Chapstick as Knot Lubricant

[psishapiro]

Question...

Has anyone who has used chapstick/lip balm for knot lubricant ever had a problems with the knots failing? I wonder if the chemical make up of the various brands could cause a failure, or if you snip the tag too close and a tight pull could cause the knot to become free. What’s been your experience?


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[scotty macfly]

What the.....why the...... who the.....son of a.....?

Why on earth would anyone put chapstick or any slick substance on your line? To me that spells knot failures.

Don't do that. It won't allow the line to grab itself like it should to make a secure knot. Might as well use Vaseline.

Plus it will collect dirt and stuff.

 

[psishapiro]

What the.....why the...... who the.....son of a.....?

Why on earth would anyone put chapstick or any slick substance on your line? To me that spells knot failures.

Don't do that. It won't allow the line to grab itself like it should to make a secure knot. Might as well use Vaseline.

Plus it will collect dirt and stuff.

I don’t disagree. I read this on a forum as a “tip” and thought it was odd. But, I’ve seen it in more than one place and I’m not confident nor convinced it’s a best practice. So I thought I would ask here, on a board devoted to knots and see if others had experience and what others had to say.


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[flytie09]

Spit is free..... But if you were a guide..... chap stick might be a more hygenic option than slobbering all over other people's line or while on nasty water loaded with parasites.

Is there anything in it that can break down your line? The full list of ingredients in a regular-flavored ChapStick are as follows:

arachidyl propionate, camphor, carnauba wax, cetyl alcohol, D&C red no. 6 barium lake, FD&C yellow no. 5 aluminum lake, fragrance, isopropyl lanolate, isopropyl myristate, lanolin, light mineral oil, methylparaben, octyldodecanol, oleyl alcohol, paraffin, phenyl trimethicone, propylparaben, titanium dioxide, white wax, propanol.

After reading this....I might not want to put it on my lips. :tape2:

ft09

 

[fredaevans]

Had a friend whose lips 'chapped' very easily .... his Doctor's Solution has him using clear lady lipstick.

 

[silver creek]

I’ve read several recommendations for using lip balm to tighten down knots. I think if it were a problem, it would have been discovered.

The theory is that the tighter that you can get a knot, the less likely that it will tighten further and abrade the knot. Furthermore, if there is a wax which is what chapstick is, it will stay on the mono and prevent abrasion should the knot slip and tighten further during fishing. Although, the knot should be wet when fighting a fish, wax is a better lubricant on mono than water.

George Anderson uses lip balm:

"Lubricate the knot with saliva or fly floatant before you pull it snug. George Anderson—owner of George Anderson’s Yellowstone Angler in Livingston, Montana—uses lip balm before he ties two monofilament sections together. He forms the knot, then uses his lips to lubricate the fly before he pulls it tight.

Fly Fishing Knots : The Knots You Need - Fly Fisherman

In this book, George Anderson says the reason he uses chapstick instead of spit is that even with spit, the leader can overheat and weaken due to friction:

The Longest Silence: A Life in Fishing - Thomas McGuane - Google Books

Also recommended by Seaguar:

"Remember, to tie a good tight knot it is important give yourself enough line to work with, and to keep your lines very moist. A good tip from one of our pros on keeping your line moist and pliable is to use Chap Stick - Try it; it's a wonderful thing!'

Seaguar Knot

And Midcurrent:

"Try Chap-Stick™ for knot lube — it’s great. Pull very hard to tighten (you might want to use gloves if you’re new to knot-tying). I sit down and tighten the knot over my legs as you can really torque it down."

Fly Fishing Knots: The Slim Beauty Knot | MidCurrent

 

[jr spey]

What the.....why the...... who the.....son of a.....?

Why on earth would anyone put chapstick or any slick substance on your line? To me that spells knot failures.

Don't do that. It won't allow the line to grab itself like it should to make a secure knot. Might as well use Vaseline.

Plus it will collect dirt and stuff.

