Stonfo Fly Line Cleaner review

What is the Stonfo Fly Line Cleaner?

The Stonfo Fly Line Cleaner is a very small and compact tool that can be clipped to your lanyard or bag and used to clean dirt and grime from the surface of your fly line. Removing dirt helps reduce friction as the line shoots through the rings so it takes less effort to cast. With a clean fly line, you'll find that casting is easier and you can achieve greater distances.

How does this fly line cleaner work?

Before use, the felt pads within the Fly Line Cleaner need to be loaded up with a special line cleaning compound. Stonfo sells a product called Line Grease, which is designed for this purpose.

What's it like to use?

One of the fisheries I frequent, Ellerdine Lakes, is in a somewhat boggy location and mud can be a real problem during the winter months and your line requires frequent cleaning to keep it casting smoothly. I generally do this with either an unscented baby wipe, which I keep in a resealable bag in my waist pack, or by pulling the line through the felt pad supplied with Mucilin silicone paste.

The Stonfo Fly Line Cleaner is much easier and more convenient to use while fishing than either of my normal methods. It clips right onto your lanyard and is pre-loaded with cleaning compound, so providing you've lubed up the pads with silicone then you've got instant access to it. The ergonomic design also means you can apply a bit more pressure to help pull off dirt and your fingers get far less greasy. Once cleaned, your fly line will shoot and cast better and float higher in the water, so causes less splashing when lifting off to re-cast.

It removes an impressive amount of dirt, even from fly lines that look fairly clean. I tested it on a cleanish fly line that was casting OK and the pads revealed quite a bit of additional dirt from just a few quick pulls through the pads. The removal of that dirt, and the addition of the slick coating added from the Line Grease, made casting much easier and it took far less effort.

How much does the Stonfo Fly Line Cleaner cost?

The Fly Line Cleaner costs around £7.70 while the Line Grease to load the cleaning pads costs £2.60. This is a little more expensive than buying a pot of Mucilin Silicone, which also comes with an applicator pad, but is much quicker and easier to apply and seems a bit more effective at freeing dirt.

More information: Stonfo