No-Knot Fly Line to Leader Connection (per Cognard)

[Alain Barthelemy]

Thanks for your support the past many months.  I am feeling better and you bet I am still fishing, just not driving as much.  I am lucky to have many good friends willing to share in the driving.  I have been thinking for a while about writing this up and finally got to it tonight.  I am hoping our Team USA members give this method a try (and it refines their presentations and competition success!)  I don't think the directions have yet appeared on TL.

For the past few seasons I have been using no-knot connections.  Not much is written about this essential procedure, except for the Whitlock articles.  I greatly admire Dave Whitlock, but I found this method from the French Champion Pascal Cognard that seems to work better.  The key is the micro-barbs.  If you follow these instructions carefully, it yields a super strong connection without the bulky nail knot.  Once you get in to making these, I would be surprised if you went back to nail knots.  I have not had one of these knots fail yet, even on outright snags on 3X tippet and worse tangles in trees.

Materials

Crewel Needle (the smallest one from this package, purchased at craft store)


X-Acto Knife (minus blade)


Straight razor blade


Lighter


Super Glue


Small piece of wood (this is a paint stirrer)


Instructions

Make a thin, shallow one-inch straight gouge in the piece of wood.  This will be used as to make the tip of the fly line more rigid.


Use the X-Acto knife as a pin vise.  Put the pin in there so the point sticks out.  There should only be about 3/4in of needle sticking out.  Tighten the knurled knob on the knife.


Cut the end of your fly line square and clean.  In this picture, I am using a Sci-Anglers GPX WF4.  I have also done Cortland Peach DT3 and Wulff Triangle Taper TT2.  As the line weight gets larger, it is easier.

Put the tip of the fly line in the little wooden groove.


While keeping the fly line in the groove, insert the needle in to the fly line end.  Try to do this in one smooth motion if you can.  It should go in fairly easily.  If you do it perfectly, you will avoid the little bump you see here.


Take the needle out of the pin vise and heat the needle with the lighter.  Only heat it until you see the tiniest wisp of smoke coming from the fly line.  Heating more will melt the fly line tip.


Take your leader out.  I generally make sure the very butt section of the leader is straight.  This leader is a 9ft 2X Orvis Super Strong (for one of my dry dropper set-ups, I build the leader from this base).  This leader has a 0.023in diameter.  I have done this method numerous times with the Camou material in 0.57mm.


This is the critical step.  Use the razor blade to cut a point in to the tip of the butt section.  Next, use the razor to make about 12 tiny micro-barbs in the butt section tip.  They should be spaced equally over about 3/4in in length, and put them on at least two sides of the butt section circular cross-section.  To make the micro barb, put the blade into the mono very lightly, so it just barely sticks in the material at an 80deg angle (from the flat plane of the table).


Remove the needle from the fly line (it comes out easily) and insert the butt mono in to the opening, as far as it will go


Add one drop of waterproof super glue, so that it drips downhill in to the opening


Hope this is useful to you!  Tight lines!

[Mike Murray]

Very informative and helpful! Thanks, will be sure to try this soon.

[Dejon Hamann]

Very useful addition Alain!

[Mike Wisniewski]

Thanks Alain

It drives me crazy when the nail knot hangs up on the guides.

Mike

[Pat Weiss]

Wow, that is a great little tutorial, thank you!

[Alain Barthelemy]

This is the Cognard method:

http://www.marryat-france.com/bdl.htm

(BDL = bas de ligne = leader)

He also recommends finishing the line/leader junction with a tapered whip of thread (that might be bright colored like an indicator tip).  I have done the whip, but find that the additional weight of the thread and glue tends to sink the tip of my fly line.  The system I describe above easily slides through the guides as is.

The one aspect of this system is that it forces you to semi-permanently mount a leader to a fly line.  You can cut it or add a Perfection Loop in the butt section of course, enabling you to swap leaders using loop-to-loop handshakes.  I prefer to simply carry an extra reel or spool with an alternate leader so I can benefit most from the no-knot.

[Robbie Bell]

Hi There,

This is all very well but who is this Pascal Congard?

Can he Fish?

 

Best Regards

robbie

[Loren Williams]

Robbie,

I agree, sow us something from someone who has some skillz.

[Kenny Dean]

seems like alot of work..but i get it..in the time it would take me to do that i mite have tied half dozen nymphs for the following day..the nail not connection will uv knot sense afterwards has never ever been an issue with me..dont know why that annoys so many fisherman..if knotless is what ur after then i guess this is the connection.

[Rob Twombly]

Ive used the whitlock system for years...this seems a tad better for strength...not that ive had a whitlock setup fail, I havent.  nice work.

