Rod Balancing

[Russ Foor]

Hello new on here, I'm up to 3.7oz balancing a rod the rod is 5.0 stock seems like to much! its a 7ft MHF I'm balancing from the reel seat right  where I hold it not sure if i can say the brand but it was a 200 bucker with lifetime warranty 

[Team9nine]

You'll get a range of opinions, but I'm no longer a fan of adding extra/additional weight to get a rod to balance. The negatives just seem to outweigh the positives, to me. Much easier/better to just buy a better balanced rod right from the start, and not have to add anything. Live with what you have, or sell it and buy something else. That said, you could probably go light and just add a little bit of weight  to the butt end without sacrificing too much; kind of a 'happy medium' if you will. What feels "balanced" and works will be different for most folks, so there probably isn't one 'right' answer - but 5 oz. to a 3.7 oz rod isn't the right answer, either 

[jimmyjoe]

16 minutes ago, Russ Foor said:

Hello new on here, I'm up to 3.7oz balancing a rod the rod is 5.0 stock seems like to much! its a 7ft MHF I'm balancing from the reel seat right  where I hold it not sure if i can say the brand but it was a 200 bucker with lifetime warranty 

 

   For some people, balance is important. For some people, it isn't. Do you know for sure that it's important for you, or are you just going on what you heard someone say or what you read somewhere? I've heard some people swear that this or that is important, or right, or the right way, or whatever, and found out from experience that they were wrong ....... or at least wrong for me.       ?       jj

[MickD]

I don't add any weight to a rod to balance the system, and maintain that a rod by itself isn't "balanced."  Balance is acheived only when it has a reel on it that makes the system feel "balanced" to the user.  As soon as a lure is added, it's not balanced any more.  If it's held tip high, balance is less of an issue than if held horizontally.  But bottom line, what most consider balance is hard to acheive with rods of high power and with lengths over about 6 feet.  

 

One problem with adding significant weight to balance a system is that it will increase the moment of inertia, and when casting aggressively, the rod can hard to stop at the end of the casting motion.  I had one almost jump out of the boat on me when I used to add weight to balance.  I build now and just build as light as possible and select reels that "balance" the system if possible.  But usually the system ends up tip heavy.  And that's fine with me.

[diehardbassfishing]

Yea, I don't think anything good can come out of this.

 

It's easy to feel "imbalance" when handling static in your house. Remember, you're fishing with this stick!

With the basic load of any type of lure, the static feeling you're experiencing goes right out the window!

I thought my new 7'4", 5.7 oz fiberglass rod was going to feel heavy or off balance with my reel.

No. Not when on the water.

 

Karl

[dodgeguy]

I used to balance my rods but I stopped when the newer lighter rods came out. I now buy rods that balance right before the reel locknut with a reel on the rod.Since I've gotten older it relieves the fatigue and stress on.my joints.

[Crankin4Bass]

If it doesn't feel comfortable, I would just return it and get something else. 

[r83srock]

9 hours ago, Crankin4Bass said:

If it doesn't feel comfortable, I would just return it and get something else. 

Good advice. 
Ive heard mentioned on here if you don’t like how it feels in your hand comfortwise, you will probably never like it. 
 

I don’t base my opinion of a rod until I have mounted MY reel to it, I always bring a reel into a store to try. 
 

Ive owned rods that were highly out of balance, and uncomfortable to me. Ive owned rods that were slightly tip heavy, but not uncomfortable, and rods that balance right at the reel seat. Oddly enough, it seems I cast more accurately with a rod that is slightly tip heavy, and once a lure is attached I don’t notice tip heaviness. I’m sure it’s my mechanics/muscle memory/what I’m accustomed to. 

[Fishes in trees]

I've changed my mind so many times about what balance is or ain't so I don't worry about it anymore.  If a rod feels right (or even ok ) I fish it and if it don't, I don't.

For instance - Do you mean balanced on your finger or balanced in your hand?  Balanced with a bait on or not?  On spinning gear, does it make a difference where the rod hits you fore arm when you go to set the hook?

Now, I'm all about details when I'm fishing and rigging up different rods & reels, however I've given up worrying about this particular detail.    

 

Another for instance - I like small, 1000 size spinning reels on my MH spinning rods, because I like to go as light as possible.   Are those rods balanced?   Not so much, for the most part they're pretty tip heavy.   Turns out I don't mind fishing tip heavy rods.   Good luck figuring out what you like in this instance.

More advice - don't balance rods when you're drinking, sitting around in your fishing shed.  I can recall messing with this issue and several IPA's later, thinking I had it right.    Next day, out on the water - sober - wasn't right.   Perhaps if I'd been a similar level of drunk, it would have felt right.  Who knows?  I do know that it  probably wouldn't have felt right driving to the lake, and that's what makes that idea a bad one.

[MickD]

3 hours ago, Fishes in trees said:

don't balance rods when you're drinking,

And don't change the sight-in on your deer rifle if you're drinking.  And don't shop on-line when your're drinking.  Good advice, all.

[fishwizzard]

I prefer a balanced rod over purely caring about total weight, but I am not fanatical about it.  I buy full handle rods when I can and will pack hollow buttcaps full of tungsten putty when I can, but otherwise I don’t really dwell on it.  I do try to pick reels that will shift the balance point back as far as is reasonable.  A side benefit to this is that a lot of the time I end up with cheaper, heavier reels. 

[cottny27]

If I have to add more than an ounce then I don’t mess with it. Anything over 6’6” - 6’9” in a split grip takes some weight to balance.  Anymore if I can get the balance at the front of the reel then I’m good. 

