I've been asked for a 3pc 8ft spinning rod to throw 1/8-1/4oz jigs to bonefish. He has a spinning rod built on a fly blank but feels it is too "whippy". Any suggestions appreciated.

I don't know of any 8'0" blanks in a three piece that are light enough and fast enough to use for bones. I use 7'6" rods in a two-piece design. These two in particular would be the ones to look at ... St Croix 3S76MLXF2 and North Fork SSP767-2.

Mike,
I think you also have another couple of options,

1) Buy an 8 ft one piece blank and build your own ferrules or

2) Build the butt from a spinning or casting blank and use a fly blank for the tip sections. I have 7ft7in multi-peice rod that I built this way using a 9' 7 weight blank. It's a little slower than I would like but casts 1/8 oz and up pretty well. I built the butt section (15in) from a carefully sized offfcut from a spinning blank. Before I glued on the butt cap I inserted the 3rd section of the fly blank inside it. The 3rd and 4th sections are thus attached and telescope like a lot of flipping blanks. Because the butt section is so stiff the rod's a bit faster taper than if the butt section used a fly blank. If you built the butt section to be 20in (and so the overall length to be 8 feet) it would be faster still. Alternatively you could build the butt section to be 27in and cut the 3rd section of the fly blank back to 20in and have an even faster taper. Either way, you have an 8ft 3/4 piece rod that packs down to about 27in which is the same size as a 4 piece 9 feet fly rod.

(The taper of the spinning blank is usually faster than the taper on the fly blank but the telescoping joint holds well with no problems. If you are concerned though you could build up very bottom of the 3rd section using epoxy.)



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2012 01:47AM by David McDonough.

CTS blank - they have various blank ranges to choose from. The alternative is anything of what the other have said: cutting, gluing, modifying etc.
Cheers,
Michal

Mike, St. Croix has 3 pc 7 footers in their saltwater series. Go on line and check their blanks so see if you can find something that works. I have built over a dozen of their 3 piecers, customers love them. I have three and use them all the time. Check the lure rating carefully, med light freshwater is not medium light saltwater for these blanks.
Buzz

They even have 7'6" 3-piece blanks. Great stuff actually, but they are not 8 footers :-(
CTS will provide 2-,3 and even 4-piece blanks in a range of lengths and weights. Pricey stuff, though ...
Cheers,
Michal

maybe you can add a section to a 7'6" blank

Bill - willierods.com

I would extend a 7' 6" blank.

[www.rodbuilding.org]

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