im in the process of gathering components for a few rods that i will be building shortly. all three on them will be built on 9' tiger eye fly blanks. they will be strictly used as spinning rods. two of the blanks are 7wt and one will be a 9wt. they will be used mainly for drifting egg sacks for lake superior steelhead. what are the smallest guide sizes that i can use for these rods? i want to go as small as possible. also, how many of each and how about placement?
thanks

You can go as small as you like as long as the line and whatever knots you use pass through the guides. Check this out from the library, it will help alot.
[www.rodbuilding.org]

I would imagine if your fishing Lake Superior Steelhead you will be fishing in the cold temperatures. Which leads to a lot of guide freezing, I use a drift rod with size 6 guides and have some troubles at times.

I'm building a 7'6" 4/5 wt tiger eye as a spinning rod for my dad. He's going to be using it for crappies and bluegills casting light tube jigs and roadrunners. I think I'm going to use a high frame 20, 16, 12, and then 3.0's to the tip (mainly because that is what I've got on hand). I've yet to mess with the guide placement, but I glued up the grip and reel seat last night. As soon as my BMCAT tips arrive I'll get it all put together.

OkAy, my blanks arrived yesterday...great looking blanks btw...now, for the components, I have ordered a couple of batsons skeleton spinning reel seats w/ the graphite insert, I just need guides now...I am planning on using the concept method of guide placement...what is the general starting guide size for a 9' spinning rod? Reel size will be a 2500 series...also about how many of each size guide do I need? I already know I need 10 total plus the tip top...any info would be greatly appreciated...thanks in advance

Go to the link in a previous message (Mike S) regarding spinning rod guides and spacing, and follow the instructions. You will probably start with a 25 tall guide based on the 2500 reel, but the diameter of the spool will determine the diameter of the first guide. The first of the smallest guides will be placed about 27 times the spool diameter from the spool, and the guides in between will be determined by the straight line path between the guide closest to reel and the first of the small guides, and I expect some of the guides will not be the tall design. But their size, height, and spacing have to be worked out for your specific blank.

You need to understand the library article from the link and use it. No one can tell you how to design the rod by exchanging notes. If you can get the ring diameter and guide heights from the manufacturer of the guides you plan to use, you can come pretty close by laying out the rod on adding machine paper mounted on a work bench with accurate sketches of the reel located on a seat and the first small guide located 27x from the reel. But ultimately, you will have to proof your design by actually stressing the rod with line through the guides, then test casting it.

The comment on icing of guides is valuable also-if you will be fishing under icing conditions you do not want to go too small. If icing is an issue, I am confident you don't want to use 3's. Mike T thinks 6's are as small as you should go.

When you get these rods done and want an interesting project, try a 3 weight 7 1/2 foot moderate action fly blank as an ultra light spinning rod designed around a 500 size reel, and you will be amazed at what you get.