Any way to prevent wind knots with spinners?

I'm not letting the spool spin while reeling or anything, but I use lures a lot so I am making tons of casts. Inevitably, at some point, I will get a wind knot during a cast and stop before I blow up my whole spool of line. I can go fishing several times before this happens but it is a bummer when it happens and I have to stop fishing. I now bring a second reel.

Is there any way to prevent it, or should I just routinely remove the winds? I do this by walking out 100 yards or so of line and then using a towel to walk down the line a few times to untwist it and that gets me in good shape again. I'm using braid.

in SurfFishingby Silly_Swan_Swallower

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23d

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Shaaaaarky

23d

Don’t use lures too light for your line.

After your lure lands in the water, shut the bail and pull some drag manually before you start your retrieve. This prevents loose line deep in your spool that will cause a wind knot on a later cast.

Silly_Swan_Swallower

23d

Interesting....! Thank you!

Your answers made me realize something, I don't know what actually causes wind knots. Is it from the line being twisted, or something else? Based on how they look, I thought it looked like the line coming off the spool grabbed up some line underneath it and twisted it up. It sounds like that is correct based on what you said.

So does twisted line cause this, or does twisted line make it more likely to happen?

Does the heavier lure come into play when retrieving, so that there is enough tension on the line to keep everything tight?

I am using 30lb braid with a luckycraft. Is that too light? I am doing this because I lost a big halibut with 20lb. Now, I know my technique needs work, I haven't caught many big fish yet so I was probably cranking it in.

1NinjaDrummer

23d

I think there's 2 main reasons that cause wind knots.

When your line starts to outrun your lure. That's why a lure that's "too light" can cause issues bc once the wind catches the lure it will slow down or stall in the air yet your line continues to peel off at the faster speed, causing twists and bunching up.
Like you mentioned your line needs to have constant tension when retrieved. Otherwise you'll have loose and tight spots which will cause these types of bunching up issues.

fishin413

23d

One small correction here. Wind knots do not happen while your line is in the air or only because your lure is too light. They happen on the spool on the next cast after you've reeled in some loose loops of line, and can happen with lures of any weight. The issue starts with that C shaped "belly" the wind puts in your line.

You're correct that the wind will stall your lure while your line is coming off the spool, but that's not what causes the knot to form. What happens is you've got all that slack line out there, and when you turn the reel handle, because the line isn't tight, it wraps a few loose loops around the spool. Then, on the next cast, especially if you really whip it, the line "grabs" those loose loops as it's coming off the spool and pulls them out. That's where the knot comes from.

The best way to solve this is to make sure there's tension on your line and pay attention to your reel. If it's windy, after you cast, sweep that rod back to take up as much slack as possible before reeling in.

Silly_Swan_Swallower

23d

Ok, both of those answers make sense. Sometimes my lure goes sky high so when I reel it in there is no tension.

I will focus on keeping my spool tight and see if that fixes the problem. Thanks for your help!

camhabib

23d

This is correct. There are other reasons as well, like over filling a spool, having the incorrect guide size, etc, that can also contribute, but those are less likely. The most likely reasons I see are loss of tension while reeling and incorrect lure weight for rod.

jtrsniper690

23d

It can also happen if your line is hour glassing on the spool or too much line. I over spooled recently and just cut out about 100' of line. Sucks but wind knots are worse.