.html

 

I'm sorry, I'll step off this thread. I sincerely hope your product sells well. I'll stick with my non-water throwing single line leaders.

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I've tried them and like them "ok" but not wild about them. My main beef are the micro-droplets of water that they fling in a calm pool. I have found that a greased silk furled leader doesn't spray as much as mono-furled leaders though.

 

I find they cast well enough but I keep going back to knotted leaders that I make myself. I've been meaning to furl my own leaders to get the customization but have not yet attempted. One day I'll dive in to furling my own and we'll see if my opinion changes.

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A couple things here. First stretch over a 5 to 7' foot leader is so little that it amounts to nothing. Line Stretch comes into play when you have a lot of line out.

 

Second I have made furled braid (not power pro) leaders and found them to be way to stiff. For native brookies i don't think they are an option. I also experimented with uni thread furled leaders with a mono core. Possibly a uni-thread leader with a braid core is a better option. I was not a fan of a mono core because of stiffness but a braid core might just be the ticket. This is the fun of furling your own.

 

I have been furling leaders for a few or more years. I started because furled leaders are way to expensive to buy and experiment with. i am a true believer in that a proper furled leader for each individual can only be acquired by making them yourself for yourself. I made my own "system" after not being able to find a viable furling machine option, nor clear instruction, on the open market. The ones I found, like the one you linked to were way way to expensive. I ended up cobbling my "system" together out of stuff already lying around my shop for damn near zero cost. That's your competition not the guy selling a dozen machines a year for 200 dollars. Most people who make their own leaders have a DIY attitude To begin with so making a furling machine is not an overly involved task. Others involved in fly fishing won't blink an eye at spending 8 to 12 bucks for a leader so they will have no interest in furling their own. You will be dealing with a very very small market unless you can on convince people to try it. That means its gonna have to be cheap.

 

That being said take this constructive criticism as you like. It is meant to be helpful not hurtful. I also believe you will have to bring the price point down below 50 bucks to have a chance. Keep in mind that you may sell a few at 150 but your not going to sell many. I would concentrate on the furling machine only, powered by a drill since everybody already owns a drill. Another thing That is a red flag to me is when somebody wants to sell me a "system." Remember the banjo minnow and pocket fishermen? Systems scream scam to me. Selling the furling machine with clear instructions on how to build a board and make a leader will work better then trying To sell a "system", in my ever so humble opinion.

 

I think you can make this work but it begins an ends at price.

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If you are serious about making your own furled leaders, I strongly recommend you buy this DVD from Kathy Scott. A video makes understanding the process much easier. It is only $20.00 and it is well worth it. She even shows how to make a shorb loop for the end of the leader. I'm not in the habit of telling anyone need to buy anything but you need to buy this!



Tell Kathy that Henry K. sent you:



http://www.reellinespress.com/simple-furled-leaders-dvd.html



Read this review of Kathy's DVD by Castwell of Fly Anglers Online.



http://www.flyanglersonline.com/prorevw/kathyscott.php



Kathy may still sell a complete kit to make a furling board. It is cheaper than driving around for all the parts for a furling board. You supply the wooden board and her kit has all the dowels, hooks, clamps, weights, thread picker, and complete plans. Her kit will save you hours of time and the expense gathering the materials.



Once you learn the basics, you can tackle the technical aspects of furled leader design with this excel file.



www.canerod.com/rodmakers/tips/furled/leader.xls




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A couple things here. First stretch over a 5 to 7' foot leader is so little that it amounts to nothing. Line Stretch comes into play when you have a lot of line out.

 

Second I have made furled braid (not power pro) leaders and found them to be way to stiff. For native brookies i don't think they are an option. I also experimented with uni thread furled leaders with a mono core. Possibly a uni-thread leader with a braid core is a better option. I was not a fan of a mono core because of stiffness but a braid core might just be the ticket. This is the fun of furling your own.

