I have built a number of freshwater rods and ice rods, but this is my first venture into salt water rods (I live in WI). My brother-in-law has asked me to build him a pair of Halibut rods. He lives outside of Anchorage and owns his own boat. I planned on going with Rainshadow blanks, possibly one built on an RX6/E-glass and not sure on the other. Thought about going with the RCKJB606-325 and either the TS66MH.

Here's his specs:

6'-6'6" length
80 lb braid
1-3 lb weight

I don't know about guides, reel seats, handles, and butts. Please help!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2020 01:05AM by Jason Bjerke.

If you are considering the Rainshadow blanks, check the Batson Enterprises web site for complete build recipes. And a phone call to them should answer all your questions.

Agree, call Batson, they are quick with a good recommendation, they've been very reliable for me.

I would say don't skip any steps when gluing up the reel seat, it'll see some stress, and you might consider a spiral setup if he's into that.

I beat the @#$%& out of my halibut rods, so I just buy the $60 cheapies myself, but that's just me,

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I tried talking him into spiral (after doing some research) and he still wanted to go with conventional.

Can you get away with graphite reel seats or do they need to be aluminum? Doesn’t really seem to be much of a price difference between the two, so that’s not a factor.

Those would be the two Rainshadow models we'd pick out for you and what many run with in the PNW. And as Grant mentioned there are blueprints available at our www.rainshadowrodblanks.com website (just go to the model you want and click on the blueprints tab).

James Taylor
Batson Enterprises
BatsonEnterprises.com | RainShadowRodBlanks.com | ALPSForeCast.com | Build2Fish.com

Awesome! I’ll go ahead and look at the blueprints and get my supplies ordered!

I'm a fan of the TS66MH, the rod will handle 'buttons in excess of 100 lbs. and now days bigger than that are pretty rare. I use a graphite reel seat and a slick butt, they slide out of holders so much better, very durable and are easy on the pocketbook.

Spencer Phipps Wrote:
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> I'm a fan of the TS66MH, the rod will handle
> 'buttons in excess of 100 lbs. and now days bigger
> than that are pretty rare. I use a graphite reel
> seat and a slick butt, they slide out of holders
> so much better, very durable and are easy on the
> pocketbook.

What graphite reel seat are you using? I see Batson/Rainshadow shows aluminum seats for their rod recipes, but I'd like to do my best to keep the weight down as much as possible because he's wanting to do more jigging with these versus trolling.

AGB22 if I remember right.