My local Sporting Goods Store is stocking Kistler rods. I noticed they are shortening the threaded end of the reel seat and using split grips. Other than leaving the burs on the cut end of the reel seat, they look fairly good for $129.00 for a casting rod. I have seen very few manufactured rods with split grips and this was my first look at one with a shortened reel seat. Looks like they may be slowly coming around.

J.B.Hunt
Bowling Green, KY

They're already there man, look harder. Split grips, no foregrip, trimmed seats have crept into manufacturer's offerings in increasing numbers for a while now.

yup alot of bass rods are like this now. St. croix even is in on the action to now.

It's a funny thing how they refer to themselves as "Kistler Custom Rods". They are no more custom than an ordinary off the shelf ugly stick. Maybe better quality components but certainly not custom.

If you are seeing Kistler's on a rack for that price they must be quite old. Their present offerings for the bass market are in the $ 279 - $ 329 range and sell quite well. I for one thank Kistler for raising the price of rods being marketed through retail stores. Sure has helped my business and it was a compliment that they decided to copy most features of present custom rods. Maybe next they will go spiral and raise the price to $ 500. At present there are a number of domestic production companies that are defining US rods as custom and Imports as production. We will see what we see in the near future.

I also thought that was pretty cheap for a Kistler . They must be old stock and made offshore somewhere. This guy stocked Kistler ,Loomis and Falcon and a bunch of lower end brands. For craftsmanship and attention to detail I thought the Falcon looked the best. Of course since I started building my own I don't pay much attention to off the shelf rods anymore. I got them beat hands down anyway .

J.B.Hunt
Bowling Green, KY

The best rod kistler makes has and always sold for 129.00 it is there cheapest rod but there best rod all the other ones have serious breakage problems. I worked at a tackle store for a couple of years and saw a lot of broke kistler rods.

Jay,

I use a number of Falcon rods that I will eventually rebuild or replace with some new rods. I can say that on the shelf they look good, but the craftsmanship may not be the greatest. If I didn't desire to have something different than what was offered on the shelf, I would have never got to learn all of the interesting nuances of rod building and the differences that are used to save time on factory rods.

I learned by splitting the rear grip and removing the fore grip on my Falcon spinning rod that the cork and reel seat were placed on from the rear and shimmed with strips of wood. On my newest casting rod, a few years newer than the rest (after being new and improved), the rear grip is no longer solid cork. It is cork tape over closed cell foam.

I'm not saying that I don't like them; they perform just fine for a shelf rod. In fact I really like the blanks, and if I find time to rebuild them will like them even better.

Joe

The $139 Kistler are the Graphite Series. I have a couple of the Helium LTAs but I wouldn't pay retail or close for one. They are light and sensitive though I have a friend who has broken one on a hookset. I don't like there silly lying marketing.

Anthony Robertson
AKRods