fishwizzard

No, but it’s better then having your fancy spoon fly into the sunset becuase your 2lb mono snapped 50’ into the spool becuase someone used some harsh language near it that one time.... It took a lot of lost spoons to get me to use thin braid over thin mono but I am never going back.

I hear what you are saying, but in both cases I keep the drag set low and use my thumb/finger tip to add pressure. I trust the drag to work but like to have manual control as well.

Look at the Moaner weighted swimbait hooks. They come in a good range of sizes and weights and they have a flat $4 shipping fee. I like the 3/0-1/8oz ones for the 3.8oz swimbaits but just bought some 3/0-1/16oz ones to try. If you swap the stock spring keeper out with a L Owner Centerpin you will get a lot better plastic life.

I use 7lb Sniper for some stuff and will give that a go. I want to stick with a braid mainline as the reel I want to use is on the small side and I don’t know how well it will handle any flouro. What’s the diameter of the 6lb fluoro you use?

That is about my ideal. I rarey get my combos to balance that good as I find smaller reels more comfortable and will trade way some balance for palming comfort. Hah, that is correct, the true CoM will obviously involve the reel being upside down.

I am going to try to fish senkos “the right way” this season but I can’t make myself start with 6lb line. I am starting with 15lb braid to 10lb Sniper and will work down from there.

This is basically where I am at. I love the Loomis MBR rods and will keep buying them and maybe an NRX just to see what the fuss is about, but other then that I am rarely looking beyond the MB lines.

I think a lot of the issue comes down to one's level of risk-tolerance. There are rod companies who have been making quality rods for literal generations and while they all have the occasional miss-step, they have their reputations for a reason. There are valid reasons to not like their stuff, but it's hard to seriously argue that about the quality they put out in general. Then we have the million rod companies that have come up in seeming the last 3-4 years. I am sure some of them are run by people who have a passion for quality and innovation and are really trying to build the next classic. But I am also sure that some of them are run by people who order prebuilt OEM rods by the container-load and just slap some stickers on them. So it comes down to how willing one is to roll the dice with their money. Try something new that might be overpriced at best and garbage at worst, but might also be the next great new innovation in bass-annoying technology or stick with something safe but maybe less exciting?

Depends on the combo. Spinning combos used to kill my wrists after a long day using one until I changed how I hold the rod and started buying lighter reels.

I would agree, a sv103 at like 8.x ounces makes the combo too heavy overall and the SV TW makes it a bit tip heavy, so I think the Steez A would be “ideal”.

Yep, I am firmly in the “light tip heavy butt” category so even a single pic of a rod balaned on someone’s finger tells me what I need to know.

It would not but given how hard it is to even get a rod’s weight out of the manufactures, I am not holding my breath on getting a CoM rating.

Balance preference is subjective, but the center of mass of a given rod can be found and easily expressed in “inches from rod butt”. It would be great if rod manufacturers would list this info. This would let you compare Rod A to Rod B and buy to fit your personal preference.

100% agree. If you select rods with an eye towards versatility you can cover an amazing range of presentations with just a couple high-end rods with no sacrifice in performance.

I went through the “NRX or FMJ” debate last year and ended up with the FMJ. I agree with most of what @punch wrote. I went FMJ as I wanted a more versatile rod that was more balanced and easier to handle. I am very very pleased with my choice and if all my rods disappeared overnight the FMJ would be the first or second rod I replaced. As to it’s lower limit, I pitch a weightless Cover Craw on mine and it loads the tip pretty well. A weightless 5’ senko at 3/8oz is pushing it but it still casts and pitches well but short range accuracy suffers. I have a Steez SV TW on mine with a RCS sv1012 spool in it and it is a great pairing. A slightly heavier reel would balance it a bit better thought. I first got the FMJ and strung it up for thr first time I thought it was too light and too slow to be a great jig rod. The first couple of bass changed my mind 100%. The rod drives jig hooks home very easily and the rod bends under even a 1lb bass enough to keep the hook in even if I am not totally on point in keeping the pressue on. I also find it grest for single hook moving baits and even throw a BBZ 40 Rat on it from time to time and have had no issue landing bass on it’s trebles.

It depends on the worm, tackle, and conditions. But for my most common "weightless worm" presentation, a Trickworm rigged on a 3/0 Owner cutting point hook and fished on a MH/F rod in light shoreline cover, it is pretty darn close to a sure thing so long as these three things happen: I am paying attention at the moment the bass grabs the worm. The bass hits when my rod tip is at the bottom part of the "lift and lower" cycle of working the worm back in The bass is large enough to get the entire worm and hook into it's mouth. This presentation is my usual starting point for smaller ponds and anywhere I find sparse shoreline pads/grass in ***' of water. It's a slow way to fish but it when it works it really works.

This is the best advice I think you could give someone starting out, especially the last part. Learning about bass was what got me over the hump from "casting a lure into the water with high hopes and little else" to "fishing". The first times I manged to look at the water, make an informed decision on exactly where to make my cast, and then to catch a bass was an amazing feeling. It was not taken that day, but this is the spot. I had fished it a few times before but never had much luck as I was just casting into the middle of the channel over and over as to not snag my lure.

I have settled on Brush heads for 1/2oz and up and Arky heads for lighter jigs. I fish far far more wood or soft bottoms rather then rock so I never feel like I am at a disadvantage. I find that I don’t loose many jigs in general to sangs, it’s almost always due to setting it into a piece of cover and no head style will help with that. Whomever said “hooksets are free” was not a jig fisherman, sometimes my hooksets cost me five bucks each.

I’m also a big fan of the Producto Tournament Worm. The shipping is a little high but the worms are so cheap that it evens out. A lot of the brackish/inshore guys I know swear by the Producto Shads as well. They are great on a jig head or as a trailer for smaller swimjigs.

I’ve come to strongly prefer rods with out hook keepers as I’d rather be able to use one of the Fuji ones placed exactly where I want it, rather than being stuck with whatever the factory decided was best. I fish a ton of t-rigged plastics and the common closed-loop factory keepers are useless to me.

It’s a shockingly bad name from the standpoint of being an easily identifiable and searchable brand.

Depends on the fluke. I don’t think a Zoom Super wouls load the FMJ’s tip very well but a heaver fluke might work ok. I think of the FMJ as a jig rod that has a taper that allows it to work well with single hook moving baits too. Maybe read up on the Loomis mbr844 GLX? It’s still a powerful rod but it’s tip is softer then the FMJ’s and I Like it a lot better for weightless plastics, although I’ve never tried to throw anything as light as a zoom super on mine. It’s a great rod for swimjigs and t-rigs though.

Unfortunately, I’ve never found a good way to predict what reel will balance with what spinning rod without just owning a bunch of different spinning reels at different weights and trying them all out. I suppose if you had a good digital scale you could just tape weights to a real you Already own until you find a good balance, then look for a new reel in that weight range.

I don't think they offer the MBR tapers in the new IMX Pro line, so this would be one of the older ones. They are great rods and at $150 in good condition, I would take one over any current production rod at that price point.

I have fished a drop shot rig on all sorts of L and UL rods, so long as the weight and the hook gauge works with the power of the rod. A thin little 3" trout worm wacky hooked on a DS rig is one of my most productive panfish lures.