I think I put my reel seat too far up on my Rainshadow SB841-3

[RipHair]

The SB841-3 is a 7' rod. I wanted to experiment with having my reel seat a bit further up as I thought my first build (the SB843-3 below it) was too short.

 

When placing this one, I did a dry-fitting where I thought it would be reasonable - as in, I tried the various casting motions, etc.. and it seemed "OK".

 

Anyway, now that the thing is glued I checked it against all of my other rods and it's 1.5" higher up than my heaviest duty rod which is a St Croix Tidemaster 7'6" MHF3 Inshore casting rod. It's 3" higher than the SB843-3. You can see the trigger on it is exactly at 13" from the end of the butt. Is this completely bonkers for a simple rod to be used for crankbaits, texas rigs, etc?? I unfortunately wont' be able to test any of these setups for another couple of weeks. Should I chop it down 1-2" to make it 11" or 12" from the butt and end up with a 6'11 or 6'10 rod?

 

[Deleted account]

One reason to build a custom rod is to have custom dimensions, so fish it as is, and "shorten" as (and if) required. I like a long butt for cranking and other tip down moving baits stuff, specially with larger lures, and a short one when using wrist rod motions. I find that if I palm the reel, and bend my elbow 90 degrees, I want the butt to clear my arm most of the time except for the first things listed above. But it's your rod, so only you can tell if it's right or not. 

[MikeK]

Don't change anything until you fish with it.  To me the biggest detriment to having too long a handle is having the butt get caught in my clothing, especially when wearing a jacket.

[casts_by_fly]

If its glued then its glued.  The process for having a shorter butt now is either a pain in the butt (pun fully intended) or a shorter rod, neither of which you intended.  Wrap it and fish it for the rest of the year to see how you get on.  Never know, maybe you'll find that you like it.  There are some times when I fish a couple of my rods had longer butts and a couple times I wish they were shorter.  

 

rick

[spoonplugger1]

The grip length you selected is in the range of what you would find on steelhead and salmon rods that are 8 to 13 ft. long, but you would only know that if you were fishing these species. I would never have gone over 11 inches. Think about it, no matter the grip length once you are at 9 inches, that hand, wrist, and forearm are a pretty substantial structure that no fish is going to move, the bones from wrist to elbow are one structure and immovable, let your casting and presentation dictate what works, as will rain gear and other interferences. People spend way to much time trying to get definite, engraved in stone answers, how much will the length of the grip help if it's anchored on your forearm at 11 inches over 13 when both are in essence immovable?

Length in front of your hand is also an advantage in casting distance, the longer the lever you  push at the same stroke speed increases tip speed, which increases lure speed.

[RipHair]

15 minutes ago, spoonplugger1 said:

The grip length you selected is in the range of what you would find on steelhead and salmon rods that are 8 to 13 ft. long, but you would only know that if you were fishing these species. I would never have gone over 11 inches. Think about it, no matter the grip length once you are at 9 inches, that hand, wrist, and forearm are a pretty substantial structure that no fish is going to move, the bones from wrist to elbow are one structure and immovable, let your casting and presentation dictate what works, as will rain gear and other interferences. People spend way to much time trying to get definite, engraved in stone answers, how much will the length of the grip help if it's anchored on your forearm at 11 inches over 13 when both are in essence immovable?

Length in front of your hand is also an advantage in casting distance, the longer the lever you  push at the same stroke speed increases tip speed, which increases lure speed.

Are you measuring grip length as being from butt end to trigger like I portrayed?

[Chris Catignani]

10 hours ago, RipHair said:

Should I chop it down 1-2" to make it 11" or 12" from the butt and end up with a 6'11 or 6'10 rod?

Yup...chop it from the butt...6' 10"ish is a good pitchin' length.

[Lead Head]

Your casting distance, fish fighting, and lure presentation shouldn't change in any noticeable way if you don't like the length and shorten the handle. The functional rod length above the seat won't change. 

 

As mentioned above, fish it a bit, or at least practice cast it some, and see how you like the handle length. Don't worry about having a shorter rod if you take some of the handle off, the 67" or so in front of the reel seat won't change. It will gain a little more of a tip heavy feel, but if the build is pretty light that is no big deal (in my experience).

