I need your inputs on balancing a rod for performance. What characteristics do you get if you shift the weight towards the top of the rod vs more weight towards the back. Whats your preferance nuetral, weight forward or back?

I can't imagine ever attempting to shift the weight towards the tip of the rod. By virtue of the length involved, nearly all rods beyond a few feet long tend to be tip heavy to begin with. I suppose there might be some technique specific uses that require a tip-heavy or forward balance point, but they'd surely be few and far between.

You can do a search, or wait for more comments here, but you'll soon find that there is a wide difference of opinion on whether you should even attempt to balance a rod and if you do, where should that balance point be. For myself, I never add any additional weight to rod in the form of a balance weight. Some of my fly rods have dual moveable hoods so I can shift the reel fore or aft to change the balance point but the majority of my rods make no allowance for balance. I simply build them as light as I can with particular importance on keeping weight off the upper half of the rod.

I would add that as a rod gets lighter and lighter, balance becomes less and less of an issue.

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I prefer balance at the middle of my grip, the middle finger, where it sits on the grip where I hold the rod while fishing. Balanced at this point. When walking, or hiking a couple of miles to get to water, the rod stays horizontal to the ground. Tip doesn't occasionally hit ground because it's tip heavy and my wrist gets tired of holding the tip up while hiking. Also while fishing on a boat, a tip heavy rod will soon tire your rod holding hand, at least it did on my 11' six wt fly rod, with an orvis 6wt reel on it. It was tip heavy enough to wear out my wrist within an hour.

Jim

I think it depends on the type of rod your building, or more specifically, the techniques you'll use it for. If I'm building a rod that will be used for a "tip-up" technique like drop-shotting, shakey head or jigging, I may balance so that the tip will be slightly up at the balance point (I always use the point where your fingers come in contact with the front of the reel, usually your middle finger on a spinning rod). If it's a "tip down" technique, I prefer a neutral balance. Just my $.02.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/07/2010 12:57PM by Ryan Dietman.

Put me in the "build the entire rod as light as possible" category. Like stated, especially the upper end = lightest possible.

DR

if the rod is 5- 6 ft, I would not worry about it. If you don't like the feel of it then put and adjustable butt cap on it that uses the weights that you can adjust Then play with them.

Bill - willierods.com

I usually build with the balance point at the base of the real seat (casting / bass setup) on the tip side and have gotten lucky with feel. I handled one of my older builds and noticed that the weight was way back (light tip) and I tried to cast a shakey head jig and it just didn't feel right for me. I had to load up on the rod to get it to cast farther, where as I had a similar setup with the weight a little further up top which threw the jig a little easier. In the hope of setting the real seat in the correct spot the first time vice adding weight to balance the setup I wanted your opinions. Neutral would be the spot, but if a change in balance point can affect casting distance/technique than Im all for moving the weight around.

Isaiah
I would be more inclined to believe that even though similar rods. The blanks were different enough to affect casting distances more then the balance point.

I have rods that I used for a while which were tip heavy them, added butt weight to increase the comfort level during use. But have never noticed a difference in casting distance. Only in less fatigue at the end of the day.

Isaiah:

It depends upon whether you are bait casting, spin casting, or fly casting. With fly casting the more weight you feel at the tip of the rod (during the cast) the better your rod is performing. More "tip weight" = more line out = longer cast. If you want a fly rod to balance when you are just holding the rod and not casting it doesn't make much difference where you add weight, or how much weight you add, for that matter.

Phil that is the point I was trying to state on my earlier post, I beleive like fly fishing a heavier tip would assist with loading the rod thus casting a little further. I just wrapped 2 rods today, one with the weight biased further up top and the other further back. Im using them for finesse casting and we'll see which one can cast the ligher jig further. Ill post back when thier field tested.

Isaiah:

My advice is, unless your goal is creating more muscle definition in your casting arm you should refrain from adding weight anywhere on your rod, particularly leveraged weight at the tip of your rod. Line speed, not rod weight, will load your fly rod.