fly rod

[willowhead]

Ariel, Misako has been waiting for an email from you.........i guess i'll tell her it's not comming, so she has that off her mind. She's really swamped right now anyway. If you want more Octapus hooks, just let me know. i'll hold them aside and send when we get back.

Kelly, if you see this, your package is in the mail.

[flyfishwithme]

Your question is most interesting and it depends what you want to use it for.
I have cast most 10' 3weights and fished with quite a few of them.
The upshot is that none of them suited the purpose that I wanted for them. hence my question "What do you want to use it for?"
In the end I designed my own requirements with a UK rod maker by the name of Steve Parkes.
Steve is a carbon fibrre expert and has an arrangement with the people who produce carbon fibre components for the Red Bull and Terra Rosso F1 teams. His website is www.atomsix.com
I wanted a 'state of the art' rod blank that had a medium fast to fast tip, a slim half wells grip and in 4 pieces.
I wanted it to fish 'spiders' (aka North Country Flies) using a short line. A longer rod helps me control the flies whether it be upstream or downstream and it had to have a strong butt section to handle bigger fish in faster water.
Well I tested the prototype last week and was completely blown away by it. We are going to go into production and I will be offering it through my web site later this year. This is using the very latest technology and resins, the next step from the 3M resinsthat are used in the Hardy Zenith Syntrex.
Price - UK350 pds with aluminium tube. Yep, that is getting up in price but these are not Chinese balnks and they use the very best components.
I must sya that I have seen many broken Stremflex butts along the riverside (although they were the previous model). An alternative could be the Marryat rods whicre very good value for price but you will have international shipping.

[skunkaroo]

I must sya that I have seen many broken Stremflex butts along the riverside (although they were the previous model).

You've got to be joking. What are people using them for? Crowbars?

To blow a butt section on even a cheaper Chinese rod you would generally have to slam it in a car door or try flexing the rod far past the 100% mark (I've done the latter and blown a Loop spey rod, mind you it was on a 25 lb salmon). All of these rods (in fact most) aren't made to be pushed to those kind of extremes.

You're new rod sounds a treat, but the price is way out of my league (at least at present). That said, it is on a par or slightly lower than Sage and GLoomis offerings at the top end of their range. Mmmm. Maybe if I stopped eating for a month?

Aaron