I just read and article that you wrote in the March/April 1999 issue of Rodmaker Magazine on placing a second stripper guide 4 inches closer to the tip-top than the first stripper guide on fly rods. On this site that guide is refered to as a tamer guide. I have been doing this for a few years now and like the results. My question is that in the article you use the same size tamer guide as the 1st stripper guide. I have always made the tamer guide one size smaller. Have I been doing this wrong or (hopefully) it has changed through the years?

I'd have to go back and look, but generally I make it the same size as the standard 2nd guide, not the stripping guide. I would think that's what I wrote.

Neither way is wrong, of course, and both are likely to obtain similar results. If what you're doing is working, then it's not wrong. Just for the heck of it, you might try making the tamer the same size as the stripping guide and see if you can find any difference, but I doubt you're going to notice much if any difference.

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Thanks Tom. That was the reply I was hoping for!