Ultralight Line Review and Rankings

Some may remember my spreadsheet of all the UL rated lines I tested a few years ago, I have it update with a a few new lines since I posted it last.

I am currently working through testing of the Varivas Infinity PE braided line and will add this to my list.

I thought I’d re post it to let anyone new see it, as well as take requests for any line someone might want an opinion on before purchasing? I enjoy testing lines and trying new things so I’d be happy to pickup a spool of line someone would like an opinion on.


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Thank you very much for this informative chart, Yodie. It has been forever since we have heard from you. Hope all is well with you and your adventures on the rivers.
Bob

Thanks for sharing this with us

Very nice info to have. Thank you.

Thank you for the update to the table.

I think I’m going to investigate more Daiwa lines and possibly some others. There are several other JDM brands making VLS style nylons I want to investigate. I love the Twitch Master, and it will be hard to un seat it as undisputed master of nylon mono in the 2-3 lb range. I’m working on setting up some heavier gear and want to investigate a VLS line in a 4-6lb range Thant comes in larger than 100m spools. I’ll do my tests using the newcomers 3lb class though to keep it fair against the TM.


TroutMagnetMan, if you read this, all this craziness is your doing, and I thank you for it, it’s still a blast trying new JDM gear, 4 years later.

PLAT/unitika u tec shin saya 2 5lb 150m ester nylon hybrid type/line-Fishing Tackle Store-en

This looks exciting, ester/nylon hybrid. This will be my next in depth review and will update the table after. Will fish with it at least 10 hours of actual use before forming initial opinion and review unless it is absolutely unusable, which I’ve only ever encountered one line like that, so somewhere around March I should have a good idea what this lines about.

PLAT/unitika u tec shin saya 2 5lb 150m ester nylon hybrid type/line-Fishing Tackle Store-en

This looks exciting, ester/nylon hybrid. This will be my next in depth review and will update the table after. Will fish with it at least 10 hours of actual use before forming initial opinion and review unless it is absolutely unusable, which I’ve only ever encountered one line like that, so somewhere around March I should have a good idea what this lines about.

Yodie were you able to purchase it already? My buddy Stan has had good luck in using that same brand in a yellow braid. I’d be interested to try that one out myself. Thanks for your comparison chart. Happy fishing!

I have not, it’s not in stock anywhere ive found last I looked.

Great info! Glad to see you back on the forum.


Regards


Sent from my iPhone using Crappie.com

I have several spools of the Unitika Hybrid line supposed to be delivered today, probably won’t get to fish it today, our mail usually comes about dark this time of year, but I will spool it up and play with it best I can from my kitchen.

I’m excited to try this, if it lives up to the manufacturers claims, this could become my main line moving forward. Hopefully it’s not garbage or a bunch of hype.

Looking forward to the review. I'm a huge fan of Ester line but reading up on this sounds like this hybrid line solves the manageability issues with Ester.


Regards

Got the line in finally this evening.

Ordered a spool of 2.5, 3,4,5,and 6.

Got the new Vanquish spare spools spooled up with 3 on the 2000 and 6 on the 3000.

Can tell right off the bat this is going to be much friendlier than the Varivas Ester I’ve used in the past. Now, I have no history with the newer ES2 Ester so my comparisons may be dated.

Bear in mind, this is not an on the water review, that will take me a while to gather a true opinion, but just an initial impression from spooling, yanking it, stretching it, abrading it etc at my house.

This line feels like premium nylon mono in the hand, yet it has very little perceived stretch to my ham hands at least, considerably than the 3lb twitch master I compared it with just now. My test was super duper scientific pulled off a 3 foot or so piece of each, wrapped a few inches around fingers on each hand and pulled. That being said, the Unitika stretched less over a 3 foot length than the Twitch Master, take that for what it is.

I overfilled the 3000 spool, partly on purpose for this test and partly because I thought I could get that last little bit on the spool, I couldn’t. BUT! Even being overfilled, probably by 10-15 yards, with the bail open and the line free to do what it wanted I didn’t have the million coils jump off in a possessed fashion like the old ester used to do to me.

The line sinks. Slowly, but it does not float. Depending on your use case and feelings on the matter this is either good or bad. Schrödinger’s line if you will…

My other spool for the 2000 has Varivas PE on it currently, so I strung it up and attached a 1/4oz tungsten drop shot weight to it and twitched it in the air with about 6 feet of line out to get an idea of shock vibration transmission through the line as well as drug it across my carpet and tile floor. I repeated this test with the 3lb twitch master and 3 lb Unitika. I think to no one’s surprise the PE was the clear winner, especially with no shock leader tied on, but the Unitika hybrid was very close, a noticeable step up from the twitch master in feel.