[RipHair]

In my 30+ years of fishing I've only ever used 6'6 rods M or MH. Actually, I have a St Croix Tidemaster 7'6 that I absolutely despise so I only fished it a few times. So even if it gets chopped to 6'10 it'll still be longer than all of my rods. I agree I will try to fish it... But because I'll be traveling on my time fishing it, how do you cut it down? I saw a youtube video of someone using a file until it falls off. I would have thought a hacksaw woulda been the ticket. Either way, I'll need to bring the tools and new butt cap out on the field in case I need to chop it.

[casts_by_fly]

I wouldn’t do field alterations. Just fish it and keep fishing it how it is until you’re home or in a place where you can work on it. 
 

A file is messy. A hacksaw is better. A dremmel tool or arrow cutoff saw is better yet. Wrap the blank in masking tape where you are cutting it. 

[uno]

I would cut off two inches. 13 inches will go well past your elbow and be annoying. It won't change the useful length of the rod, which is based only on where the reel sits. Hacksaw will work fine on the blank. Slide another rear grip on from the bottom and it will look like you meant to build it that way. 

[RipHair]

Well, I ended up breaking this rod when a darn bass at the end of last season slipped outta my hand, dropped and broke the tip...

 

Got a replacement tip sent out (thankfully it's a 3pc, would have sucked to strip everything off then redo it whole) and redid the tip. At the same time I ended up hacking off 2" and stuck another butt cap on it. It's now a 6'10 and a mighty nice one at that. This was also the rod I posted about before where I thought I was smart putting the barest amount of epoxy on the guides. Well, I added another coat to them all to make them whole. Looking forward to fishing this! I redid

[RipHair]

Well, I ended up breaking this rod when a darn bass at the end of last season...

 

Got a replacement tip sent out and redid the tip. At the same time I ended up hacking off 2" and stuck another butt cap on it. It's now a 6'10 and a mighty nice one at that. This was also the rod I posted about before where I thought I was smart putting the barest amount of epoxy on the guides. Well, I added another coat to them all to make them whole.

 

I think it might be interesting to share that the relative ERN and AA changed a bit after hacking off 2":

 

The rod when it was 7'0 had these measurements (taken from another thread):

 

AA: 83.1

IP: 609g

ERN: 20.92

 

Now it looks like we have:

 

AA: 79

IP: 572g

ERN: 19.7

[MickD]

That is a great blank/rod.  I use it for all kinds of stuff, including casting light glider jigs for bones and a 5 foot shark this year in the Bahamas

 

.  I think I remember 82 degrees and 600 grams for mine.

[MickD]

11 hours ago, RipHair said:

Well, I ended up breaking this rod when a darn bass at the end of last season slipped outta my hand, dropped and broke the tip...

I'd like to thank Rainshadow for their support.  I too had to replace a tip on an Eternity II fly rod after a bonefish swam between my son's legs thus an instant high stick failure.  It was easy and fairly inexpensive to get the tip replaced, nice not to have to build and rewrap the whole rod.  Not a "bad blank," but didn't matter, same great service. 

[RipHair]

3 minutes ago, MickD said:

I'd like to thank Rainshadow for their support.  I too had to replace a tip on an Eternity II fly rod after a bonefish swam between my son's legs thus an instant high stick failure.  It was easy and fairly inexpensive to get the tip replaced, nice not to have to build and rewrap the whole rod.  Not a "bad blank," but didn't matter, same great service. 

How do you compare their support vs other manufacturers? Anecdotally with various rod companies and also MHX they have a no questions asked, just $25 or whatever replacement, maybe a bit extra for shipping. Whereas I found with them, they seem to be pretty discriminatory on identifying if it was a defect and if not then the process was a bit less clear.

[MickD]

The fly rod is the first broken rod I've ever had to deal with other than a few that were accidents and once piece rods that I chose to sleeve-repair rather than totally rebuild with a new blank.  so I have no other experience.  I was fully open with Rainshadow that the blank was not defective, that it was a high stick failure, and it didn't appear that that changed anything.  

[RipHair]

10 minutes ago, MickD said:

I chose to sleeve-repair rather than totally rebuild with a new blank

I tried google searching for sleeve-repair but didn't come up with much. Do you have any further info on what this is? The only other repair I found was to make a spigot ferrule.

[MickD]

https://www.rodbuilding.org/library/repair-oquinn.html

Just now, MickD said:

https://www.rodbuilding.org/library/repair-oquinn.html

I've done a number of rods with this, and it does a nice job.  On a Pac Bay Quickfire 8 weight fly rod I misused it and it shattered near the center.  I put a short spigot in it to hold the pieces together and a sleeve and it's now my spare.  The CCS numbers after repair were the same as before and it feels the same even though I did add a little weight to it.  

