In a rush. I am making this rod for myself so the budget is low....less than $100 for the blank if at all possible and I prefer to keep it to rods available from mudhole. I want to make a stream trout spinning rod from a fly blank that will comfortably toss the weights my St. Croix SCIII 7 foot ultralight rated for 2-6 pound line does. Only, I'd like a fly rod handling, fighting action, etc.
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I still say perhaps they should offer rod builder's insurance where the premium stays the same but coverage doubles during the full moon periods. They should also cover therapist sessions for any builders who may have inadvertently found themselves attached to their rod building chair via 5 minute epoxy to help recover the confidence issues. That and, if the epoxy soaks through to the underwear
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I think there's something to this rod builders gremlin idea. I was ramming an EVA fore grip down a 5 foot calstar blank. I've done this countless times and yet for the life of me can't figure out how the heck I managed to clock myself in the forehead with the tip. After I got off the floor I checked to make sure everything else in the room was ok. Just glad I missed my eyeballs. Maybe they s
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Another thing this thread proved is that it is still possible to have a civilized discussion on the internet without slinging insults at each other. I hope that forum users realize how lucky they are to have this resource with people willing to make these sorts of patient discussions. I am grateful that Tom didn't lose patience and turn me into egg foo young on the subject and that he saw right
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Tom, uhhhhhhmmm, yeah, I tried it and uhmmmm. Well, that was a very interesting experiment because I had to go to two hands. I used a 30 pound dumbbell instead of the anchor. If the rod started out off balance (guides not up) the guides fell towards the floor as I started to lift and stayed there with some twisting which spiral wraps eliminate. But, when I started with the guides straight u
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Tom, I found the old debate and lo and behold it wasn't you! I must be losing my mind or something...maybe mad cow disease! I don't want to name names but it happened three years ago. I just ran the test again and found something interesting. When you test your rods in your ball bearing fixture, where are you providing the upwards pressure point (simulating the hand holding the rod?)
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Tom, I still haven't seen a rod that was properly built on the spine when put under load spin away from the spine. I have seen where a builder builds on a spine of lesser prominence and so when placed under load, the more prominent spine at the butt end of the rod takes over and the blank spins there. This happens a lot in older and cheaper blanks with multiple spines. Many inexperienc
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Timothy, Uhmmmmm, I haven't yet seen a properly spined rod under pressure try to flip to the guides going down yet. Not once. I only have a touch over a hundred rods under my belt which ain't much compared to many builders on this forum, so I know I haven't seen it all...Far from it, but I still haven't seen a rod under pressure flip to guides down unless the rod was built with the spine
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This is just my two cents. On most freshwater rods, I have not noticed any need to truly build on the rod's spine. However, on certain saltwater rods, especially in situations without the harness and fighting lugs, long fights get more tiring when fighting the rod as well. With today's blanks, the moment you have a gimbal, saltwater fighting sticks don't seem to need to be built on the spine.
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Ben, I live in madison and have been professionally buidling custom rods for more than 10 years. You can find me on lake-link.
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In case you want to throw something heavier, you can also take a page from the japanese popper chuckers and use the ferruled reel seat from fuji. I take a gator glass butt section of a standup rod for the handle and use a calstar 7 foot grafighter rated 40-100 pounds and crop 2 inches off the butt and voila...you have yourself a stick that can chuck double pounders all day long. Just make sure
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I've built rods for casting pounders for clients before. The blank with the highest appreciation from my clients for tossing pounders was the Calstar grafighter in the 9 foot 30-80 pound rating. It is by far not a pool cue. One of my client is sponsored by muskie innovations so that's why he needed the rod for casting those giant plastics before anybody else was getting them. Supposedly there
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To all, Thanks a lot! I just about fell out of my seat laughing! I am making home-made poppers for saltwater long bombing from moving boats in big seas. The heavier lure weights help stabilize the angler as long as you cast with the swells. Otherwise, it gets a touch dicey....especially since I use assist hooks on the popper. The poppers are heavily weighted and measure well...very long
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Anybody know of a rod blank that can long bomb 2 to 2.5 pound lures all day long without any chance of breaking due to blank failure? This does not include surf casting rods as this is strictly for casting home-made lures long distances from boats in both salt and fresh water. Thanks.
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Billy, I would be tossing home-made lures well over a pound in weight. Home-made poppers that I would be tossing for distance for GTs in Malaysia and muskies here in Wisconsin. The question is whether the Seeker would last longer than the Croix in tossing heavy baits and which one will throw a heaver bait a longer distance with less effort. I like the whip effect on most Seeker blanks bu
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Hey guys, Was wondering which will survive longer throwing giant baits: the St. Croix SCII XXXH or the Seeker 8 foot 40-100 lb jig rod? I don't have the Seeker in hand so I can't compare the blanks so if anyone has some hands-on experience with these I would be very grateful. This would be for chucking giant home-made poppers. Thanks all!!!!
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Victor, I throw a lot of scum frogs and weed demons and the blank I love most is the shikari 7'9" XF rated 10-17 pounds... much lighter than most people would go, but if you don't load the rod past 90 degrees and use a good high speed reel, it's very hard to damage this rod. I like the XF tip because the fish almost doesn't feel the rod on the hit and they suck down the bait a little d
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Roger and Ron, Thanks a lot! That's exactly the info I needed. Cheers!!!
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Sorry, but I didn't post correctly....I have my own customized UL rods, but the HT panfish rods are some of the few ones with a grafted tip from an ice fishing rod making the tip very flexible for down rods and such. Any ideas on splicing ice fishing blanks into regular UL blansk and some areas to start looking to do the splicing properly so they're not as fragile as the HT ones? Thanks in adva
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Hey all, I have been using these HT rods for panfish that are 7 feet long with a graphed-in tip or something like that. There is nothing like them, but they are fragile. I was thinking of custom building something like this, but I realize I will have to graft some blanks. Any ideas for blanks to use? Thanks.
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Anyone happen to know what blanks Melton Internat'l is using for their 2-piece tuna sniper and popping rods in the 60-80 lb class? Thanks!
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what color was the guide? There are several guides with titanium in them or coating around them.
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Hi all, I am looking for a rod blank 7.5 -8 feet long with the capability to long bomb 16-24 ounce jigs and poppers and not be too tough and turn my lower back into egg foo young. 8.5 feet was just too much for me. I am right now checking out rock cod blanks, but I am open to any and all suggestions. I have been looking mostly at moderate to moderate-fast actions, but again I am open to s
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Anyone happen to know the blank weight of the Calstar GF800XL?
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Anybody know the vickers hardness rating and the specific heat of the American Tackle Nanolite Rings? Thanks much.
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Buzz, In SE Asia, New Zealand and some areas of Australia, they are using a similar tactic called spin-fly. There are now dedicated blanks for this style of fishing that originated from the prawn fishing rods and the fly rods. Now they have their own blanks made for the purpose. I have tried, with success using the Seeker 7 foot 2 piece rod rated 1-4 lb test with decent success. It did
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Ahhh, my bad. I am looking for a rod that will do several duties for fishing in SE Asia: 1) bait fishing for threadfin salmon, 2) casting light poppers and small metal slices, 3)a good beater stick for fishing the narow-barred Spanish Macks, 4) a live bait rod for fly-lining to dorado, 5) light jigging with metal jigs. I have a 6.5 footer doing all this for me now, but it's a little too sho
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How do the Loomis blanks rate in against the Calstar grafighters in terms of durability and lifting power? Thanks.
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The Phenix rods said only fast action. Are these actualy x-tra fast but listed as fast?
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Salt water rated. Thanks!!!
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