Another newbe question. Swimbait rod my friend, he will be using 50#braid which he says is 12# mono diameter. I'm looking at casting guides from Alps. The Alps MXN are for 12-30# line and the XN are for 25-50# line. Are the recommend weights of the guides based on line diameter or test of the line? Easier question is which guides should I go with?

Thanks Rick

Lxn is all you need

Thomas is correct, line rating and powers are not linear, freshwater rated rods for the same line class are lower powered. I have a saltwater rod I built in 1985 with bass class guides that has survived fish to 10 ft. long and hundreds of lbs. with no damage using 80 lb. braid and 100 lb. leaders. Transport, getting stepped on, etc. and how it's stored are bigger factors in my guide selection.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/17/2022 06:58PM by Spencer Phipps.

Ok, Thanks

One thing to keep in mind with braided line , despite what braided line manufacturers have always indicated, you should choose a braided line based on what you need it to do and NOT based on what a certain braid strengths mono equivalent diameter happens to be .


Choosing braided line based on what mono diameter you used to use before switching to braid is really limiting it's ability to greatly increase not only your fishing enjoyment but to also greatly increase your rod/reels performance potential particularly with spinning gear .

You can pull a car off the ocean floor with 50 pound braid , exaggerating of course but it's so ridiculously strong and so ridiculously overkill for most types of fishing . I do nothing but surf fish and have been for many decades and the highest pound braid I occasionally use is 20 pound and that's only when I'm targeting very large fish . For general everyday usage I have always strongly favored 10 to 14 pound braid which I've verified breaks at 28 to 36 pounds consistently . Most surf anglers back in the day spooled up with 17 to 20 pound mono and landed giant surf fish regularly and that mono in the 17 to 20 pound test range did not break at double it's advertised rating. Those lines broke very close to their listed ratings . That should give you an idea of how much lower you can go with braid and still easily land large fish quickly and efficiently

Abrasion resistance is a factor but not nearly as much as some make it sound

To be sure about line/leader strength a cheap spring scale, or just a #30 weight can be used to test strength. The most common result of this test, especially with braid, is your knot will fail - which is a bad thing but a good thing to know - and fix.

I used #6 rings on my NFC SWB808 rig. I run #40 braid on it to lessen throwing off/busting off my lure if my reel backlashes to a sudden stop during a cast (not to fight fish). Using an FG knot and #25 pound mono or fluoro leader makes a decent sized knot, and the #6 ring passes it just fine; I'd go smaller guides if throwing straight mono or fluoro.

This is a bit off topic, but related to guide size choices: Braided lines are amazing for their suppleness, diameter to # test ratio, minimal stretch, and vibration transmission. Braid also has its limitations when that smaller diameter digs into the spool, can cut your hand, and more visible to the fish that care about line visibility. What cris said is so true: Chose a line if it fits what you want it to DO.

The size of guide, in my mind, is more about other factors such as line flow and leader passage than 'strength'. Even the smallest guides are brutishly strong.

Take a rod off your rack that has a comparable power to the swimbait blank and string it up, fill an empty milk jug with water and give that 8 lbs. a lift, there isn't one respected manufacturer of guides out there that builds a guide that won't withstand that weight and more if you hung that same weight off that single guide. It won't even visibly deflect let alone bend.

I made the same mistake. I went to 50 lb. on my float rod because of the line diameter.. A friend convinced me to change to 20 lb. It was amazing in the casting difference with the smaller line. I have never had a trout break 20 lb. line.

I use 65# braid for its' diameter. 20 and 30# braid cuts into cover much easier than larger diameter braid. And that cutting into cover increases hang ups. IMO if you're fishing heavy cover. large diameter braid is the way to go. That is if you're going to even use braid.