Hey all, this may have been discussed before, but for the life of me I could not find the search bar. For medium action bass spinning rod how would stainless steel ring material hold up. I would be using 8- 10# braided line. Would it be the lightest of ring material choices? I’m looking to replace the older guides on a few spinning rods.

Thanks in advance for the input!

The weak point us usually the tip with braid. If you use a ceramic tip you should not have any troubles. All my recebt builds are pac bay minimas with a ceramic tip of some sort. Light to med builds 6 to 10 braid no problems

I was just thinking about this! What I was wondering is if anyone runs matching stainless tops with these, and how well they hold up?

I have used them with ceramic tips for years, and it's a good combo, but I still get a fair amount of guys who manage to pop the ceramic out of the tip top - thus considering trying the stainless tops. I ran them a little once, and it seemed they were a little hard on mono, but it's been a while.

The stainless guides - ceramic tip is pretty solid to me though.

In a way it's a trade-off. The minima tip tops do groove, but don't pop out or crack. Ceramic tip tops don't groove but can pop out or crack. In both cases the tip top needs to be replaced, which is very easy to do. It a matter of which one you think will last longer. I tend toward using ceramic tip tops, but have used Minima tip tops on a lot of rods with good results.
Norm

You are so right Norman! For a guy that's careful with his stuff, I don't think I have ever popped a tip ring out. But building rods for a lot of people, some are much better served and prefer the stainless top because it holds up to "stuff". It's possible on the spot failure due to popping out or chipping, vs. predictable eventual wear.

Thanks for the reply’s. I will experiment with ceramic tip top and SS for the guides, nothing ventured, nothing gained ????

I have redone a couple and built some with Minima guides and used the Minima tip tops. The tip tops failed on a couple of rods and I replaced all with ceramic.

How about the newer "Recessed Ring" tip tops?
Here is a link to our site.
[www.schneidersrods.com]

Another option is the classic "Carboloy" ring material.
We have discovered a cache of early USA made Carboloy tip tops and 2 foot guides.
We will be posting them on our "hot Specials" page soon.
Also, Pacific Bay and Batson both have them available in current production.

Best wishes,
Ron Schneider
Schneider's Rod Shop
Mountain Home, Arkansas
[www.schneidersrods.com]
mtnron40@yahoo.com
870-424-3381