Nash Bullet BRAID - Steve Burke's review

I've been reading with interest, Steve Burke's review of Nash Bullet BRAID ... HERE[/b]

In it Steve says, among other things, "However one of the disadvantages is braid’s poor resistance to abrasion. It’s usually way inferior to nylon in this respect – despite what many suppliers claim! My own gravel pits at Wingham are full of bars and flints, and as a result no braid has lasted more than a few months before needing replacement – and some only one trip! That is until now. In fact, I’m still using the same spools of Bullet Braid as I started with in the autumn, and so I’m certainly impressed!

Could Steve please give some details of all these other braids that have needed replacing within a few months?

Also, does anyone-else have experience of this braid?
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Steve also goes-on to say ".... for lure-fishing on snaggy waters Bullet Braid is the best line I’ve used to date. "

Steve .. compared with which other braids?


".... Because it’s been aimed at the carp market lure-anglers seem to have missed it so far. "

Not sure that is or was entirely true, Steve ... the price is/was more than a tad on the high side viz.
................"200 metre spools cost £19.95 and 350 metre spools £34.99. "

After all, Sufix Herculine ( Gardner Tackle , formerly via Relum) is/was aimed at carp anglers but is widely used by the cognoscenti of lure-anglers
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In my view, the fact that both braids are aimed at carp anglers is one reason why they're over-priced! :mad:

DG

Bullet braid has a particularly high diameter for it's breaking strain compared with other braids on the market which I suppose is no co-incidence that it has a better abrasion resistance.

I've tried a number of braids over the years. One that didn't perform at all well I seem to recall was Corastrong. Also one I definitely remember not lasting well was Leeda's Outcast. Yes, I know that Poledark has recommended Outcast for his type of fishing!

I suspect the reason is that I use braid in lighter breaking strains than other anglers as I may need to cast light lures a long way - Wingham is a big water and I've always an eye open for a big perch. It's with these thin braids that there appears to be an abrasion resistance problem on new gravel pits that have sharp bars. Eventually erosion and silt deposition as the pits mature should solve at least part of this problem.

The Bullet Braid I was using was the 15lb b.s. However, as I pointed out in my review, this does appear to be under-rated. (It makes a change from the over-rating of monos that DG has recently highlighted!)

Jim Gibbinson did some bench on Bullet Braid and found its abrasion resistance was even as good as Quicksilver and superior to the other braids he tried. However, these weren’t lab tests.

DG, perhaps you can help here? Do you have any lab test results on abrasion resistance of various braids? I'd certainly like to try out in the field any braid that you can recommend. I’d be particularly interested in any with high abrasion resistance compared with diameter.

Talking of lab tests, did you find any details on the memory/suppleness of various monos that we discussed a while back?

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<font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Steve Burke:

I've tried a number of braids over the years. One that didn't perform at all well I seem to recall was Corastrong. Also one I definitely remember not lasting well was Leeda's Outcast. Yes, I know that Poledark has recommended Outcast for his type of fishing!
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">DG: Thanks for that, Steve .... oh, and I think you'll find that Den The Poledark has moved-on from Outcast braid {see here)


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<font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Steve Burke:

I suspect the reason is that I use braid in lighter breaking strains than other anglers as I may need to cast light lures a long way - Wingham is a big water and I've always an eye open for a big perch. It's with these thin braids that there appears to be an abrasion resistance problem on new gravel pits that have sharp bars. Eventually erosion and silt deposition as the pits mature should solve at least part of this problem.

The Bullet Braid I was using was the 15lb b.s. However, as I pointed out in my review, this does appear to be under-rated.

Jim Gibbinson did some bench on Bullet Braid and found its abrasion resistance was even as good as Quicksilver and superior to the other braids he tried. However, these weren’t lab tests.
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">DG: Right .. I understand ... and yup, I read Jim G's reviews of Bullet XT mono and braid ... sadly, a strange mixture of some pukka lab tests, a bit of wooly waffle, more than a tad of arrogance ..... and some of his test methods which, considering the existence of European Standards for such tests (e.g. pre-conditioning the line in water etc), seem rather odd and unnecessary to me. Oh, and the same goes for his carborundum-paper test for abrasion resistance ... he should take a leaf out of Dave Barham's book!

To my mind, this DIY testing mainly comes down to meanness with money on the part of the mega-minting marketing companies .... happy to take our money, but not happy to spend any/much of their tax-allowable expenditure on pukka independent lab test to EN/ISO standards to ensure that their products and claims comply with legal requirements.

I still laugh about a certain tackle marketing company (whom you know well!) who were seriously plugging the abrasion-restance of their mono based on tests which involved rubbing the dry line over the edge of a table, house-brick etc ... give me a break :mad:

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<font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Steve Burke:

DG, perhaps you can help here? Do you have any lab test results on abrasion resistance of various braids? I'd certainly like to try out in the field any braid that you can recommend. I’d be particularly interested in any with high abrasion resistance compared with diameter.
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> DG: Yup, but for some equally good if not better data, see Dave Barham's pukka lab tests .... right here on AN ..... Dave Barham's pukka line lab tests

For the time-being, what I can re-assert is that BS for BS (not diam for diam), no HPPE (Spectra or Dyneema) braid comes close to a half-decent nylon or copolymer mono in terms of the current test standard used for abrasion resistance ... and in a while, I'll insert a bar-graph, below ..