 

I have been furling leaders for a few or more years. I started because furled leaders are way to expensive to buy and experiment with. i am a true believer in that a proper furled leader for each individual can only be acquired by making them yourself for yourself. I made my own "system" after not being able to find a viable furling machine option, nor clear instruction, on the open market. The ones I found, like the one you linked to were way way to expensive. I ended up cobbling my "system" together out of stuff already lying around my shop for damn near zero cost. That's your competition not the guy selling a dozen machines a year for 200 dollars. Most people who make their own leaders have a DIY attitude To begin with so making a furling machine is not an overly involved task. Others involved in fly fishing won't blink an eye at spending 8 to 12 bucks for a leader so they will have no interest in furling their own. You will be dealing with a very very small market unless you can on convince people to try it. That means its gonna have to be cheap.

 

That being said take this constructive criticism as you like. It is meant to be helpful not hurtful. I also believe you will have to bring the price point down below 50 bucks to have a chance. Keep in mind that you may sell a few at 150 but your not going to sell many. I would concentrate on the furling machine only, powered by a drill since everybody already owns a drill. Another thing That is a red flag to me is when somebody wants to sell me a "system." Remember the banjo minnow and pocket fishermen? Systems scream scam to me. Selling the furling machine with clear instructions on how to build a board and make a leader will work better then trying To sell a "system", in my ever so humble opinion.

 

I think you can make this work but it begins an ends at price.

 

Thanks, I will have to come up with a different term. I call it a system because I include the knot tying tool, the lay-out board basically everything needed except thread. Here is the problem with drill powered machine. It is impossible to spin the legs and walk down the leader at the same time. In order to twists in each section it is very helpful to be able to feel how the leader is coming together. I HATE the drill powered machines I had one 20 years ago and it was horrible then for building a truly nice leader and I am sure it still is. Sure you can keep going back and forth from the drill to the leader and try to control the spin but that is a pain. On top of that how do you know how many twists you put in each leader since the drill is probably variable speed.

 

I do follow your logic about pricing and cobbing together something but if that was really the case we would all be tying flies with a pair of needle nose vice grips screwed to a wooden frame. At the same time if people chose a vice they would buy the cheapest functional vice available and none of the really nice vices would ever sell. There are many people who enjoy tying flies, building rods and may enjoy building leaders but don't have the interest or knowledge to build a machine like this.

 

I am gathering that most of the folks posting here are to fishing the same situations many of my friends and customers fish. I do not mean that to be rude in any way but not everyone takes fly fishing to the same level or enjoy s fishing the same way.

 

 

On your last comment, I cannot believe you said that about fly fishing.... I am very conservative about what I spend on fly fishing gear but I am in the minority. We spend $60 for a bobbin, $300 for a rod blank, $300 for reel, $70 for a line that might last two seasons of hard fishing, $3 for spool of thread, $70 for a chicken neck, $400 for a pair of waders, $200 on wading boots, and finally $80 for an out of state license to fish certain streams. $150 is nothing to be able to build high quality custom leaders for the rest of your days, that suit your fishing perfectly. A good leader can make or break a day of fly fishing.

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If you are serious about making your own furled leaders, I strongly recommend you buy this DVD from Kathy Scott. A video makes understanding the process much easier. It is only $20.00 and it is well worth it. She even shows how to make a shorb loop for the end of the leader. I'm not in the habit of telling anyone need to buy anything but you need to buy this!

Tell Kathy that Henry K. sent you:

http://www.reellinespress.com/simple-furled-leaders-dvd.html

Read this review of Kathy's DVD by Castwell of Fly Anglers Online.

http://www.flyanglersonline.com/prorevw/kathyscott.php

Kathy may still sell a complete kit to make a furling board. It is cheaper than driving around for all the parts for a furling board. You supply the wooden board and her kit has all the dowels, hooks, clamps, weights, thread picker, and complete plans. Her kit will save you hours of time and the expense gathering the materials.

Once you learn the basics, you can tackle the technical aspects of furled leader design with this excel file.

www.canerod.com/rodmakers/tips/furled/leader.xls

 

That is one of the things that will be with the machine. We will also have some formulas we have used for given situations. If you build a lot of furled leaders maybe I need to send you a machine to test out.

