Reply To: Substitute for TMC 5262

Tim,
As we talked about during our recent phone conversation, not all hook companies are created equal. Well, we all know that some hooks are better than others and some hooks are made “cheaper” than others, but that’s not what I mean by being “created equal”. The lengths of the shanks are not all equal. In other words, a 2x or 3x shank isn’t the same length for each hook company. I guess there isn’t a set standard on shank lengths that I have found anywhere ( the same goes for gape size).
If you are a fly tier, I feel it’s important to find a good hook company and know their hooks, i.e. sizes, shapes and gauge of the wire used to make the hook. I guess what I’m saying it’s wise to stick with one company. I use barbless hooks and have converted to the Firehole Outdoor hooks. They are a new company (give our FATC a discount) and they are developing hooks of different sizes, lengths and gauges as they grow. Their hooks are very shape (important), they are barbless (important to me) and they have wide gapes (again, important to me).
Remember, you can always tie the fly the size you want on a longer hook by just tying it smaller on that longer hook.