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<font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Steve Burke:

Talking of lab tests, did you find any details on the memory/suppleness of various monos that we discussed a while back? </font><hr />

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">DG: .. oh yes .. thanks for reminding me ... I did find a load of data that included that, but I've got to extract it from the rest ... when I get a moment ... and, from memory, the tests were done with both wet and dry line, which I thought was rather good.

quote:

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Originally posted by Steve Burke:

Talking of lab tests, did you find any details on the memory/suppleness of various monos that we discussed a while back?

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Limpness/Suppleness/Lack of Spool Memory/Wet castability

A touch of the déjà vu here, Steve, because when I checked my notes, I found that I had posted a reply ages ago .. obviously you didn't see/read it

At no extra vis a vis my Invoice, I will post the bar-chart of the extracted lab test data .. later ..meanwhile ..

... for the same BS ..... apart from 100% HPPE braids and fusion lines which have very little intrinsic memory and very good wet castability, of 16 modern or updated nylon and copolymer monos, reassuringly Stren EasyCast more than lives up to its name; Berkley Trilene Big Game, with its other virtues, is pretty good too.

So, if you don't need high tenacity, but you do need true abrasion resistance as well as lack of memory, I'd personally go for Stren Easy Cast .... it does exactly what its name implies
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DG

[ 23. May 2004, 10:12 AM: Message edited by: The Diamond Geezer ]

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<font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Steve Burke:

Do you have any lab test results on abrasion resistance of various braids? I'd certainly like to try out in the field any braid that you can recommend. I’d be particularly interested in any with high abrasion resistance compared with diameter.
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<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">BRAIDS : relative (lack of) wet abrasion resistance

Firstly I should emphasise a couple of factors and facts .. nevermind the unsubstantiated and unsubstantiatable claims ....

(a) when it comes to AR, there's no substitute for diameter, so if you're talking about high tenacity braids and/or fusion lines, it's NO CONTEST compared with a half-decent modern nylon or copolymer mono. Here is a bar chart extract of just one series of back-to-back wet abrasion tests carried-out by an internationally-accredited (ISO) laboratory. I can't give you specific names because I don't have that authority to release them by the company who paid (lots!) for the tests to be done ..
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and ( the word braid is like the word mono in that they are meaningless unless you specify the artificial (or natural) fibres from which they are woven (braided).

and © Fusion lines based on HPPE have marginally better wet abrasion resistance than a comparable HPPE braid, but, as you can see from the above bar-chart, neither can hold a candle to the high-AR monos

The most common modern braids are based on HPPE (Spectra or Dyneema) and are braided by only a few companies throughout the world

Some marketing companies have coatings added allegedly to improve castability or abrasion resistance, and others have some polyester filaments inter-woven with the HPPE fibres to make the resultant hybrid braid sink.

One of the best hybrid braids is Masons Tiger Braid

So if you want a braid with abrasion resistance comparable with a mono, you'll have to choose something like Kryston's hooklength braids, and these are not designed for, and are too thick diameter-wise and too expensive to be used as a mainline.

I think also, you have to ask yourself, if you're lure-fishing with a 15 lb braid and on the look-out for some lovely mega-perch, whether you actually do really need true abrasion resistance! It's not like bait fishing after all.

And then there's the cost factor .. unless you're a cadging tackle-tart. Braids tend to be much more epxensive than monos, because of the cost of HPPE and the slow braiding process etc. .. and that's before the cost of the marketing hype is added

Personally, if I'm lure-fishing for perch, I use a proper HPPE braid
e.g. TUF-Line from Western Filament,
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........ also available in green.

and if I'm bait-fishing e.g. for pike, or carp or barbel or tench, where I really do need true abrasion resistance, I use Drennan ESP,
Sufix Tritanium or Synergy, Shimano Catana (Thanks to Rob Ward! ), Diawa Sensor or, for extra castability .. Stren Easy Cast, coated with a line lube

Where do I send my Invoice, Steve ?

DG

quote:

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Originally posted by Steve Burke:

Talking of lab tests, did you find any details on the memory/suppleness of various monos that we discussed a while back?

---

Limpness/Suppleness/Lack of Spool Memory/Wet castability

A touch of the déjà vu here, Steve, because when I checked my notes, I found that I had posted a reply ages ago .. obviously you didn't see/read it

At no extra cost vis à vis my Invoice, I will post the bar-chart of the extracted lab test data .. later ... SEE BELOW now..meanwhile ..

... for the same BS ..... apart from 100% HPPE braids and fusion lines which have very little intrinsic memory and very good wet castability, of 16 modern or updated nylon and copolymer monos, reassuringly Stren EasyCast more than lives up to its name; Berkley Trilene Big Game, with its other virtues, is pretty good too.

So, if you don't need high tenacity, but you do need true abrasion resistance as well as lack of memory, I'd personally go for Stren Easy Cast .... it does exactly what its name implies
____________

DG

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[ 26. May 2004, 08:16 AM: Message edited by: The Diamond Geezer ]

Mamy thanks indeed, DG. In haste - I'm off out.

quote:

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Originally posted by The Diamond Geezer:

Where do I send my Invoice, Steve ?

DG

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quote:

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Originally posted by Steve Burke:

In haste - I'm off out.

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:confused:

[ 26. May 2004, 08:15 AM: Message edited by: The Diamond Geezer ]