Help; Braid, Mono, Floro

[Lou]

Hi,

I have Diawa 17's on St. Croix rods. You have the basics. I use heavy braid, I believe that it is 30lb, why not? The critical thing is to remember that the reel counts turns, not line. So, put on, for the sake of argument, 100 yards of mono on each, 300 yards of braid, then X feet of Floro. You'll want HEAVY floro, and use 20lb Blood Line, or Blood something, for leader, it's going to take a beating and you don't want to lose fish. As you lose floro your line counters will become increasingly unequal. At some point you'll have to respool the floro, but hopefully you will not get into the braid. Usually you change mono annually, but yours is protected from the UV, and it's just backer anyway, so floro is mostly all you need to concern yourself with. As you're probably going to use heavier line, you will have to bare that in mind when calculating depth, but it's all a guess unless you pull off line, measure it then compare that to your line counter. I'm not anal retentive enough for that myself. Besides, with as many as 3 different diameters, leader, floro, and braid in the water, it's still not going to be perfect. If you are doing this for fun, that's it, if not you should likely purchase more identical rods and reels in case something happens to some line, or worse.

Best Regards,

Lou