Re: Colors I believe it is safe to say that most people who use leadcore a lot let all the leadcore out so that it is beyond the tip of the rod and past the inline planer board if one is used. This is because of bad experience with the lead core line wearing particularly at the rod top guide and breaking off later. If inline boards are used, the constant motion causes a lot of wear. If no board is used, then the wear is not as bad but can still cause problems after a while. I usually run half cores and/or full cores. If I want to get down deeper than these will go, I add sinkers via snap weights on the backer side of the backer/leadcore knot and then let the line out some more. This way you can get the half core to run as deep or deeper than the full core depending on the weight used and the amount of backer let out. Even if you leave some leadcore line on the reel it is best to count the colors as you put the line out unless you have line counter reels because you usually can't be sure of the order of the repeating colors on the line unless you are sure to do it the same way every time, don't ever splice in more line to fix a broken line, etc.