Why on earth do top fly rod makers use snakes as standard?
They are dreadful. They produce line-slap, have a short life-span, lose feel in the blank, scratch paintwork on cars, and are generally very ugly.
The rings on my sage rod are worn out and I've only had it two seasons.
This is the only reason I have taken up an interest in rod building.
I'm telling you guys the first big rod company to fit hi-tech lined rings to their hi-tech rods will make a freaking fortune!

Lamiglas tried that, the Esprit fly rods had Fuji Alconites on them, now they have Recoils.

Spencer

Not really - in order to sell a better guide you also have to educate the public on why they're better. As long as the fly rod industry can use inexpensive guides on expensive rods and customers prefer, even demand them, they'll continue doing so.

........

Reminds me of G Loomis's attempt at the spiral wrapped rods; that didn't make it very far either. It's hard to get the right message across to the general fishing public on these things.

Putter
Williston, ND

Where all these poisonous snakes, Oh that's right there here with me in OZ.. Putter that reminds me I saw a spiral wrapped GLoomis factory rod in Sydney when I was there last, the bloke said he had it for years, even at a super discounted price he could not get rid of it, I must admit I was tempted to buy it and strip it for the blank. GLoomis means big dollars in Australia.

Myles

I think that the first casting rods that Loomis began selling were spiral wrapped. The general fishing public wasn't ready to accept anything that was "different" than what they expected (sort of like today!). They had to go back to conventional to compete. I think that it will be some time before the mainstream accepts them

Mike

I'm trying to break new ground here in Aus with the spirals. Us Aussies are a hard bunch to convert from anything that has been proven to work unless you can prove something new is a heap better than the original. The spirals I have done have sold quicker than anything else but I believe only due to their "uniqueness". Most blokes want something that their mates haven't got. They aren't fully interested in how it works, just that it does the job and others are going to notice them with their weird rod. Those that have fished with their spirals for some time are mostly like me, fully converted and spread the word. My next job is a Loomis GL3844 spiral in the mahogany series. This is for me and not for sale. Sorry got a little off track from snake guides.

Regards
Outback

Do a search of custom rod builders. You will find that many build there flys with double and single foot snake guides. That is what the people think they should have on???? Casting most with guides on top. Like Tom said the people don't know??!! Make them look like off the shelf, if that is what they want??

I don't think Lamiglass did enough to promote the single foot ceramics on their rods. No large, full page adds. No advertisements that adequately highlighted the superior guides, etc, etc. Addtionally, Lamiglass is a very small player in the fly rod market. Very few fly anglers can go to their favorite fly shop and test cast a Lami. Many guys would rather have a rod that they can examine and test before buying. All these factors contribute to their lack of success.
I think if Sage, Winston, or Orvis produced a rod with ceramics and marketed it well, it would sell.

Kevin

Kevin is right; those are the companies with the deep pockets that could reach out with advertising and educate the angling public. They charge more for their product because of their advertising and it would be great to see them sway people to what is definitely better...they could bring it around to the modern world and leave the snakes in the stone age!

Putter
Williston, ND

I might add that you really do not want the major players to market anything but obsolete systems. A custom rod is then instantly distinguishable from the factory models and will hopefully command the price of your American supplied labor. The customer that can't be educated is probably not interested in custom rods.

Why would Sage, etc. spend money to promote something that is not only NOT make them any more money, but actually cost them MORE?? There customers are perfectly happy with, and even demand, the status quo

Mike

well I wont buy a sage rod unless it is built using top quality guides

I would never buy a $100 spinning rod without fugi concept guides so why on earth would I accept second best in in a $600 fly rod?