Make Your Own Wind-on Leaders

[Islandboy]

Have yall tried this yet? My roommates Dad makes them and says he has about $6-$8 into them after it is all said and done. On most of my light tackle I have about 6' of double line and then the swivel connection to attach leaders. I feel this makes it a little easier to switch colors/lures. With a wind-on you could just snip the hook and recrimp.

[Fish]

In all the years I've been messing with this shit I have met about three guys who could make good wind-ons. In a tournament situation there is too much riding on this chinese handcuff theory to try and wing it on your own and for fun or meat fishing you don't need wind-ons. If you happen to know someone who makes them and makes them well then take some lessons and try it. Otherwise I recommend buying them from a catalog.

Heres a couple of pieces of advice if you insist on making your own. The diameter of the dacron needs to be tight as hell around the mono. In other words it will or should take you some time to push the mono up into the dacron three feet or so. Also, to add security, scuff the mono up with some light sandpaper to add some grippability to the connection.

When using wind-ons, there is, or should be, a ball bearing somewhere in the connection. A lot of wind-ons come with snap swivels but the ones most guys use for heavy tackle forgo swivels with snaps as the snap represents a weak link in the chain. The typical complete wind-on leader starting at the hook would be hook, sleeve, lure, 6-8' section of flourocarbon, ball bearing swivel, and a 12-15' length of standard mono wind-on. Generally, the best way to change out lures is to cut the loop at the crimp where the wind-on meets the flourocarbon. Slip the lure off, change it out and recrimp.

[badmotherphacker]

i make all mine the chinese handcuff way about like you stated. the better you get with them, the quicker you can make them. but it's still not fast. i run at least 16 or more "s into the dacron and finish it off with super glue.

something to do on a lay day.

oh, and those snazzy australian swivels, too. to keep the "wind on" in wind on.

[Fish]

If you use nice rods with roller guides and you value them you should avoid reeling any hardware through them and coach new anglers to NOT reel the snap up against or into the rod tip roller.

Again, there is a time and a place for wind-ons. I like to use 18' long leaders made of 100 to 130 lb. mono connected straight to a ballbearing snap for fun fishing. I use this set-up because I still like to wire fish.

[badmotherphacker]

10-4 on the snap swivel captain. the australian swivel does the trick though.


you fish much or just blow fishwhistles?

[badmotherphacker]

on a sketchy tuna day, ill run a full bag of 80# junki, yes the entire 100 yards, to pull charlie in.

[dukmon]

hey fish, can carlas boat hold four? i wan't this badmotherphacker guy fishing with us!

[Fish]

Yes mutherphacker, #80 jinkai is pretty transparent. Speaking of transparency, you and dukmon use the same brand of swivels and both start sentences in lower case. Coincidence? Perhaps.

Lets ask Hammers. Hey Hammers, what do you think? Please bring your considerable knowledge to bear on this complicated topic.

[Hammers down]

We to like to wire fish, NO WIND-ONS. We don't trust um, so we don't use them. We use wire on our wahoo setups and flouro on the others. I hate wire but we have caught some huge Wahoos and Mono or flouro is no match for those teeth or that tail.

[Islandboy]

Thanks for the info-always willing to give it a try if it gets a couple of bites from Charlie. I have seen plenty of tuna caught on wire(not frequently) and plenty of wahoo on 60-80 flouro(even more cut-offs). Had some friends last year get into them late in FEB and crush them in March. When are yall going to bloody the boat? I may be stuck on the sidelines as the big boat is still in the BAHAMAS!

[duckcrazed]

I'm headed out on an overnighter tommorow AM. We'll be tagging bottom fish on four sites in 100' of water, but I'll pull a few baits just to see if there's anything around.

[Islandboy]

DC tommorrow looks like it will be ~3ft. It is still early yet but it looks like Fri/Sat may be do-able. If so I'll be out there sinking squids.

[Fish]

Originally posted by islandboy:
Had some friends last year get into them late in FEB and crush them in March.

Wahoo are out there year round.

[Islandboy]

Roger that FW I was speaking of the tuna fish. I have been out on New Years Eve and caught wahoo. I have been keeping an eye on the sst's and they don't look too bad for this time of year. If it stays in the 60's the fish will be here(w/in 60 miles) soon.

[Fish]

The tuna are there as well though you can't stop at the 30 fathom break and expect to catch them. Find warm spots out in the stream and you'll find tuna. I have caught them in every month of the year off South Carolina.