 

paul

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I have been pondering Poopdeck's comments as well as the comments of others. The one school of thought I find very interesting is the cost of a nice machine like I have designed. If anyone who thinks $150 is too high and ties their flies on anything but the cheapest vice available needs to step back and read what they are posting. Based on the logic that something jury-rigged will do just fine you should be tying your flies using a pair of off brand vice grips with cheap scissors from the drug store.

 

Do you have a nice tying desk or do you tie on a flimsy card table. The card table will work just fine, hey why not a folding TV tray.

 

During this process I have had to seriously look at all facets of this. I have designed this machine to look like a piece of furniture you would be proud to show friends and family members. It has been designed so that building a leader is actually easier than tying a basic nymph. It is designed to that leaders are repeatable in every way from stiffness to stretch. This is basically a full proof way to build high performance leaders at a fraction of what off the shelf generic leaders cost. I have left nothing to chance, no guessing here or fudging there.

 

I have been involved in fly fishing for 40 years and I have had to fudge and cut corners so many times it is ridiculous. My first fly reel was something I put together out of my erector set. I had no choice so I threw something together. Based on the some of the logic that has been shared here I should be still using it today.

 

Why do people buy the smallest Hatch reel with the disc drag that could stop a car? They buy that reel because they want something nice. That reel is way over engineered but it is beautiful in every way so people buy them. A simple click an pawl reel would work just fine for those light weight rods but the Hatch is really something special.

 

I could go on and on pointing out examples where something clumsy and rudimentary would work but something nicer makes life so much more enjoyable but I am sure you see my point.

 

Here is the one I built 10 years ago and I way beyond that now.

 

post-28595-0-09912800-1457026565_thumb.jpg

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I apologized for getting into this discussion on my last entry. By way of explanation ... here's why I would not buy your machine.

You posted this, "On your last comment, I cannot believe you said that about fly fishing.... I am very conservative about what I spend on fly fishing gear but I am in the minority. We spend $60 for a bobbin, $300 for a rod blank, $300 for reel, $70 for a line that might last two seasons of hard fishing, $3 for spool of thread, $70 for a chicken neck, $400 for a pair of waders, $200 on wading boots ..."

 

Here's what I spend:

1) Bobbins ... (I have three) one came with my kit, several decade ago. The other two came from a $25.00 grab bag at a sales event.

2) None of my rods cost more than $129.00 ... and that one was a special deal from MidWest Custom Fly Rods.

3) None of my reels cost more than $50.00.

4) All of my rods have $10.00 line (loose spools from eBay) and I use it for more than a couple of years ... it's on there until it doesn't float any more.

5) I have three spools of fly tying thread. Most of my tying is done with a large supply of sewing thread I have on hand.

6) The ONLY hackle I have, which I just recently bought, cost me $23.00.

7) I have a pair of boot footed waders that cost about $100.00.

 

Your total ... A little over $1000.00

My total ... A little under $400.00

 

So, you can understand that I truly do not spend a lot of money on fishing.

I have a blast fishing ... couldn't live without it. Over the past 30 years or so, I've averaged over 100 days a year fishing.

I don't worry if a rod breaks, since I don't have a week's pay wrapped up in it.

Even after all my life of fishing, maybe I am still a beginner, since all my equipment is (as other's have stated) "entry level" gear. If that's the case, I hope to go to my grave as a beginner, if being more than that is going to cost me more money.

 

As I stated in my last post ... I apologize for getting into this discussion. I am NOT an advocate for spending money when I can make something at home for MUCH less.

Again, I'll back off of making any more comments, since you don't need to hear from the poor side of the sport.

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I apologized for getting into this discussion on my last entry. By way of explanation ... here's why I would not buy your machine.

You posted this, "On your last comment, I cannot believe you said that about fly fishing.... I am very conservative about what I spend on fly fishing gear but I am in the minority. We spend $60 for a bobbin, $300 for a rod blank, $300 for reel, $70 for a line that might last two seasons of hard fishing, $3 for spool of thread, $70 for a chicken neck, $400 for a pair of waders, $200 on wading boots ..."

