Because I was so surprised at the results of the monofilament test, I decided to try out a few 20lb braids.

This time I visited the Ultima line laboratory in London. They have some serious kit there - about £20,000 worth!

The line testing machine is linked directly to a computer gives you an on-screen display of what is happening to the sample as it is being tested. All the results are then printed out.

As well as testing for linear breaking strain, it also tells and shows you, via a graph, the exact percentage of stretch in the test sample and exactly when the stretch takes place (not too relevant for braids).

LINEAR BREAKING STRAIN

Again, I tested each sample three times. The way you connect the samples to the machine is very different to the Berkley one. Each sample is clamped between two sets of ceramic blocks. These alone cost a couple of hundred quid a pair!

The nature of the blocks prevents the sample from slipping and holds it firmly in place without damaging the sample.

Just like the mono test I did, the results really made me think.

KNOT STRENGTH

Each sample was tested five times, which meant I had to painstakingly tie three lots of each sample to quality swivels in order to get an accurate result.

The knot I used was a doubled, four-turn tucked blood knot, without doubt one of the strongest for joining braid and light monofilament to swivels.

To be fair to each brand, I scrapped the highest and lowest results for each sample and took my average from the three remaining. This was to sort out any inconsistency with my knot tying capabilities.

CONCLUSION

The price per metre (bearing in mind I did this test exactly a year ago) was worked out by dividing the price of each spool by the amount of metres on it - interesting stuff, it just shows what a variation there is in this relatively new market.

However, as you can see the stated breaking strain was far less than the average breaking strain for most of the braids I tested. I'm sure the diameters have a lot to do with this.