Beyond ICE Braid 100 Yard Spool - Blizzard Blue

Braid has no stretch, so at 30 feet down through a hole you feel a light bite that mono would swallow. It is also far thinner per pound test, so it cuts through water fast and drops your jig straight. The Blizzard Blue color stays visible against snow and ice at the hole.

The fluoropolymer coating is hydrophobic, so the line sheds water instead of soaking it up, and water in the line is what freezes into the guides and onto the spool. Keep the line out of the slush pile, skim the hole, and it stays manageable in real cold.

This spool comes in 6lb, 8lb, 10lb, 20lb on 100 yards, which is more than enough for any ice reel. Run 6 to 8lb for panfish and crappie, 10lb for walleye, and 20lb when lake trout or pike are in play. Add a short fluorocarbon leader in clear water, since braid is visible up close under the ice.

Same 8 strand PE construction, built for the cold. Eight tightly woven fibers make it thinner, rounder, and smoother than 4 strand line, with zero stretch so every tap at 30 feet reaches your hand.

Put down a few wraps of mono backing or a strip of tape first, since braid slips on a bare arbor. Keep firm tension the whole way and stop about an eighth of an inch below the spool lip. Overfilling a tiny ice spool is what causes loops jumping off in the cold.

Braid is slick enough to spin on a bare spool. Either lay down a short mono or fluoro backing and join it with an FG or double uni knot, or wrap a strip of electrical tape around the bare arbor first. Then spool under steady tension with the line coming off the filler spool the same direction it goes onto your reel, which is what keeps wind knots from showing up on your first cast.

Much thinner at the same strength, usually right around half the diameter. That is the whole point: you pack far more line onto the same reel, you cut through wind instead of ballooning in it, and you cast noticeably further. Exact diameters for every pound test in this line are listed in the size chart on this page.

No. Modern guide inserts handle braid without any trouble. What actually shreds line is a guide insert that is already chipped or cracked. Run a cotton swab around the inside of each guide once a season, and if it snags a fiber, replace that guide before it costs you a fish.

Not with nail clippers, and not with a knife. Braid is a PE fiber that frays and rolls away from a dull edge instead of cutting, so you end up with a mashed end that will not pass through a knot cleanly. Use a dedicated braid scissor with serrated blades for a square cut, and your knots will seat right the first time.

Braid outlasts mono by a wide margin, so most anglers get multiple seasons out of one spool. The last stretch of line takes nearly all the abuse, so before you replace the whole thing, strip off the first 20 to 30 yards and retie. When the line starts feeling fuzzy well down the spool, or you have lost enough to hurt your capacity, it is time. You can also pull the line off, reverse it end for end, and respool to get a full second life out of it.