How to Tie a FG Knot- Daiwa Tech Tip

The FG knot is one of the most popular ways of tying your braided line to your leader, whether it be a monofilament or fluorocarbon leader.

It’s very widely used now amongst the angling community. I use it personally for everything from four pounds all the way up to 200 pounds. So applications from bream fishing all the way up to GT fishing. So it's very, very versatile, runs through the guides, extremely smooth and definitely one that most anglers should have in their kit.

In a Twist

It’s very easy to start. All you do, make sure you've got a little bit of your braided line pulled off your reel. Lay it over your thumb and index finge. Pinch it at the bottom and then wrap the tag in and the mainline around your pinky finger. The idea behind that is then you can pull nice and hard and create tension. So it's very important to have tension when tying this knot. You want to pull out a bit of leader, and then with the tag of your leader, you put it in underneath the braid.

What you want to do now is twist and then you poke that tag through and then you twist again and then you poke it back through the other way and see that whole time I'm maintaining tension. So twist, poke it through, twist, poke it through and whilst you're doing that, making sure you're pulling down nice and hard, pressing the knock back on itself.

Wrapping It

Keep going with that for about 15 to 20 repetitions depending on what braided line you are actually using, whether it be light or heavy. Generally in the heavier stuff, you don't need to do as many, In the lighter stuff you can get around 15 sometimes. In heavier stuff you can get away with 10. It really just comes down to what material you're using.

With flurocarbon you genuinely need to do more because the material is actually harder, whereas nylon is softer. So you can generally get away with doing less.

Platted Goodness

Once you get up to about 15 repetitions you’ll have a nice platted line. You hold your tensioned line between your fingers and making sure not to let anything go.

Next you’ll do your first lot of half hitches. You’ll want to do them around both your tag and your main lines. You’ll want to do them nice and tight and want to make sure when you do them that you alternate them. The first one that I did was underneath, so the next one will be over the top, and you continue to do this for four sets.

Getting Tight

It’s very important at this particular point that you tighten the knot. So I've got little tight line sticks here. You can use the back end of a pair of pliers or a glove. So just wrap your line around the tight line stick or even your hand or whatever you're using on the braid. And then also on the leader, wrapping around, like that.

You will notice when I pull this tight that the braid itself over the top of the knot will then turn opaque. So you'll see it slowly changing colour as it's tightening up. Pull it nice and tight.

Getting Hitched

So now you need to do some more half hitches up the main line. So the last lot were over the main line and at the tag end. So now you just want to do half hitches up the main line. Because the last half hitch you did was over, the first one on this side needs to be under because they need to lock back against each other.

Once again do four sets. On the last one I’ll go through the loop three times for added closure. Pull it down nice and tight and you’ve locked off the knot. Even if the knot does start to come undone because you’ve done the half hitches interlocking.

Meet Brett Habener
Daiwa Digital and Creative Manager 

One of three Queenslanders in the Daiwa Australia Marketing Team Brett brings to the team extensive retail, wholesaler, digital and content creation experience. Our most experienced in-house videographer, editor, and graphic designer, Brett is a high skilled angler, having spent years fishing remote, high class fishing destinations.