I don't use it, but you'll find many who do. Even the Rio website has mentioned it on their various videos for knot tying. Go through the You Tube knot videos and you'll see lots of guys recommend it. If using saliva is not in the cards for you, the best product I've found for knots is called Knot Perfect. It's not easy to find, but it's still available. Especially for fluorocarbon, it's preferable to spit. When I'm doing lots of knots at my desk I use it for every one I tie. I don't always have it on the water with me in which case I use saliva like most everyone else.

 

[clsmith131]

I use spit. It seems like the chapstick would make your line more visible. Also, a little finesse when tying goes a long way toward strength. I did use some chapstick on some dubbing the other night though...

 

[scotty macfly]

You guys are killing me, and I mean that in the most PC way.

Yes, spit is free, so use it. If you're a guide, and you don't want to use saliva for the obvious reasons, and I completely understand that, what you all are missing is one big thing.

We moisten or wet the line to lubricate the line to slide easily and get a good knot, right? We are on the water guys. God gave us a river, stream, pond, lake, whatever it is your fishing, dip the tippet in the water to lubricate it. No more chap stick, lip stick, or even saliva. The water is right there in front of you, so use it. Like saliva, it's free and abundant.

Knot Perfect is good though.

 

[lake flyer]

I use it all the time in the winter steelheading, because the fluorocarbon is kind of sticky when trying to set the knot. NEVER had it slip and break. Chapstick is great for knots, pretty good for keeping ice off the line guides, great for chapped lips, splits and cuts in our frozen fingers. It is a must have in my winter tackle bag for steelhead. It also works as a pretty good running line flotant when I am having trouble with that sinking in skagit casting.

 

[psishapiro]

Knot Perfect is good though.

Haha!


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[el jefe]

Silver alluded to it in his post, and I'm surprised no one else has mentioned it, but fly floatant is an excellent knot lubricant. I don't use it on all knots, but I use Poo-Goo (or whatever fly floatant you use) to crank down my blood knots. I work the knot to where it just starts to tighten up. Then I get a large drop of floatant between my thumb and forefinger, and roll the knot back and forth, working from one of the coils to another. I grip the tag ends in my lips to keep them out of the way, and pop that knot down. Forms beautiful coils on a blood knot, and the Poo-Goo works into the coils on the blood knot better than ChapStick does.

 

[sweetandsalt]

I often apply SPF lip balm to protect against lip sun burn, which hurts. So, if I have it on and I moisten my knot with saliva, I suppose I'm using lip balm too.

If a coil based knot starts to balk during tightening, try pushing the coils together with your thumb nail to aid in smoothly sliding it closed.

 

[duker]

Silver Creek beat me to it--I was going to quote McGuane's article that mentions George Anderson using Chap Stick: "otherwise you overheat these copolymers."

Makes sense I suppose, but I just use spit and haven't had any issues. As S&S mentions above, I do use SPF lip balm if I'm saltwater fly fishing so I suppose I so get a bit of balm on my knots.

Scott

 

[mnigro]

Like someone stated, great for getting heavy, stiff mono blood knots to seat tightly ang smoothly. That’s & the seagar are about the only knots I use it for.

 

[darkshadow]

Spit is free..... But if you were a guide..... chap stick might be a more hygenic option than slobbering all over other people's line or while on nasty water loaded with parasites.

Beats the Valtrex prescription, I say.

 

[biker1usa]

I don't use chapstick, but I do use Vicks lip care for floatant. Better then what you can buy and about 1/3 the price. I have one I bought about20 years ago and am still using it. That tells you how much I fish with floating flies.

 

[fliedout]

I've used it for years for heavy leader material without any problems. In my experience saliva isn't sufficient for heavy and/or stiff material.

 

[1fish]

Chapstick may be okay for leader or tippet knots, but for the tippet to fly knot, I'd be worried about getting the fly hook stuck in my lip.


That was meant to be a joke.

 

[cb3fish]

Psishapiro

I have actually watched vids of people bragging about using lip bomb to make the knot slip down tighter, however I always thought to my self why? I use spit and my knots tighten right down especially if you pull hard enough-perhaps use lip bomb if you have little pencil arms?-lol

CB