The big downside to this line is it is only very slightly fluorescent blue clear line, it may glow in the sunlight,I don’t know, but in my kitchen with led lights overhead it’s clear line and i feel the smaller diameters could be hard to see. Time will tell, as sensitive as I think it will end up it might not matter.

I ran the stretch test pieces across my concrete porch edges and tugged on them again, surprisingly to me the Unitika looked and felt horribly abraded but when it broke as I was pulling it, it broke at my fingers not at the abraded section, the PE didn’t do that, it frayed and gave way right where it had rubbed on the concrete. The twitch master didn’t care a bit about a little concrete, it never did break as I ran out of wingspan to pull it.

Probably won’t be able to get to the pond or river to actually use it until the weekend, but I’ll be looking for opportunities to test it out.

I’m excited so far for the potential this line could have and what it means for my fishing, if it lives up to its promises it will quickly take over as my #1 line.

Time will tell.

Cheers Y’all.

Got to fish with the 3 and 6lb today.

So far my initial impressions holding up, with a couple additions from actually getting use on the water.

1. Cast distance is excellent, with the Graphiteleader Finezza Prototype 610 UL, the 3 lb Unitika, and a 1/15 oz zman micro finesse jig head and zman Larvaz plastics, I was casting every bit of 100’ if not more.

2. This line makes a “noise” when reeling it in, not quite like braid does, but there’s something. I can’t figure out what it is.

3. Sensitivity is right where I thought it would be. Quite a bit more than mono and fluoro, but not at pure ester/braid levels.

4. It is a bit knot sensitive, my normal not I toes is a Berkeley knot, but it kept popping when I’d cinch it too tight. Switched to Palomar knot and no issues.

5. It’s not as hard to see as I thought it’d be, it was not sunny though, that may change that.

I like it, a lot.

If it holds up over time I’ll be moving a lot of my fishing over to this.

This is a great middle option for guys that don’t like the super stretch of mono/fluoro, but dislike leaders and leader knots with this small diameter stuff.

I’ve fished and handled it enough to be able to recap,end you might try it if any of the features here interest you. Not ready to recommend it or rate it for my chart, probably be summer time before I got enough time with it for that. But I can at least say it doesn’t suck and some if not all the promises from the manuf. are accurate thus far.

Good report and review. Thanks for sharing

Thanks for the review, think I'll go ahead and order a few spools of the 2.5, 3 and 4.

Gonna have to try some.


Regards


Sent from my iPhone using Crappie.com

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Yodie

Some may remember my spreadsheet of all the UL rated lines I tested a few years ago, I have it update with a a few new lines since I posted it last.

I am currently working through testing of the Varivas Infinity PE braided line and will add this to my list.

I thought I’d re post it to let anyone new see it, as well as take requests for any line someone might want an opinion on before purchasing? I enjoy testing lines and trying new things so I’d be happy to pickup a spool of line someone would like an opinion on.


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Have you ever tried the Varivas Area Super Trout Infinity PE X8? I just bought the suffix nanobraid 2lb but i feel like the diameter of 0.04mm is not accurate. It seems to be way thicker then any JDM line i purchased. To me it seems like a 0.10mm diameter of a JDM line. Not sure if you noticed this as well? Was quite disappointed. As theoretically, this nanobraid by suffix should be half the diameter of the Infinity Varivas trout braid line but it seems thicker

Quote:

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Originally Posted by yoloboie

Have you ever tried the Varivas Area Super Trout Infinity PE X8? I just bought the suffix nanobraid 2lb but i feel like the diameter of 0.04mm is not accurate. It seems to be way thicker then any JDM line i purchased. To me it seems like a 0.10mm diameter of a JDM line. Not sure if you noticed this as well? Was quite disappointed. As theoretically, this nanobraid by suffix should be half the diameter of the Infinity Varivas trout braid line but it seems thicker

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I haven’t used that particular braid.

id be curious to know if the suffix nano braid you got might have been mislabeled? I have had other varivas JDM braids with listed thickness that match what suffix lists as their thickness and they seem very very similar.

on another note, I stopped using the 2lb suffix because it was TOO thin and wispy and just a mess if any wind was present, I lost no cast distance going to the 3lb or even 4lb but a lot better manageability.

