Hi, I just finished a Rainshadow ISB822.5 . The blank is rated 1/8-5/8 oz. I think that maybe the small micro guides might have affected those ratings, the lure rating seems to be more like 1/4 or higher-5/8 oz. with the use of the smaller guides. The rod casts well above a 1/4 oz. but seems like it does not load anything under 1/4oz. at all. I was wondering if using the small micro guides could have effected the lure rating. The guides I used where one, BYAG20, BYAG12, BYAG8, BLAG5, five BLAG4, with a American Tackle HFBT5 tip top. I am wondering what effect the micro guides may have on a casting rod that the lower lure rating is 1/4oz. I did notice that if I left more line hanging from the tip that it helped casting the lighter lures a little. Any opinions greatly appreciated. Have a great day, Rich.

Im wondering if that # 20 guide is to small for whatever your doing with it and the lighter weight baits dont have the weight to pull whats choked through.

Hi Henry, The size of the butt guide was the first thing I changed back and forth, up and down the blank when test casting. I even went as far as to try that Kevin Van Dam line and lure conditioner with the six pound Suffix line. I have to say the KVD line conditioner did make the line extremely loop free. The line when entering the the butt guide shows very little if know sign of a standing wave at the but guide. I am using a Stradic 1000FI spinning reel with a spool diameter of 39.7 mm. I think my problem may be that the blank is supposed to be used for a drop shot rod, (I think.) In that case with a drop shot rig and the extra line for the rig it may cast the way drop shot rods cast. I did try it as a drop shot rod and it actually casted better than expected but a little less than I hoped for smaller weight lures. Quarter oz. baits and up the rod casts pretty well. Thank you for your reply. I will have to do a little more test casting before I wrap and epoxy my next rod. Have a great day, Rich.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2008 05:33PM by Rich Gassman.

Rich, I can't imagine the fault is with size 4 running guides. I have the same rod with #6 flys and I use 1/8 oz jigworms all the time. I'm doing one now with #4. I do use a 25 size concept guide though for the butt. I just don't like how my rods perform with a 20 and mono.

And I know that Steve Gardner is using the RX8+ ISB822.5 with 2mm guides, but his butt guide was a 25 as well if I recall.

Chuck



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2008 06:37PM by Chuck Mills.

Hi Chuck, I do not think it is so much the size of the ring of the guides but rather the weight of them. The size four running guides are smaller, but more important with this type blank, lighter than a size six guide. I guess I think that the larger guides would cause the blank to load a little better during the cast with light lures. I may be and probably am way off base in my thinking. I do love the smaller guides, to me they are easier to wrap (size fours anyway), easier to align, and just plain look good. I did try different spacings and guides that included a 25 butt guide, it seemed to me the 20 butt guide casted as far as the 25 so I went with 20 setup. There really is no standing wave in the line from the spool to the butt guide which is why I think it has more to do with the weight of the running guides. I am going to do some test casts to see just what distance I get out of a eighth and quarter oz. with out putting the pedal to the metal so to speak. It has been a while since I fished with a spinning rod, maybe I am expecting to much. I have the extra spool filled with suffix braid which I never tried while I was fishing. I am wondering if I put the spool of braid on the reel and test cast it, if it casted better that would tell me the butt guide size should be bigger and it is not the lack of weight of the combined running guides. I guess if I have to remove the guides I will, sure wish I would have used CP. I may get to see how hard it is to remove ThreadMaster light. Chuck, thank you for your reply, have a great day, Rich.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2008 07:39PM by Rich Gassman.

I built on that blank a few times i did test cast it but with much heavier weight than you are having problems with. I used the TAT guides wow are they nice. the rod felt like it had no guides on it. : ).

One thing about batson blanks I have found so far are they are somewhat under rated. I can use much heavier lures than they are rated for is what im getting at. I havent really tried going in reverse and seeing how low they will go but from knowing they are underated. I wouldnt expect them to be perfect in the lower end of their rating knowing the rateing is not quite right to begin with.

I think Rich has something here after building a few rods on these blanks in the different grades.
If you look at the Batson guides spacing chart for their spinning blanks they do not use any of their "F" guides at all on any spinning rod. Because they use the heavier spinning guides are their rating different because their test rods are throwing lure and additional guide weight which skews them a bit, or is it more of an abstract human individual perception at work, or both?

Keep us posted. For what its worth - I cast two-handed and really fire it out there sometimes with no hesitation after the back cast. Make sense?

Hopefully someone with more micro guide experience will chime in soon.

Chuck

Henry might be right on this. Also you have not yet got to what I would consider "Micro guides" when you get to the 3mm down to 1.5 or 1.2mm then you are there. 4mm have been on the market for long before Micro guides were available.

On most of my set ups I'm at 25-10-5- 3.5-3's to the tip or smaller and have not noticed your problem.

