Paul Dubriske, a seasoned trolling specialist from New Hampshire and owner of Cut2Spec, which manufactures G2jiggers and Cee Dee streamers, showed me a great technique for marking your own wire line. I will warn you that unless you have a permanent marking station like Paul does, two people are a must. Supplies needed include 300 feet of wire line, a fly reel that has been filled about half full with Dacron backing, three different colors of shrink-wrap tubing, Permabond 910 instant glue, and a heat gun or hairdryer.
Cut ten ¼” pieces of each color of tubing (total of 30 pieces with 10 pieces per color) and slide them all onto one end of the line arranging them by color. Cut a 1” piece of tubing (color doesn’t matter) and slide this on the very end of the line. Gently fold about 1.5” of the wire line on itself to form a loop and carefully place a few drops of the glue onto the two pieces of wire line that are now side by side and forming the loop. Gently slide the 1.5” piece of tubing back over the two pieces of wire line that you just placed the glue on. Now use the heat gun to shrink the tubing, being careful not to get the heat gun too close to the tubing as the tubing will crack. You now have a loop that will be used to attach the wire line to the backing. Make sure to examine your rod guides prior to making the loop to ensure the loop is small enough to pass through the guides (i.e. if you are using a long leader or if a monster fish were to take you into your backing).
Tie the Dacron backing to the loop and reel 25 feet of wire line onto the reel while using your fingers to keep the ¼” pieces of tubing from going onto the reel. Be very careful to keep the wire line tight or it will twist and could become unusable. One person needs to reel and glue while the other person holds onto the original spool of wire line very tightly during the entire process, making sure to keep the line taunt at all times.
Take the first four pieces of tubing and glue and heat as described above, keeping each of the four pieces about 1/8” from each other. Reel another 25 feet of wire line and repeat above process with the next three pieces of tubing. Follow this procedure until you glue and heat the next two pieces and then the final piece of the first color of tubing (see picture). Proceed until you have utilized all pieces of tubing and your 300 feet of wire line (your last color of tubing really only needs 9 pieces as there is no need to mark the very end of the wire line). Make another loop in the wire line as described above and tie your leader to this loop.
This is confusing to me. I’ve heard that you shouldn’t troll on the wire, just on the dacron backing. What good is it to have the wire marked like this if you can only use it with all the wire in the water?