Hi All
Have taken all your advice on board from my last post and have got my guides all placed and will be wrapping shortly. I was amazed at how the guide spacing turned out after placing them while the blank was flexed. BUT I'm going to get another couple blanks for saltwater flyfishing. Any advice as of size of guides for bigger diameter flylines like 8, 9, 10,11. Ive went with 6's(Titanium frame SiC's) on the rod Im making just now and it seems good but its only a 6 weight. Does anyone have a rough guide I can follow? Thanks

Many rod manufacturers post guide size & spacing charts, so do many of the sponsors posted on the left of this site. Check those out & compare them to see what the consensus is. Also, many fly fishing sites will also have charts if there is a rod building section to the site. Finally, try a search on this site, I'm sure that you will find some here as well. You will find that there will be many opinions on sizes and spacing. After casting many rods & building many more, you will get some opinions and preferences of your own...there is no one "right" way to do any of this rod building stuff.

Build and enjoy...

Tim

Even a #6 guide has plenty of space for large fly lines. A 10-weight line won't use 10% of the space in #6 ring.

However, you need to be able to clear knots and shooting head connections. For that reason on the larger rods, say 8-weight and up, I tend to lean toward #7 or #8 running guides. I have used #10's on the really large rods when heavy shooting heads and their related connections are expected.

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Tom has sort of summed it up but the easyiest way i found was take the leader and tie a big knot (like an overhand on a blood knot) then feed it through various sizes of guide until it clears easy I was surprised how small the guide really needs to be
as for the spacing I`m sure we discussed that before no two blanks are ever the same so individually space each one ( you can use one as a template but still space accordingly ) those little fractions out can and do make a lot of difference

hope it helps
Allen

Thanks Again for the great help. Tom you must be able to read minds because the knot issue was my concern. How would you recommend stepping down the guides. Ill tell you what Ive done for my 6 weight. Ive started with a 12 DF to 10 SF to 8 SF to 7 - 6 mm SF to a 7 tip as I couldnt find a 6 in titanium. On a Saltwater rod would I do much the same or thinking I may step down sharply from second DF stripper to 7SF???