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Full Version: Lap Knot - Flyline to leader knot
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Here is a very simple to tie knot for tying your fly line to a leader. Also, One can untie it easier than most knots.

Few are aware of this knot but those that have used it swear by it. Some of those have been using it for many decades. My first use of it was on a cold winter day on the Dream Stream with the wind blowing 90 to nothing and I found that the braided loop attached to my leader was failing.

It is a very easy knot to tie and untie in cold weather. It has been a standard knot in the carbou lands of Lapland for centuries to lash loads down.

I first came across it on another forums website run by James Castwell. On that site he calls it a Castwell knot simply because at the time he could not find another reference to it.

Here is the webpage with the a pictorial of the knot. You will need to scroll down this page of bends to the Lap Knot.

[url "http://www.realknots.com/knots/sheetb.htm#Xschootsteek"]http://www.realknots.com/...etb.htm#Xschootsteek[/url]


Note that you must make the "bend" with the fly line; not the leader. The bend, fly line is the right side of the pictorial. The leader is the left side of the pictorial. It comes undone very easily if the "loop around and through" is made with the stiff butt end of a leader rather than the tag end of the flyline. You also have to pay attention to the direction of the flyline's loop around with respect to the tag end of the leader. Reversing it makes a less secure connection. I have used this knot with leaders that have a loop, such as a perfection loop, tied in the butt end of the leader.

If you do a google search for the " castwell knot" I think you will find a much better demonstration of the knot than the reference I have above. But I can not post the site here since it also has a forum on the site.

I just found another website that now has the castwell knot.

[url "http://www.pechetruite.com/Noeuds/Albright-Castwell%20knots.htm"]http://www.pechetruite.com/...Castwell%20knots.htm[/url]
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Just found this page, Scruffy, and need some clarification of this: Note that you must make the loop with the fly line; not the leader.

In the drawing of the Lap Bend, the line at the left ends in an open loop. The one on the right ends in a bend. Which of those are you saying should be the flyline?

Brook
http://www.the-outdoor-sports-advisor.com
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Good question. I should have thought about that in the explaination.

The one on the left (the 'U' shape) is the butt end of the leader. The one on the right, the bend, is the leader.

If you do a google search for the " castwell knot" I think you will find a much better demonstration of the knot but it is on a web site with another forum.

If you reverse it the knot will not hold. I know cause I tried it several times in the reverse fashion. It just seemed to me to be the correct way to to it but it is not. Each time it pulled undone without much exersion.

I will edit my post to include that bit.
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That's clear enough, now. Thanks.

Brook

http://www.the-outdoor-sports-advisor.com
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Great explanation, thanks scruffy.



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