Got a bass fishing fanatic as a co-worker wants me to build him a custom rod. I gave him some ideas about various blanks and components to meet his needs. This will be for jig casting short range to BIG bass.

He has selected the St. Croix 3S66MHF blank. He stated this will be for 12 lb line. I intend to make a custom handle and use Fuji SIC titanium guides, like a 12 and 10 all purpose cast/spin double foot, then a 10 and an 8 light action cast/spin single foot, then 4 or so fly 7's to a no 7 top. Thinking of keeping that tip section super light and sensative.

Interested in the opinion of those many on here with far more bass rod experience. Will that guide selection do the job or is my guess just wrong??

If this for a casting rod, used for short range flipping/ pitching. You need a lot more rod than that. If you could e-mail where you live. The bodies of water he will be fishing (try to name some popular ones in your area). I can get you hooked up with some info. Just to let you know I primarily fish rivers and lakes in; IL,WI,IA,MI,TX,SC,NC,GA,MO,AR,OK. My strengths are deep clear water, and stained (not muddy) shallow water.

You should select these guides and tip top:

Fuji TLNSG 16, 12, 10
Fuji TLSG 8 x 2, 7 x 3
Fuji TFST 7 ( ID to suit your blank tip, should be 2.2 based on my experience)

Anthony Lee

Tim,
That is an interesting approach to getting as high a sensitivity as you can. I assume that you mean wire fly guides toward the tip. You might also consider using single footed ceramics out toward the tip and using fewer of them to keep the weight down. The trade off will be that the ceramics will last longer and cast slightly better but using fewer guides will result in higher stresses on the rod. The stresses will increase roughly in proportion to the increase in distance between guides. ie. increaseing the distance between guides 20% will result in roughly a 20% increase in the stress.
One other thing that you might consider is, if you look closely at almost all blanks they do not deflect in the first few inches therefore there is almost no stress or strain in this first few inches and no guide is required. And naturally this is the point where added weight has the most effect on sensitivity. You might consider moving the first guide from the tip back from the tip and you might gain as much as you do with the wire guides.
Have you measured the difference in the weight of the fly guides and the single foot sic's.

the avids are nice rods and the MH's are very stout, maybe too much for 12lbs test line. if he is fishing lite cover with 12lbs line a 3c70m would be a good choice, but for thick cover and heavier line i would go with the 3c70MH. you might want to look at doing some sort of spiral wrap, that way you could use #6's guides towards the tip. do a search on bumper wrap and you should get all the info you need. good luck.

Tim:

In my opinion, 12# line is pretty light for jig fishing except for open water. If he is fishing cover, then 15-20# would be more appropriate. You said he was making short casts, so I'd have to "assume", he is casting to cover. I agree with Stan that the MH would be the best choice in power. Depends on the weight of jigs he is throwing, too. With the jig technique, sensitivity is a real issue. I'm not sure what his budget is, but I'd consider the LE...ie. 5C66MHF blank combined with the Ti/Sic guides. Another blank to consider would be the Shikari SHX PMB 664. Both of these blanks are light, increasing sensitivity.

As for guides, my standard set up is the TLNSG 12 / 10 / 8...then TLSG 6's to the tip and a TFST6 top to fit. I'd suggest the spiral wrap, as well.

I build my casting rods with a split rear grip, no foregrip, reel seat threads trimmed. If you'd like to get an idea of how I build my rods, you are welcome to visit my website, where I have a few pictures to give you an idea..... www.georgescustomrods.com

If you build him one like this...I assure you that he will be back for more!

Good luck..........George

Thanks for the info.

This fellow is very much a master bass caster. This is Sacramento River Delta fishing and lakes in the area. These are Florida sized bass. He wants the MH stick and specifically 6'6". He has used spiral wrap but wants this one standard wrapped. Price is not a problem. He just bought a new top of the line Ranger bass boat. The blank selected is ideal for the performance/durability tradeoff called for. No. of guides will provide perfect stress curve matching. All the guides will be Fuji titanium SIC ring. I much appreciate all responces, but particularly like the detailed guide info given by George Roth. (By the way, checked out his site and he does have the split handles down very nice.) However, I now consider that the fly guides are just too low for a standard wrap. If it means one extra guide to keep the line off the blank, OK. But the TUNSG 7 appears to be a bit taller and stronger. I don't think the extra weight will be a concern, particularly when using titanium. Still will be considerably lighter than any steel frame SIC two foot traditional casting guide.