What is the very best knot for today’s fishing lines?
Answer by Steve Pennaz, host of television fishing show, “Lake Commanders” on the Pursuit Channel, and North American Fisherman, North American Outdoors, Fishing Club Journal (in which he created the insert called “Knot Wars”). Formerly Executive Director of the North American Fishing Club and Founding editor of North American Fisherman magazine.
The answer to the question must start with the line being used. When superlines were first introduced, a number of anglers found out quickly (me included) that favourite knots for monofilament didn’t always work with braided or fused lines. In most cases the knots didn’t break but slipped easily under a few pounds of pressure.
In general, knots developed for monofilament (Trilene Knot, Improved Clinch, Palomar, etc.) work well with fluorocarbons as long as the angler understands one significant difference between the lines: mono has a natural lubrication that allows the line to cinch fairly well without wetting (wetting before cinching is still highly recommended). Fluorocarbon, on the other hand, does not cinch successfully without extra lubrication (saliva); at times the resulting friction generates enough heat to significantly damage the line to the point of failure.
Better braid knots are being developed all the time. While the Palomar is good, we found the Double Palomar (going through twice) is better.
Besides strength, I consider ease of tying when selecting a knot. If a knot takes a long time to do, or do right, I rarely use because efficiency on the water is important. Frankly, I am not a fan of the Palomar when fishing multi-hook baits for that reason.
Whatever knot you chooses, in most cases you can strengthen it by approximately 10% simply by going through the hook-eye twice when starting the knot.
