The Wire Knot & making a livebait trace

There have been a few questions about how I go about attaching the wire between the hooks of the 2 hook rig.  I was using a uni knot  but I've been testing a new knot over the last few weeks and now that I've caught some nice fish on it I'm quite happy to recommend it.  I can't remember if I read about it somewhere or if I came up with it on my own so we'll just call the the Figure 8 knot for now.  Its quite simple and very strong but there are a few caveats.  You must use nylon coated multistrand wire and the strength needs to be 30lb and above, any lighter and it will likely fail.  You must also test it by hooking it up to a bar and giving it a hard pull, if the wire was kinked during the knot cinching it will break, otherwise it will be solid as a rock.  Its worth noting that all my traces are tested with heavy load prior to bagging, that way you know the trace wont fail when you've got a fish on.

Step 1.  Tying the figure 8 knot.

Cut about 20cm of wire.  Thread the wire through the eye of the hook then bring it back along the incoming wire, loop it around the wire then thread it back through the loop you created close to the eye of the hook.  Once you've done that it should look like the picture below.

Tighten up the loop by pulling on both the incoming wire and the tag end and it should look like the picture below.  Cut the tag end leaving about 3mm of tag.  Ensure that you slide the  knot down the right hand side as shown in the picture below.   This will be the eye the mono gets attached to.

Tie another figure 8 knot to the hook on the other end of the wire.  Test both knots by hooking it onto something and giving it hard pull.  Once finished it should look like the picture below.  That is the wire section completed.  Ideally it should be between 10 & 15cm long for pike, 7-10cm for slimies & yellowtail.

Cut about 45cm of 40-50lb mono, using a uni knot attach it to the top hook making sure that it is tied to the left of the wire and tie a swivel on the other end also with a uni knot.  Your trace should now be completed, test the trace under load before bagging.  Your completed trace should look like the picture below.

Once completed and tested all my traces are placed into ziplock bags showing hook size, intended bait use, wire and mono strength.