 

[Chris Catignani]

@MickD posted the set of instructions for the repairs...this is pretty much what I have followed for years.

 

One thing I want to point out is in red and bold in this section...

Number 2. The break shown last time was in an area that will not see much flexure or bending. Under heavy load, the rod at this point will be mostly straight, except when casting the line. The act of casting is probably the peak load that this repair will ever see. As we go further up the rod the bending becomes more severe. The break in No. 2 is about 14 inches from the tip. The bending moment is more pronounced in this area. Your sleeve needs to be slightly longer in order to accommodate the longer moment arm and slightly stiffer sections being joined. So increase the length of this sleeve to about 1 & 1/2 inch to 1 & 3/4 inch over all, which will mean that about 5/8 to 3/4 of an inch on each end will be structure. Don't forget the tapered ends. The bend moment on this area will be quite severe. Maybe enough for the graphite sections to rupture the low modulus sleeve even though it is wrapped and coated. To counter this shearing force, we will install a very small piece of either fiberglass or graphite on the INSIDE. This piece must fit snugly, and be about 1/4 inch long. If it is any longer it will be involved in the bending force and we don't want that. Be sure that this piece is in place before you position the outer sleeve. When the adhesive is cured, the sleeve is cleaned up and wrapped and finished like any guide or ferrule. Grasp the rod about a foot on each side of the repair sleeve and bend it into an arc with the repair in the center of the arc. The arc should be constant - no noticeable flat spot at the sleeve location. If there is a noticeable flat spot, then your sleeve is either too long or too heavy, i.e., too thick a wall section.

 

I have to believe that this is a typo...1/4 inch for an inside stint is way too short.
Looking at the photo(#3) as it sits...if the outer sleeve is 2 inches...the inner sleeve looks to be at least 1.5 inches.

 

 

[casts_by_fly]

1 hour ago, Chris Catignani said:

@MickD posted the set of instructions for the repairs...this is pretty much what I have followed for years.

 

One thing I want to point out is in red and bold in this section...

Number 2. The break shown last time was in an area that will not see much flexure or bending. Under heavy load, the rod at this point will be mostly straight, except when casting the line. The act of casting is probably the peak load that this repair will ever see. As we go further up the rod the bending becomes more severe. The break in No. 2 is about 14 inches from the tip. The bending moment is more pronounced in this area. Your sleeve needs to be slightly longer in order to accommodate the longer moment arm and slightly stiffer sections being joined. So increase the length of this sleeve to about 1 & 1/2 inch to 1 & 3/4 inch over all, which will mean that about 5/8 to 3/4 of an inch on each end will be structure. Don't forget the tapered ends. The bend moment on this area will be quite severe. Maybe enough for the graphite sections to rupture the low modulus sleeve even though it is wrapped and coated. To counter this shearing force, we will install a very small piece of either fiberglass or graphite on the INSIDE. This piece must fit snugly, and be about 1/4 inch long. If it is any longer it will be involved in the bending force and we don't want that. Be sure that this piece is in place before you position the outer sleeve. When the adhesive is cured, the sleeve is cleaned up and wrapped and finished like any guide or ferrule. Grasp the rod about a foot on each side of the repair sleeve and bend it into an arc with the repair in the center of the arc. The arc should be constant - no noticeable flat spot at the sleeve location. If there is a noticeable flat spot, then your sleeve is either too long or too heavy, i.e., too thick a wall section.

 

I have to believe that this is a typo...1/4 inch for an inside stint is way too short.
Looking at the photo(#3) as it sits...if the outer sleeve is 2 inches...the inner sleeve looks to be at least 1.5 inches.

 

 

 

No, I don't think that's a typo.  The area of the blank he's talking about is a high flex area.  The primary structure is being provided by the outer sleeve.  However, where the main blank comes together if there is no reinforcement inside it will make a hinge and flatten, putting a stress point on the inside of the outer sleeve.  The short inner section is just to maintain the roundness of the blank and prohibit that one specific point from making a hinge without adding extra stiffness under the outer sleeve.

 

Photo 3 goes with section three which is much further down the rod.

[Chris Catignani]

42 minutes ago, casts_by_fly said:

...

Photo 3 goes with section three which is much further down the rod.

Ah...I stand corrected.

 

(from the article)

"Nevertheless I inadvertently went ahead and made the internal plug 2 inches long."

[KP Duty]

I bet the balance is great ??.