Appreciate your info. I am using the following line:
Triangle Taper Saltwater Floating Fly Line - Royal Wulff
The line is thin on the spooled end then it thickens however at the very tip (where tippet attaches) it narrows down again. This narrow portion appears to be several feet in length.
What is happening even after slowing down my tempo is the line does shoot out but I believe due to the narrow tip where my leader/tippet is attached it simply falls down in a pile. In other words I think if I did not have the narrow tip i would cast much better as i do with my 6 wt which is loaded with Royal Wulff Ambush ( thick tip end with no narrow end , as i recall.
The Wulff site says i can trim the line but I am hesitant to trim a line which cost me $70 !!
Again all is well with the thicker head but it really does seem that the thinning out of the very end is causing that part of the line and the leader to just fall straight down. I have a nice straight line lying on the grass for say 40 feet and than a pile of several feet of line/leader.
I'm sure if i were a better caster i could have the line work as it is intended. As I understand it the idea of the thinned out terminal end is for a more delicate presentation but what I am presenting now would scare off a grizzly bear.
Maybe it is considered "cheating" but any harm in trimming off the thin terminal end and just forming a new loop.
I want to fish and not be frustrated with this 9 wt setup.
I do NOT want to go back to my spinning outfit.
Any thoughts??
Hi,
You need some time because this reply ran a little on the long side but I've finally posted.
I seldom touch this type of thread because most of my experience is outdated and I'm not up to speed on all the current rods. Most all of our members are very good with the current line / rod match ups and have vastly more experience than I have. I do however still fish just not very often with a 9 foot 9 weight rod. I have one and use it for pike on still water so it isn't as if I'm about to speak on something of which I have no knowledge of at all.
I've read your posts and will say that given the descriptions you make of what is happening I can see two distinct possibilities, maybe three...……. For an attempted cast using the rod you have to simply end up with the line and leader landing just 20 foot or so away in a pile there are a few possible causes. One would be that the line on the rod is somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 grains too light in which case even a highly skilled caster may have great difficulty making a decent cast with the rod / line match up.
A second possible cause (and this may sound unpleasant) would be that the caster simply doesn't possess the foundational casting skills of technique such as proper timing, power application and so on to make the combined tackle work as it should. When you say that the very tip of the line and leader land in a pile that would indicate to me that you need a little more timing and zip on the final forward cast and a more solid stop of the rod with the tip fairly high.
Enough of the criticisms of something I haven't even seen, I have a second thought.
If you are making multiple false casts and I'm talking about a bunch of rod waving forward and back before you try to make the presentation that may be where your difficulty is rooted.
Unless you are very experienced with overhead casting with a single hand fly rod it is very difficult to put 30 or 40 feet of fly line in the air and make a continuous series of false casts. If you are doing this then the timing must remain perfect as does the power exerted in each move from forward to backward cast stroke. If anything changes then the line will form a tailing loop either as you pull back from the forward cast into the back cast or visa versa. This tailing loop thing will kill the energy in the cast and break the rhythm of your casting.
I am not a fan of multiple false casts being used to set up a delivery. The more false casts made the greater my risk of being out of sync just a tad and that will lead to a less than perfect delivery cast.
So with all that said, try this. Make your 40 foot cast with the line laying in a nice straight line on the lawn with only a couple feet and the leader landing unsuitably.
Now with that 40 feet laying there lower the rod tip until it is only a foot off the lawn. - - Reach up and grasp the line just below the stripping guide. - Now make a serious effort to rip that line up into a backcast by bringing that rod straight up over your casting arm shoulder while at the same instant pulling the line you grabbed by the stripper down until your hand is near or at your hip. - - Stop the rods backward stroke at about the 1 O clock position and allow the line to unfurl to your rear. As the line is traveling backward and nearly fully extended to your rear bring the hand still grasping the line up smoothly but quickly until it is near to the rods grip. - - You will be able to feel the line reach the terminal end of travel to the rear if you have used sufficient power to make the back cast. - - This is the moment for the hand still clutching the line to pull down while at the same instant your casting arm should begin a short fast / powerful forward stroke. The line hand should travel back toward the hip but not below your waist. - - You should be seeing a very powerful forward cast traveling straight to your front, when that line is just about fully unfurled release the line held in the free hand. (this is how you shoot line into a forward cast) With practice you can learn to 'shoot' line into the back cast as well and that is how you achieve really long casts...…...
A cast made like I just described having only a single back cast should fully unfurl, leader and all. It is not unusual for the very tip of your line to land with a bit of a hook to either side but that's something to address after you have the cast landing correctly.
If you use this technique (single back cast) and are still seeing a pileup then we are back to line weight or...………. you are not allowing the cast to fully unfurl to your rear prior to making the forward / delivery cast stroke.
If I am looking to make long casts on a lawn for the purpose of impressing someone with how far a particular rod can cast this is the technique I use. Once I have casts landing at 70 to 80 feet I will strip in line only until I have the rear taper back through the tip top. If the line has a 40 foot belly then I have 40 foot still lying on the lawn when I pull into the back cast. When done properly you will eventually see the line to backing connection out of the reel and you can do this using one, that's 1 single back cast with proper power and timing combined with a solid stop point.
I honestly hope that made sense because I took some thought and time trying to explain it.
Ard
