Custom rod

I envy you – a rod built just to your specs! For small stream fishing and wary trout you can't beat the old Winston IM6 blanks. I think Winston calls them WT now. Slower action than most, and a bit tippy – perfect for spring creek presentations. I fish Winstons up to six weight, above that I like a little faster action. Expensive but worth it. Tight lines, Richard

Still searching for the winston im6 but I came across this sage rod

http://www.flycatcherinc.com/level1/component_details.php?MODEL=TXL

Comes in a 7' 4 piece and sounds like a very nice stream rod.

Any recomendations for quility real seats and guides?
Looking for bomber, quility guides as I wont be using a case with this to save weight(im pretty carefull when carrying my rod).

I've built a few rods with materials purchased from Anglers Workshop in Woodland Washington. They are a good company to work with. I just checked their web site and they have IM6 blanks under their own label as well as all the big name blanks. The last rod I built was a little UL 6.5' 2 wt in the IM6 blank. In my opinion, the IM6 blanks are a very good value. They sell everything you will need. Here is their web address….

http://www.anglersworkshop.com/Default.aspx

I had a custom rod built by a friend of mine back East. I think he is still building custom rods.

I asked for and got a 3 piece 7 ft 3 wt soft action rod which has turned out to be really nice for small Sierra rivers and creeks. The rod is slow action (a "wet noodle" rod according to the builder), but is like a surgical instrument for pin point casting and makes smaller fish feel big. He made it with oversize guides which gives me a bit more distance when I'm casting on lakes. He also made a 9 ft 3 wt for another backpacking buddy of mine. The 9 ft is a lot better on lakes due to the additional casting distance, but is a bit long on small brush-choked streams. I'm not sure what the idea compromise would be.

Have you considered a bamboo rod?

Bamboo rods tend to be more expensive than graphite, but they are wonderful fishing tools and beautiful and rare examples of modern craftsmanship.

I own a 7 foot 3 weight made by Joe Arguello that is one of my favorite possessions. It is perfect for fishing high country streams and creeks.

http://www.jea-bamboo-flyrods.com/Main.htm

I'm new to the forum and this may all be a moot topic at this point, but if you look at http://www.rodbuilding.org you can find a huge list of suppliers on the left of the page.

I've built quite a few rods, and if you're going to have one built specifically for you and specifically for backpacking, I'd have to ask a lot of questions about what you really want. But, if you do some spin fishing as well as fly fishing, then my favorite is by far a composite of both.

The best rod I've built along this line includes a longer cork grip with rings to secure the reel anywhere along the grip. This allows the placement of a fly reel or a spinning reel and is also lighter than most reel seats. I then used a slightly modified Fuji new concept guide system to make casting as a spinning rod fairly efficient. The rod still works great as a fly rod.

I wouldn't recommend this build for someone wanting the ultimate performance out of either a spinning rod or a fly rod. But for those that want to carry only one rod into the backcountry and think they may want the functionality of two. It's a great build.

Daniel,

The custom rod you described appears to close to the design of my backpacking fly fishing and spin fishing combo rod. It is a Fenwick model GS70ML-4. Are there any other commercial rods that are close to the design you recommend?

I'd never seen that Fenwick model before. But then, I guess I stopped looking at a lot of commercial rods several years ago when I started making my own.

That is very close to what I was talking about. Seems like Fenwick even put a pretty good price on it. It is also the best spin/fly design I've seen or have been able to come up with. It looks like Fenwick even did a pretty good job with the guides. The pictures I found weren't real clear, I'd be curious how well it casts with a spinning reel.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any others that follow this pattern. Most of the ones I've seen have the reversible handle and still have the low profile casting type guides that you'd expect to see as stripping guides on most fly rods. These never work very well for casting with a spinning reel.

Thanks for pointing out the Fenwick to me.

Daniel,

The large ceramic Fuji guides allow effortless spin casting.

Daniel. Good idea on a dual rod setup. Unfortunatly the person that was going to build my rod no longer has the time. I am currently looking into building my own but it is taking a back seat to a host of other things. Richard that fenwick looks very tempting. How do you like it?