I have a Batson RX7 763/4-4 that I use to fish medium-small brook trout cricks. I do a lot of this kind of fishing and this is certainly my go-to rod for it. I've used it hard since I built it (2 yrs ago).
I built it with brand name single foot TiN plated single foot snakes and Im noticing a lot of wear (stainless showing through) around the inside of these rings and tip top.
Now Im quite careful with my gear and I baby my fly lines. I havent fished this rod from any sandy banks nor have I fished it in full sun nor in brackish waters at all. Is it natural for guides like this to wear perceptibly in two seasons?

I would love to get perspective on guide wear from the contributorship here. Has any one experienced similar disappointments with seemingly high quality guides? What guides do you folks believe are the longest wearing?

Does anyone believe that a high quality traditional chrome snake (like maybe H+H or snake brand) would have worn better than these TiN plated ones?

Thanks for your experiences,
Joshua Markvan

Go ceramic and forget about guide wear. All stainless, metallic or plated type guides are going to wear, cut or groove. It's just a matter of time and use.

Joshua, in my experience the inside of TiN plated guides go silver pretty quickly, but I wouldn't worry until they begin to groove. Tich guides appear not to lose colour/wear as quickly (I seem to remember reading somewhere that Tich is harder anyway). Without wishing to begin another debate on wire V's ceramics I tend to think the friction advantages of ceramics on a short 3/4 creek rod are probably overkill in terms of cost and how far you want to cast and will slow down the action slightly with the extra weight (compared to single foot wire guides anyway). I'd respond differently if you were talking 6 weight or above though. Jim

Action does not change with additional weight, although the rod's efficiency (recovery and reaction time) does change.

Ceramics are normally not used with the intent of lowering friction, but rather to eliminate wear along with a host of other benefits. Properly sized, they add very little in terms of extra weight. In the past few years, they've continued to get smaller and lighter.

..........

This is one of the big reasons I recommend the REC Recoils. No plating to wear off.

Not to mention the other great reasons light weight, corrosion resistant, and much more durable than any other snake.

I have been redoing my factory rods with Recoils a huge difference.

Christian

Christian, I'm right with you. At this point, I'm recommending different ceramics and RECoils sngl fts on very small or light fly rods where optimum damping is the goal.

Jim, I'm a big ceramics fan, but I agree with you that cost and clunkiness is still a deterent in some situations. RECoils fill this void. I just wish they made the single foots in smaller sizes.

Thanks all for chiming in,
Josh

Josh,

As others have said, the gold coating will wear off in short order. Also, gold is particularly bad for saltwater compared to other colors.

Ceramics will be the best guides for wear for sure. On that little blank I'd have no problems putting alconite guides or better. If you want to go with wire, you might as well just go with the light wire guides from Pac Bay. While I like the lightweight of the recoil guides, I can't justify the price difference on a rod that won't be used in the salt. The flexibility is a nice gimmick and good if you abuse rods ( I don't), but certainly not necessary. They don't provide any benefit of less wear on fly line over other wire guides. The most wear comes from bending the fly line at a sharp angle at the tip. That is related to the diameter of the tip ring. So, I'll stick with the light wire guides for my rods under a 3 wt and alconites/TiSiC on any heavier rods.

Thanks,
Rick

I've had the same experience with those TiN guides. Once the gold has worn off, they still fish fine, though I suppose the line doesn't flow quite as freely on the plain stainless steel. . .?

I too, switched to ceramics a while back. I even use them on little rods, as the small amount of extra weight doesn't seem to matter in light of the numerous benefits.