I am in the process of building a lead core trolling rod on a rainshadow solidglass .385"X.105"X72. I looked on the website and it says the guide spacing website is down to check the blueprint page and that says it's down to check the guide spacing page. I have enough guides to put up to 8 guides plus tip top. Does anyone have the guide spacing for this particular rod?

Brandon,
I have built many many many ice rods using this blank. It is really an excellent blank for that purpose as it is for the purpose that you have intended.

Since I cut a bunch of length off the butt of the blank, the numbers that I use would not be applicable for your use.

But, it is a very nice blank with a nice smooth action.

Since you are using this for a lead core trolling rod, I assume that you will be using it as a bait casting rod.

If so, I would start with the stripper guide at 19 inches from the center of the reel and go from there. Put a good bend in the rod, and use a china marker or use masking tape to mark the blank in the locations where a guide would keep the line following the contour of the rod, without having the line touch the blank, if the line is running along the top of the blank.

I believe that you can keep the first three guides after the stripper spaced pretty far apart, but then the guides will have to get much closer together as you near the tip to avoid having the line touch the rod.

I will go down and check my prints for the spacing of the top 30 inches of the blank that I use when building this blank as an ice fishing rod.

If you measure from the tip, as I do when making ice fishing rods.

Tip - 0
1st - 4 1/4 inches
2nd - 8 1/2 inches
3rd- 13 1/4 inches
4th - 18 1/2 inches
5th - 24 1/2 inches

Then, if the first guide is 19 inches from the center of the reel, you only have to position the 2 remaining guides.

I have built many many many ice rods on this blank using this spacing and have never had any negative comments from any of the clients about the guide spacing.

By the way, this is a nice fish that one of my clients caught on his first day of fishing with one of the rods that I built using the blank you listed above:

[www.rodbuilding.org]

So, the blank has no problem handling big fish.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/09/2019 11:26PM by roger wilson.

Roger,
Thank you very much that info is very helpful and a great starting point for me. I primarily build ice rods and spinning rods so bait casting rods are a new territory for me. I have built a couple sturgeon ice fishing rods with this exact blank and really like them. I had enough spare parts laying around I thought I would try my hand at building a trolling rod.

Brandon,
A local rod shop has built hundreds of head boat or trolling or plug rods using this same blank for the reasons that you use them. Inexpensive blanks, nearly indestructible, and in a word - the rods simply catch a lot of fish with next to no breakage issues, no matter the handling.

Thank you so much for the info! That is one heck of lake trout your client caught!
What type of guides do you use for the ice rods? I can't remember off the top of my head what brand but I used double footed guides with a spinning reel for sturgeon.

I typically use the Forecast vs3 spinning guides which have the extra brace in the middle to better stand up to the tough life of an ice fishing rod used out of doors in subfreezing weather.

It is typical for ice fisher folks to beat the rod against the ice to knock ice out of the guides. Not recommended, but that is what many of them do. So, I use the guides that will hold up to this sort of treatment.

[www.getbitoutdoors.com]