Hi Guys,
Newbie, so have patience. Building my first spinning rod on a 7' blank I will use for casting off of my boat for stripers and blues. I have a Penn SSV 5500 reel with 20# braid. I read the article in the Library for guide sizing and placement and I am a little confused. I plan on having a 14"grip, add 5" for reel seat and top of reel is approx. 19" from butt. When I measured the outside diameter of the spool lip (2") and multiply by 27 I get 54". When I factor in placement of the reel, the chocker guide would be 73" from the butt leaving 11" for the remaining 6-7 guides. I assume I am doing someting horribly wrong. Help!

No, you're doing it right. The distance from the choker guide to the tiptop is of no concern whatsoever. The only thing that matters is the distance from the reel to the choker guide. That's where line control takes place.

Locate the choker guide 54 inches from the reel spool and take up whatever distance remains from the choker to the tip with as many running guides as you need. There is no call to use 6 to 7 running guides. If you only have 11 more inches to the tip, then just one 1 or 2 running guides should be enough. Then go cast it.

Do make sure you are not confusing the choker guide with the butt guide. They are not the same thing.

..............

No, you aren't doing anything wrong. At worst, the only thing you are doing wrong is assuming an article could address every type of rod.

For those of us that fish salt water with good sized spinning reels on short to moderate lentgh rods the article could make you feel like you are doing something wrong. The point to understand is the choker location is determined by reel spool sizeuide and slide it forward untill it cont alone. The length of the rod isn't important and if your choker guide is the rod's tip top so be it.

In your case you will have the choker guide 11" from the tip. You will probably have two more guides, of the same size/type, between the tip and the choker. Just space them equally for now. The butt guide will be about 1/2 the spool diameter, meaning a size 25 for you. You will locate it based on a straight line from choker guide to reel's axle (centerline of spool). Start with the guide near the reel and slide it forward until its outside frame contacts this straight line. The butt guide and the choker guide locations are now "set in stone". Now decide on the next guide up from your size 25 butt guide. A size 16 is probably about right. So set it near the 25 guide and slide it forward untill its outside frame contacts said straight line. Repeat with the next guide up, probably a size 12/10. All of these guides should be high frame spinning guides such as Fuji's BYAG series. The choker and the two guides forward of it should be low frame guides like Fuji's BLAG (size 6,5 or 4).

So far we have the choker, two guides forward of it....the butt guide and two guides forward of it....so a total of six guides so far. That might be enough depending on your rod but typically one more is required. Again using Fuji as an example, you will probably need a "low frame" spin guide here like their J suffix guide (IIRC), probably a size 8.

Needless to say you will need an assortment of guide sizes to pick from. Then you are going to need to read up on static testing to fine tune things. The butt guide and the choker shouldn't be moved (much if at all). The ones near the tip probably will. Strive to keep the "reduction" guides in that bulleye's alignment.

The first time or two it will take some time/trail/effort. I promise it will be worth it. Very soon you will get the hang of it and never feel the need to consult a guide spacing chart nor will you ever doubt that you have layed out the guides in anything but the best possible manner.

So don't be concerned that your choker guides is X number of inches from the end of the rod. It is what it is. Don't be concerned if that means you need X number of reduction guides instead of only one...two...or three. It is what it is.

Next time around you might go with a little smaller reel and a little longer blank. Maybe then you will have a 16, 10, 6, folllowed by six 4's. And that will be fine too because....it is what it is.

Russ in Hollywood, FL.

Thank you Tom and Russ for the clarification. I built a spiral conventional rod which came out really well and static tested that one, I assume process would be the same.
Love the Forum and really do appreciate the help.

Rick
Long Island, NY

Russell spells it out quite nicely!!!

Rog