[Mike Norton]

interesting post, i seen something like this years ago in a flyfishing magazine and it worked quite well. Thanks for bringing it back to mind.

[Aaron Laing]

After swearing at a loop to loop connection in a French Nymphing rig I've created, I decided to give this method a whirl.

I haven't had it out on the water yet, but it looks good. I've tested the splice with a couple of good tugs and she holds well. It took a couple of tries to get the needle deep enough in the line (I found it worked better for me to go without the notch in the wood), but once in the rest of it was a snap.

I did the whip on the line for a little added strength and a smoother transition through the guides and I used fleximent instead of superglue over the whip. Because the tip of the flyline on this rig rarely sees the water, I'm not too concerned about the extra thread at the head.

I'll be putting it through its paces shortly, but I expect no issues.

Aaron

[Scott Brown]

I meant to post this thank you note a week ago, but I have followed this great tutorial and now have the no-knot on two of the my fly reels. I love the streamline profile, but have to admit that I tied a perfection loop to the butt end for convenience. If you are like me, it takes an outing to build confidence that the technique works and the connection will hold, but it does.

The biggest challenge I had was getting the needle far enough into the flyline, or so I thought, but it got in far enough. Thanks Alain!

Scott

[Alain Barthelemy]

Glad this tutorial is helpful.

Indeed the hardest part is getting the needle in to the flyline.  You only need about 1/2in of insertion, and the best advice I can give is to push the flyline on to the needle, rather than vice versa.  What you want is to compress the dacron core longitudinally so that its diameter increases a tiny bit (Chinese handcuff effect) and accepts the needle.

[Aaron Laing]

Yes. Thanks for the tutorial.

I just returned from the annual family vacation and had a chance to test the rig on the Adams river here in BC. I caught plenty of small guys with it before having it tested it on a 4 lb rainbow (landed) and again on a 6+lb rainbow (broken off). I've definitely gained confidence in this connection method.

Thanks again.

Aaron

[Alain Barthelemy]

Update:

For the past month, I have tested a slightly simpler method with the same results.

Instead of making the "micro-barbs" in the mono with a razor blade, simply roughing up the end with fine sandpaper seems to work just as well.  The key to this revised method, however, is to clean the tip of the butt leader section with alcohol before inserting it in to the fly line tip and gluing with Zap-A-Gap.  The alcohol removes whatever oils or grit that may impede the glue bond.

No failures yet.

[Daniel Podobed]

I'm glad you updated this Alain, I didn't know it was here. I will be employing this technique on tuesday.

[William Kavanagh]

Update:

For the past month, I have tested a slightly simpler method with the same results.

Instead of making the "micro-barbs" in the mono with a razor blade, simply roughing up the end with fine sandpaper seems to work just as well.  The key to this revised method, however, is to clean the tip of the butt leader section with alcohol before inserting it in to the fly line tip and gluing with Zap-A-Gap.  The alcohol removes whatever oils or grit that may impede the glue bond.

No failures yet.

Thanks for this  Alan, by the way Robbie to answer your question. P. Cognard was three times world champion

[Alain Barthelemy]

You're all welcome, and here's one other minor tweak.  If you use Zap CA (Thin CA), or the "thin" Zap-A-Gap, your results may slightly improve.  The thin stuff has a superior wicking action into the fly line / mono joint.  There is nothing better than pulling on your leader and not having to fight to get it through the guides.

(I have serious trouble getting the needle inside the Cortland Comp Nymph line, but all other Cortland and Sci-Angler lines are easy.)

[Mike Norton]

Alain
can you refresh my memory..what is the purpose for heating the needle? to get the flyline end to "open" up to put leader in easier?

[Alain Barthelemy]

Yes. Heating the needle flares out the fly line coating a bit. Only heat it until you see the first wisp of smoke.

[Alex Argyros]

Why rely on wicking action?  It seems to me that coating the scored butt of the leader with glue before inserting it into the fly line would assure more even coverage, hence a more secure connection.

[Alain Barthelemy]

Alex, you can try that, but sometimes the friction of the insertion will make the glue set up before it goes in all the way. Try it and let us know.

[Mike Norton]

Thanks Alain. that is what i was thinking while trying to find a article i had seen in the past on this, do recall it was a little different than this but not by much.

[Steven Good]

I need help with this,  I have tried for over an hour to get the damn needle into the flyline with out success.  I find when I do get it in the point has pricked through the flyline.  I then find that once I do get the needle in then heated I can't get the butt of the leader in.  What am I doing I have tied several sizes of needle even small to large, It can't be that hard.  I have even checked the diameter to make sure the needle is slightly larger the the Butt.