Just curious if anyone has any opinions of two specific fly blanks made by cabelas. The first Is the PT+ blanks, and secondly The inexpensive Traditional II fast action blanks. The Traditional has such a nice finish and was wondering just how fast people thought they were. Both very good looking blanks.

I prefer to support this board's sponsors and I understand why they're not-they sell tons of stuff other than rod building supplies. That being said, I have built several rods with their blanks and they are really nice and a good value. I still think that one of our sponsors would have the same blank at the same price.

I have built rods on Cabela's blanks and think they are a good value. However, I agree that some of the sponsors blanks are just as good or better. For example, I have used Pacific Bay blanks with very good success.

Understood. I have built so far almost all of my rods on sponsors blanks as well, some real nice ones to boot. I can't help but try to do as many comparisons so that I can truley find out which blanks better or worse at as many price levels as I can . Thats the way I work. Try to gain as much knowledge as I can about as many different blanks as possible. Thats all.
That said I don't think it is a bad thing to compare sponsor and non sponsor products. If comparisons and honest opinion are limited to only sponsors, I believe it does a disservice to this forum and its sponsors, and becomes nothing more than an advert for the sponsors of this forum (wich I also understand). Hope I'm not offending any sponsors by saying that, and I would bet that the sponsors would welcome some honest comparisons.

I've built a few rods on Cabela's blanks and as a whole have been quite happy with the results.
Most of the builds were on blanks that they have discontinued and am now using the new blanks.
The 8' 5 weight traditional 2 is an excellent casting 8 weight blank but failed terribly as a 5 weight.
The IM7 blanks are good moderate priced blanks that cast true to weight. I've cast the PT rods and have a blank here but have yet to build it. The PT rod did cast quite well.

Eugene Moore

I have a 14 year old PT+ 9' 2pc. 4wt that casts and fishes great. Before I started building rods, this was my fly rod of choice. It handles the wind without a problem, and I've used it to catch some pretty big trout (20+inches). I have never checked the AA or ERN, but I would say that it is a fast rod, with a lot of reserve power.

George Forster
Fort Collins, CO

The newer dark green color PT+ blanks are very nice. So are the bright green Tradition II blanks. The PT+ is made in the U.S. if it matters to you. I've built several of both and I prefer the PT+ over the Tradition II because it's right on when I do CCS tests of the blanks. The Tradition II is faster and tends to be at least a line weight above what Cabela's lists (again according to CCS tets). The PT+ blanks are not as fast, but they are really nice medium- fast to almost fast blanks, and much lighter than the Tradition II blanks. As stated by others, you can't go wrong with any of the vendors listed here, but I hope I've helped answer your question. Let me know what blank you're looking at and I'll see if I have the CCS data for one I've built.

John Gertz
White Bear Lake , MN