Hello all. Does anyone alter the placement of their reel seats to balance their fly rods? If so, how do you usually do it (e.g. add a fighting butt).
thanks,
Tom.

I think the only way you can do this effectively, would be to alter the location of the reel in relation to where your grasp the grip. Adding a fighting butt, while adding a little weight to the back of the rod, may not make very much difference. Depends on the weight of the butt, I suppose.

Some guys will make the seat downlocking, which moves the reel back an inch or so. So the overall weight of the rod and reel hasn't increased, but the balance point will change.

In an earlier issue of RodMaker, I showed how to make a reel seat with dual moveable hoods, which allowed you to move any reel fore or aft by a few inches in order to slightly change the balance of the overall outfit.

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Thanks for the information Tom. I have come across a strange scenario while building my first flyrod which has an uplocking seat. When I put the handle and reel seat togther as intended, the rod is somewhat top heavy. For curiousity's sake I put on a 1.5 inch fighting butt which moved the reel forward slightly and added some weight, now the rod balances much better. It looks a little strange, reverse half wells grip with a fighting butt, yet it seems more comfortable. I think I will play around some moreto see what I come up with...

Or.. just use a slightly larger (heavier) reel and leave the rod alone.


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At the moment that's not really an option, I only have the one reel. Besides, it's more fun this way...

you can also weight the reel by winding on some lc 13 leadcore line before adding your backing. maybe not the best solution but it will work. if you can get the balance point right at the tip of the grip that should be ok.