I never used a shock leader and wonder how many of you use them? I never have been able to cast very far with my 8 foot rod but 95% of the time it is not needed. I normally just tie the double drop rig to my 14 or 17lb. Trilene XT mono line. I also just purchased a 9 foot St. Croix Triumph that I’ll try out next month.
Any help would be appreciated.
BH
On my small set ups, 15lb mono, no shock leader. On the bigger rigs, 30lb braid, 50lb mono shock leader. I have been cut by the 15lb mono on long casts, with waterlogged hands. When I used 25lb mono, only had a 35" 50lb “rub” leader.
I use the rule 10 lb line weight for every 1oz lead for hard surf casts. If I exceed that (usually do) I use a shock leader. The main purpose for me is to not have the lead and rig break off during a hard cast and injure someone. I certainly agree with the smaller lines cutting you as well.
If your fishing for sharks use about 3ft longer than your rod of 150lb mono. So on a 10ft rod about 13ft will do. About 1 ft on the reel and 2ft out of the tip connected to about 18 inches of wire. I use a sinker slider with a liter than my line coast lock swivel so the swivel will bend out instead of popping my line.