Fad rods Tenkara Switch and Glass .

[FarmerDave]

afishinado wrote:


There are boo rods out there that cast well and are works of art, but I prefer to fish lighter medium action rods for trout and faster rods for heavy freshwater or saltwater.

You would like the bamboo rod I rebuilt for trout. Fairly light for about a 5 wt and medium action. That is, if I hadn't broken it again. I have a new old tip section, but have to make time to redo it.

I'm more practical with my rod choices and view them less with romance and more as a tool. The more versatile the tool is in my hands and the more efficient and proficient I become with it, the better I like it.

I can certainly appreciated that. But if that was my only concern, I'd be using a spinning rod in most cases.

And what's up with wood handle inserts on graphite fly rods? If you are only interested in functionality, wouldn't graphite be a lighter material?

I appreciated craftsmanship. My furniture is real wood. Oh, I'm sure most plastic furniture would do the job and be lighter, but why?

I am currently using plastic (graphite) fly rods for now. Nothing against them. Very functional. I just like the feel and craftsmanship of the split cane rods.

BTW, I also prefer hickory handles on my log splitter. Had an 8 pounder with a fiberglass handle and it didn't last nearly as long. I switched back to a 6 pound and the hickory feels better, too.

 

[FarmerDave]

PennKev wrote:

redietz wrote:
Graphite hasn't opened up any new use for fly rods.

Actually it has.

It's a vast improvement for heavy line weight rods. A 7" 4wt glass rod is all fine and good but do you want throw a 9' 10wt glass for any appreciable amount of time?

Same thing with high stick nymphing. A 11' 4wt glass rod? Nuh-uh. Don't think so.

Heck, look at which vintage glass rods are most desirable. Almost all are sub 9' rods. Graphite's advantage in creating lighter, longer, faster, and more responsive rods cannot be understated. There are, in fact, many applications where this is desirable.

I guess none of that matters if your fishing is limited to small trout streams, but there's a big wide world of fly fishing out there and a lot of it is more accessible due to the advantages of graphite.

Good point, but I have a 9' 8WT somewhat fast action bamboo rod that I have no problem casting all day long ... until I broke it while trying to get a few more feet out. It's a Shakespeare Springbrook in bass tapper, probably from the 50s (plastic reel seat). It probably weighs 2 or 3 times what a comparable glass rod would weigh. It's all in what you are used to.

I could shoot the line into the backing with that broom stick.

I had caught 10 lb steelhead on it. I even once caught a 42" grass carp on it with no issues. Then I broke it while casting. Actually this happened twice. South Bend Ferrules suck.

One day while steelhead fishing I was suffering from tendonitis, so I decided to go back to my all around rod that I had for years. It is a St. Croix 8 ft 5-6. I had to keep checking to see if it was still in my hand.;-) It really felt weird, but at least I was still able to fish.

Eventually I rebuilt a lighter 9 foot bamboo rod specifically for steelhead. Much slower action, and weighs about half as much as the old Shakespeare. Lately it has been back to the graphite.

 

[PennKev]

redietz wrote:
According Lefty's autobiography a few years back, people who fly fish for tuna prefer glass in a 14 weight or higher, because it doesn't shatter like graphite. (I assume that preference is not universal). Nothing there that can't be/wasn't done with glass. No new niche there.

A 14wt for tuna is so far at the end of the spectrum that it is irrelevant. Based on my limited knowledge of such blue water fishing, I'm suspecting that this is an application where ability to cast far, and cast often is far outweighed by the need to have a rod that isn't going to break... ....ever. This doesn't really fit into the equation of glass being a better casting rod or having some characteristic that makes it easier to cast well. This is ugly stik territory.

And every 11' weight that I've cast (and I own a couple) aren't fast graphite, they're slow to mid-flex. I'd love to see a modern glass rod in that length. As I said before, resins have improved over the years, and modern glass is very light.

Every long graphite rod I've handled is far more responsive with quicker recovery than glass. Even if many have fairly moderate actions for graphite, the recovery rate is still much better than glass. With long rods this is a very important feature IMO, not only for making a pleasant rod to fish, but also one that casts well. If you take it further to the 11' 2 & 3wt rods that euro nymphing has spawned, I don't think glass is at all practical. I' don't see how such a rod made in glass would not sag under it's own weight.

I'm not saying that graphite isn't useful, but it wasn't a game changer, and the trend for ultra-fast rods for all purposes was a fad whose time has come and thankfully gone.

Rod actions may be fads, but graphite itself is not. The fiberglass fans are quick to forget about all the drooling that occurred over Winston IM6's and Sage LL's back in the day. Rods that were/are far from stiff, fast action, and these came along long before the ultra fast rods hit the market.

 

[tomgamber]

Sure, but no more than fishing for snakeheads.????

 

[tomgamber]

But no more than wearing camo or the flag as formal wear.