"What I was asking was if the wire was of different diameter at different points, would it help the solve the problem of balancing penetration versus hook strength. The area of a hook bend where the deformation occurs seems to be far enough up the bend (say about midpoint of the hook bend, up to where it meets the shank) that any additional thickness shouldn't interfere with penetration."

It might not interfere with the penetration, but it would surely just move the "weakest part" of the hook to another location...not remove it...

For instance, if the weakest point is on the bend of the hook, it may deform quite a bit before failing...if you remove that weak point, making say, the point the weakest link, it may actually fail sooner than if there were a weaker point on the bend.

Perhaps this is too obvious, but at what pounds of pull the hook fails at may not be nearly as important as where it finally fails...a flexing or bending hook bend may actually work to keep a fish hooked, whereas a stiff bend may actually cause the failure somewhere else on the hook...again, too many variables to test in the lab, IMHO.

Fish on...

Todd