But as far as your question I posed basically the same question a while back to Karry Batson as to whether the ratings on blanks included consideration of the guide weights. He passed that question onto their blank engineer and I am at present waiting for his response.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2008 11:46PM by Steve Gardner.

I want to say thank you to everyone for your great advice. I will keep you posted about my casting tests. I think if I try to cast weights above a quarter oz. I will get pretty good distance without putting to much effort into the cast. I am sure it is something I just overlooked. If I can make a mistake I usually do. The thing that bothers me is the line looked so good going from the spool through the guides, yet casted the way this one does. After test casting it will not be to bad to remove the guides and start over. I usually use a 2000 series reel and start with a 25 butt guide. Maybe the smaller spool and smaller butt guide has something to do with my perception of how I though it would cast. Thank you again for all your help. Have a great day, Rich.

Rich, Have you measured the action angle of that blank? It lists as extra fast and I've found the Rainshadow blanks to be uniform but there is always the chance you may have a slower blank. I really doubt that the lighter weight of the guides is a problem. If heavier guides add to rod loading, (energy storing), it would seem the extra weight would also cause an equal energy loss on the release.

Stan Grace
Helena, MT
"Our best is none too good"

Stan, there are posts on surf rod buildign forums where guys use heavier guides to help better load the blank when using lighter lures. In a real world situation, tehy get more casting distance than with the smaller lighter guides - in those specific scenarios. In a Physics classroom, it probably doens't make sense.

I would suspect that applied force may be involved but I doubt if a lighter spinning rod would benefit from adding weight to the tip. A human arm can hurl a baseball much further than a shot put.

Stan Grace
Helena, MT
"Our best is none too good"

If you are unable to get the blank to load, you might as well be casting with a tomato stake. Arms and catapaults have nothing to do with a fishing rod...actually they do and that's a great example. Take a human being, put his feet into concrete Mafia style, and put his arm in a cast so it cannot bend. Throw the Baseball. Now give the Baseball to a regular person, and have them throw it. Teh person who is able to move their body, and bend their arm will eb able to throw teh ball further than someoen who cannot. Same with a fishing rod - a rod will cast further if it loads up. If you can't load it, you can try as hard as you want to cast it further, but it's just not going anywhere.

That's why if you take your favorite fishing rod, and have it break 3-4" off the tip, it will not cast nearly as well as it did full length. Most casts will go short, and land hard, and will go left or right from where you are aiming. I'm not saying to use heavier guides, the answer might be to use lighter rated blanks.

I think it really has to do with the rating of the blank. While lighter or heavier guides change the feel somewhat, I find that the rating of the blank is a bit more subjective than some people believe. I use the rating as a guideline and go for what "feels" right. I have two rods I built with the same exact blank. On one rod I feel comfortable throwing a 1/2oz double willow blade, and on the other I don't want to go above a 3/8oz. Just the way the cookie crumbles, I reckon.

Anthony
AKRods

I suggest you try this rod with a 2500 sized reel and maybe 6 pound line. I have size 20's on most of my spinning rods and they cast well with 2500 reels and 8 pound and lower pound test line. There is a very noticable improvement with 6 pound line and this is maganified with light weight baits. 1/4 ounce is actually heavy enough that it should cast well. We use Sliders and other small plastics which will be lighter than 1/4 ounce and cast most on "medium" power rods. By the way a size 20 bottom guide works well with 30 pound braid!

Hi everyone, I want to say thank you to everyone for you help. I think I figured out my problem. I feel pretty darn dumb right about now. I had a little time to go and cast the rod again. I restrung the rod and put on a Texas rigged six inch worm and a 4/0 worm hook. I told myself I am going to lightly cast it and watch the line as it runs through the guides. I watched the line and it looked good, the way I thought it looked before, but something felt different. When I started to reel the worm in to cast again I noticed it was out there a long ways. I gave it a little better cast the next cast and said to myself, there ain't nothing wrong with the rod. What the heck. The only thing I can think of is I missed putting the line though one of the running guides and fished it like that the entire day. I did something similar with a spinning rod that I put little Recoil spinning guides on. I tried lighter baits also and there was a considerable improvement also. I guess when you get older your eyes go and in my case it seems the brain is not far behind. Thanks again for all your help, sorry about that, I will go stand in the corner for a while and contemplate if I can be so dumb again. Have a great day, Rich.

LOL!! What a great story, Rich! Funny as heck.

Don't stand in the corner though. We've all done MUCH dumber things than that!!

Putter
Williston, ND

Whew!! I have that same blank(ISB822.5) on order and for the fishing that I do 1/8 to 1/4 ounce jigs is about all I use. You had me really worried that I was going to have to build it for someone else who uses heavier baits.

Threading Micro guides;
For those whose eyesight is slightly limited like mine here is a suggestion for threading Micro that has worked for me.

I take the line and pinch it between my fore finger and thumb just inside the point where they round up to my finger nails. Then side my fingers up the blank, with the blank between the two finger tips.
This guides the line through the guide. Works pretty good is easier then threading a hook.