[Bankc]

I went through my rods last night, thinking about this thread.  I discovered most of my rods are pretty unbalanced and a few that are pretty well balanced.  It hasn't bothered me before, and it's not going to now.  If I hadn't sat down to examine this specifically, I never would have known.  I'd be much more concerned with adding weight which might rob the rod of some sensitivity, versus the feeling of it being unbalanced.  

[kayaking_kev]

I like to build rods with short handles for kayak fishing, so it's even harder to balance a rod.

But, out of the 5 I've built over this past Winter, 3 of them are balanced and the other two is a Mag Heavy 7'6 and the very first rod I ever built, a 7'3 MH. Oddly enough though I've been fishing a lot with one of the unbalanced rods.

[WRB]

Every rod is tip heavy as soon as a lure is tied on.

Tom

[fishwizzard]

10 minutes ago, WRB said:

Every rod is tip heavy as soon as a lure is tied on.

Tom

 

Eh, not when the lure is in the water and the line has some slack in it.  I hold a spinning reel with my entire hand in front of the reel stem so the tips naturally "float" up a little, that's the sensation I prefer for slow bottom contact fishing, but it's hard to achieve on a casting combo without some money/effort.  

[WRB]

At the moment the lure is on slack line the tip may feel heavier depending on the way the angler hold the rod.

Spinning rods are easier for sure to hold with finger in front of the stem, in the middle or behind. I tend to hold spinning and casting rods in front of the reel using the fore grip.

Momentary tip heavy a few seconds isn’t or shouldn’t be a major problem.

Adding extra weight to a light weight rod under 4 oz is counter productive imo.

Tom   

[fishwizzard]

17 minutes ago, WRB said:

I tend to hold spinning and casting rods in front of the reel using the fore grip.

 

I have some older Loomis casting rods with longer cork foregrips and I cannot figure out a way to hold them that.  Nothing seems correct and the few bites I have gotten resulted in some hooksets where the best I could do was not drop the rod.  I spend a little time trying whenever I have one of those rods out and the fish are not feeling me, but I have never really given it a serious try.  

 

Are you gripping the foregrip from the bottom with your wrist more or less facing up or around from the side so your wrist is touching the reel?  

[QED]

My heaviest spinning rod is 3.25 oz and most are under 2 oz so balance isn't a concern since the rods are so light that the mass distribution isn't even a consideration.  On ultralight rods I use Tennessee handles and hold the reel with the stem between my middle and fourth finger which leaves my index finger free to feather the line against the spool.  Does casting a spinning rod while holding the foregrip ahead of the stem even permit that?

[Columbia Craw]

Neutral in the hand.

[Bankc]

17 hours ago, fishwizzard said:

 

I have some older Loomis casting rods with longer cork foregrips and I cannot figure out a way to hold them that.  Nothing seems correct and the few bites I have gotten resulted in some hooksets where the best I could do was not drop the rod.  I spend a little time trying whenever I have one of those rods out and the fish are not feeling me, but I have never really given it a serious try.  

 

Are you gripping the foregrip from the bottom with your wrist more or less facing up or around from the side so your wrist is touching the reel?  

I can't speak for him, but in the old days before graphite rods were common, I always gripped the rod at the foregrip with my wrist facing up.  That way my finger and thumb could hold the line as it entered the reel.  It was a technique used to feel soft bites by keeping your finger tips on the line before rods got sensitive enough to feel them through the rod.  It also helped with hooksets, as you could get more power behind the rod since the rod was going to flex pretty good anyway.  It's a lot like what some saltwater anglers do when using reels without line guides.  

 

I still do that from time to time, though more often than not, it's in situations where I'm trying to reel a bunch of line in under tension, like after a bad backlash or when respooling a reel.  

[jimmyjoe]

      OP posted Saturday. It's now Wednesday. Where did he go?   ?     jj

[NOC 1]

On 6/26/2021 at 1:55 PM, Russ Foor said:

Hello new on here, I'm up to 3.7oz balancing a rod the rod is 5.0 stock seems like to much! its a 7ft MHF I'm balancing from the reel seat right  where I hold it not sure if i can say the brand but it was a 200 bucker with lifetime warranty 

I am a fiend for balanced rods and I almost always use a Matagi Butt Cap that will allow me to unscrew it and take off or add weight to precisely fit the reel. That said, if you are trying to balance the rod at the handle where you actually put your hand you are probably going to be disappointed. if you insist however, just weigh the reel and add that for starters and THEN start adding more weight until it balances.

 

The point I'm making is that the way you are trying to do it (I think) requires you to account for the reel weight as well. If you can get it to balance anywhere under the reel you are golden. I usually shoot for a balance point at the front tip of the foot of the reel. The thing is if you balance it at the grip you'll end up with a rod that weighs maybe 15 Oz. and I'd bet that you like that a lot less than just balancing it at the reel seat. If it is a well designed rod it should normally take an once or less.

[cottny27]

I feel like balance makes the rod more sensitive.  When your dragging a t-rig or jig your not dealing with dragging the extra weight of the rod too.  What do you feel more…a bite on a 1/32oz jig or a 1oz jig?  I do like my crank bait rods a little tip weighted at the front off the nut. 

[T-Billy]

I prefer my bottom dragging rods balanced. I use those slip on rubber furniture feet. Only a couple bucks for a four pack. I pour the needed amount of lead into them a little at a time and secure them to the rod butt with electrical tape. Cheap, easy, works great, and 100% reversable.