that,s funny Robert..wire guides are BLAH in my opinion..lol.

I just searched for 15 wt. fly rods on line. Every one I could find, from the cheapest to the dearest, was equipped with snake running guides. See for yourself.

Phil, they are why we have custom rod builders..

ben - Any idea why they use snake guides exclusively? Blue-water fly anglers who fish for (and catch) big (100+ lbs.) fish are generally pretty savvy and very practical about their tackle. The companies who build and sell them their rods make and sell what they want: what works best vs. what "looks best". I would like to hear from custom builders who have built and sold more than say, two 15 weight rods.

Ben,
Any time that I build a fly rod, it uses 100% snake guides.

Good luck

if it doesn,t have snake guides, it,s not a fly rod, right? i,ll put it another way.. if you want to sell as many fly rods as you can possibly sell, they had better be sporting snake guides..all i,m saying is i have fished with both and i will never go back to wire guides. i know ceramic single foot guides are not as light as wire, but using permagloss or tm-1 instead of epoxy on the wraps makes it close.

Ron, I've been building fly rods for about 2 yrs now and I try to find out as much as I can about building rods through the various forums. After I thought that I would use or a least take a look at the lite snake guides so I ordered some . But just yesterday I tied a lite wire guide and standard guide and took a look at it and decided not to use the lite guides. They looked too lite to the eye. I had read posted material about rod recovery and how quickly the tip recovers during casting and wgt seems to be a factor so my initial post was written. Seems to have started a storm of vastly differing opinions. I always do my best with what I see on YouTube and the blanks I get from ybea. So far the rods have received very good reviews. All that said and apparent importance of wgt on these rods the lites were considered.

The ability to make long casts is not of much importance in Big Fish (13 wt.+) fly rods, but protection of the fly line from being cut by guides is carefully avoided. I don't think the coating on 15 wt. fly lines is chemically much different than the coating on a 6 wt. fly line, but big-game fly rods still use - snakes apparently without damage to the fly lines. You would be amazed at how hard and how long a 100 pound yellowfin tuna can pull on a fly line.

The ability to make long casts is not of much importance in Big Fish (13 wt.+) fly rods, but protection of the fly line from being cut by guides is carefully avoided. I don't think the coating on 15 wt. fly lines is chemically much different than the coating on a 6 wt. fly line, but big-game fly rods still use - snakes apparently without damage to the fly lines. You would be amazed at how hard and how long a 100 pound yellowfin tuna can pull on a fly line.

isn,t that yellow fin tuna running against the fly line braided line backing not so much the flyline which is a short shooting very dense sinking line to get the lure down a bit..and instead of the guides wearing the line the hard line and the braided line are wearing the wire guides..the guides are probably replaced every season and snake guides are probably used in order to qualify as a fly rod in order to set some new fly rod record..lol.

The guide can only place as much force against the line as the blank can exert.
The tip of the blank, being small in diameter, can exert very little force against the guide or the line.
The butt of the rod, being much larger, can exert more force against the guide or the line.
To exert force the guide must have resistance supplied by the blank.
Placing light wire guides in the lower half of the blank should be avoided. There are fewer guides to spread the load and the blank is much stiffer increasing the load each guide must carry. The rod tip generally has more guides to distribute load with a lower load provided by the blank.
Snake guides distribute load over a larger area than ring guides. This reduces stress on the fly line for a given load.
The use of light wire guides on the rod tip has little detrimental affect on the fly line.
Single foot light wire guides have a very small area of contact, but when placed on the rid tip where blank load is small can still achieve adequate fly line life. I've had fly lines last for several seasons without an issue. The lines are taken care to keep clean and are stored away from electrical loads in moderate temperatures away from sun light.

I do not subscribe to one size guide for the entire blank. As the blank diameter increases, and it's ability to transmit load, so should the guide wire diameter and the area in contact with the fly line.
Double foot inserted guides for the stripper ( one or two). Standard wire snakes for the center half of the rod decreasing in size toward the tip. Light wire single foot guides for the tip third of the blank.

Gene

Thank you, Gene. This old dog got some new ideas from your clear and logically-supported suggestions.

Gene, please clarify the possible effect of storing a line near an electrical load. thanks

Michael,
Electrical loads can generate ozone who's oxidizing effect can cause stiffening and subsequent cracking of polymers.
The "smell after an electrical storm".

Gene