I’ve used Sufix Nanobraid for a year or more before I started using Unitika night game PE line and several of the Varivas braids. For a domestic offering I feel that the 2lb isn’t a bad line to use, albeit a bit larger. All of my small braids blow around terrible and send me home when it gets up. The night game changed my thinking on braid in general as it was my first Japanese braid and also a gift. Depending on your budget you could do a lot worse than the Nanobraid. All my reels now wear a Varivas braid between 4 and I think 8 lbs and I’m happy with it. I tried some sun line and it just had too much stretch for my liking. It came back off pretty quick and I still have it on the spool. The Twitchmaster is a good line to my liking but very different from the PE sensitivity. I have to remember what I’m using and keep a steady retrieve lure on those rods.
Thanks for all the info y’all have offered us on all this line, saves all of us lots of time and money.

The best braid I’ve ever used is the Daiwa Presso braid, it is small diameter, but stiffer than the nano braid or smaller Varivas braids so has less line bow to it and doesn’t seem to be affected by wind quite as bad, it’s big downside, however is the stiffness, it’s not always great, and cost, it’s VERY expensive comparatively.

Nanobraid became my favorite due to availability and cost and above average attributes, it’s not the best, but it is better than most, and I can stop in an Academy and pick a spool up if needed.

So far I’m still super happy with this Unitika Ester/Nylon hybrid. Once I make it through this coming season with only this line I’ll rank it and update my spreadsheet, but so far it’s super.

Don’t know if I said this earlier but the Nanobraid I have is a darker green. If the sun isn’t bright I can’t see the stuff to cast it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Yodie

Got to fish with the 3 and 6lb today.

So far my initial impressions holding up, with a couple additions from actually getting use on the water.

1. Cast distance is excellent, with the Graphiteleader Finezza Prototype 610 UL, the 3 lb Unitika, and a 1/15 oz zman micro finesse jig head and zman Larvaz plastics, I was casting every bit of 100’ if not more.

2. This line makes a “noise” when reeling it in, not quite like braid does, but there’s something. I can’t figure out what it is.

3. Sensitivity is right where I thought it would be. Quite a bit more than mono and fluoro, but not at pure ester/braid levels.

4. It is a bit knot sensitive, my normal not I toes is a Berkeley knot, but it kept popping when I’d cinch it too tight. Switched to Palomar knot and no issues.

5. It’s not as hard to see as I thought it’d be, it was not sunny though, that may change that.

I like it, a lot.

If it holds up over time I’ll be moving a lot of my fishing over to this.

This is a great middle option for guys that don’t like the super stretch of mono/fluoro, but dislike leaders and leader knots with this small diameter stuff.

I’ve fished and handled it enough to be able to recap,end you might try it if any of the features here interest you. Not ready to recommend it or rate it for my chart, probably be summer time before I got enough time with it for that. But I can at least say it doesn’t suck and some if not all the promises from the manuf. are accurate thus far.

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After another 3 months of use, what are your thoughts on this line?

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Originally Posted by TXPanfisher

After another 3 months of use, what are your thoughts on this line?

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Limited trips in those 3 months, but I can say:

it’s not forming a memory or set on these small spools
Seems to still be just as tough and strong as new
Surprisingly easy to see in various overhead light and water color conditions, this was my biggest worry.

I’m sold on it. I just got in another 2000 and 4000 vanquish and will be ordering a few more spools soon whenever I can find it in stock.

Id like to end up with 2,3,6, and 8 spooled up across my fleet of vanquishes.

Putting lots of hours on this line last weekend and all this week, took a week off work to head to a cabin at the lake with the family and get some fishin in.

I still feel the same way as previous, those thoughts have only been reinforced, aside from one new development.

This line seems to develop debilitating twist in it faster than anything I’ve ever used. I’ve had a rig with 3lb Twitch Master on it in the boat and fished it about as equally as I have the Unitika during the day, and by the end of a 4 hour trip there is noticeable twist developing in the Unitika with none in the twitch master.

Pulling off a bit more than the farthest cast and reeling it back in with no lure attached fixes the problem, so it’s a 90 second fix, right now I’m undecided whether this is a deal breaker for me, it has not caused any wind knots and only once wrapped up around the rod tip that I felt wasn’t my fault. The benefits of this line are strong….