 

Here's what I spend:

1) Bobbins ... (I have three) one came with my kit, several decade ago. The other two came from a $25.00 grab bag at a sales event.

2) None of my rods cost more than $129.00 ... and that one was a special deal from MidWest Custom Fly Rods.

3) None of my reels cost more than $50.00.

4) All of my rods have $10.00 line (loose spools from eBay) and I use it for more than a couple of years ... it's on there until it doesn't float any more.

5) I have three spools of fly tying thread. Most of my tying is done with a large supply of sewing thread I have on hand.

6) The ONLY hackle I have, which I just recently bought, cost me $23.00.

7) I have a pair of boot footed waders that cost about $100.00.

 

Your total ... A little over $1000.00

My total ... A little under $400.00

 

So, you can understand that I truly do not spend a lot of money on fishing.

I have a blast fishing ... couldn't live without it. Over the past 30 years or so, I've averaged over 100 days a year fishing.

I don't worry if a rod breaks, since I don't have a week's pay wrapped up in it.

Even after all my life of fishing, maybe I am still a beginner, since all my equipment is (as other's have stated) "entry level" gear. If that's the case, I hope to go to my grave as a beginner, if being more than that is going to cost me more money.

 

As I stated in my last post ... I apologize for getting into this discussion. I am NOT an advocate for spending money when I can make something at home for MUCH less.

Again, I'll back off of making any more comments, since you don't need to hear from the poor side of the sport.

I do not take offense and I am very much like you. I do not have much more than $100 in any of my current rods (I snapped my Winston) as I build my rods. For many years I waded in over sized hiking boots I would turn into wading boots by gluing carpet to the bottom. I have a few nice reels but none over $100. I do use nice fly lines but I found a real nice line maker in the UK who sells his lines direct so they are under $50 TMD. I built myself a very nice vice a couple of years ago because I wanted something special. My other vice is an HMH Spartan I have had for 25 years and I tied flies for a shop in exchange for the vice.

 

I have NO issue with your comments because you write how you live. I take issue with people who think it is too expensive but they have all Sage rods and Hatch reels. Actually I respect and admire you for keeping what should be a simple pass time just that a simple pass time. That is not my nature with anything I do so I am a bit envious. I also design and fly RC sailplanes and even there I constantly push the envelope.

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What's the lightest you can go?

With the braid I have right now I can go down to a 3wt but below that the leader gets a little stiff.

 

Damn, I was hoping for 000wt and 1wt...

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Judging what is and isn't too expensive is a personal judgment. An expensive reel might be worth it to me and not to you, yet I may spend less than you do on another item. The argument that if we spend a lot of a reel or vise then we must also find it worthwhile to spend a lot on another item is flawed. We make these sorts of decisions in many areas of our lives - homes, car, entertainment, clothing, meals, etc etc. If I don't see a need to spend more on an item then I won't, even if I spend more for other items in other areas of my life. I wish you well in your endeavor, but you'll have to argue the merits of your system, not try to convince people it should be seen as a good value because they spend money on "Sage rods and Hatch reels" and a nice tying vise.

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Judging what is and isn't too expensive is a personal judgment. An expensive reel might be worth it to me and not to you, yet I may spend less than you do on another item. The argument that if we spend a lot of a reel or vise then we must also find it worthwhile to spend a lot on another item is flawed. We make these sorts of decisions in many areas of our lives - homes, car, entertainment, clothing, meals, etc etc. If I don't see a need to spend more on an item then I won't, even if I spend more for other items in other areas of my life. I wish you well in your endeavor, but you'll have to argue the merits of your system, not try to convince people it should be seen as a good value because they spend money on "Sage rods and Hatch reels" and a nice tying vise.

Valid Point and well received. That was a bit of a knee jerk reaction. I try very hard to be more understanding than that. I offer my apologies to anyone I offended.

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What's the lightest you can go?

With the braid I have right now I can go down to a 3wt but below that the leader gets a little stiff.

 

Damn, I was hoping for 000wt and 1wt...

 

I can do those but not with the braid I currently have. I can build those leaders quite easily with other materials I have on hand. I fish a 1wt quite a bit.

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