spoonplugger1

If you look at the of the rod you'll notice the guides are further apart than on a rod from today that has guides on top, why? Once we've discussed that, we can understand why the spiral wrapped guide system was developed in the late 1890's / early 1900's, and first published about in a book in 1908.

All rod blanks are classified as a composite because of the binding epoxy, scrim, etc. used in the blanks construction. If they use even one fiber of material in the blank they can legally call it anything they want. The HM 85 designation in truth doesn't have to mean anything, HM can mean anything, or nothing. The company and the copy writer just waits for us to fill in the blanks when we see it used. No one has a graphite out of the 60's that won't turn into shrapnel if not used sparingly, in a multi-modulus layup, and only in the heavy, durable butt area.

The Alps guides have a superior design that holds the ceramic in the guides, far less chance of shock damage, or losing a ceramic ring.

You could also repair the grip by removing the damaged part and replacing it with new just like we do with cork couldn't you? D size thread spun on you rod wrapper cuts EVA like butter. You'd have to use epoxy as your glue, contact cement would bind immediately upon the slightest contact of the pieces whether they were where you wanted them or not. I like the idea of replacing the grip from the back side a lot also, very easy to do, especially on the newer small diameter blanks.

X fast action simply means the tip in relation to the power built into the rest of the rod is less than a fast action rod, this allows you to have a broader lure range the rod will throw effectively, but this rating is on the low side of the scale always due to the softer tip. This can make the rod a little bit more sensitive, but whether, or not we as anglers can actually feel the difference is up to each angler to decide. The rest about getting into the backbone of the blank faster, etc. is counterintuitive isn't it? You have two rods built with identical power characteristics except one has a softer tip, you pull back on the rod which flexes the tip and effectively shortens the distance between the tip and your hand, making the arc the tip travels shorter and less effective at moving the line the distance necessary to pin the hook in the fish's face. In short giving a 6 ft. 8 in. blank the same hook setting power as a stiffer tipped 6 ft. 6 in. rod. Not exactly what I intended to do when I build a longer rod that now has more weight, tip weight, and feels more out of balance due to the longer length. Building or buying a rod by the characteristics described in publications, isn't as easy as it looks. No ones measures their products by an industry standard, and to tell you the truth the companies have no interest in having one, they want you to buy by company loyalty, price point, etc. It's better for them to have the water a bit muddied as far as the publc's knowledge goes.

The Alpster's rod was a great one, the best I've ever owned, or fished was the Shikari FS764, or IFS764. I've been told the Liberty flipping rod blank at Get Bit is as close to that blank as anyone has gotten, but I haven't first hand knowledge. The problem with most blanks are they are too fast, fine for feeling the fish and than world class in insuring the fish doesn't stay pinned and in the water where he belongs. You've just reared back on the rod, the fish has its mouth closed, is not pinned and start flopping around, you have just added a spring board to any action the fish does, after all it's a very short line tying you to the fish, even mono doesn't give much at this distance. Softer, more moderate rod blank, still feels fish well on a short line, but isn't near the spring board assisting in the bass launching out of the water while his mouth is closed, BUT the hook isn't home all the way. This isn't my opinion alone, Dee Thomas who invented flipping, Rich Forhan who learned from him and developed the Revolver Rod innovations, you finally see on rods today, even though he developed them 15 years before, Rick Clunn who used Rich's rods and developed many tackle innovations with Rich over the years, all agree with a bunch of rodbuilders/tounament anglers who read Rich's book, read his rod building articles, and listened to his and Mr. Clunn's seminars over the years. The Alpster Lamiglas XMG rod is also a dandy as was the Certified Pro version in 7 ft. and 7'2" versions, there was an XMG 50 845, but it was a monster and just about unfishable in my opinion.

Josh, So you want a soft tipped rod to pitch/flip 1/2 jigs? Isn't that a bit counter productive, a rod tip that first gives to the load before lockup when setting the hook, and would have a bigger bend in the rod when you hangup on structure, than have a big pop away from the structure upon release? Wouldn't be my pick.

I've used both the stainless steel and the titanium guides many times, they are a better quality product than what you see on the store rods, those guides used to be available from Jann's Netcraft. There is an easily decernible difference in weight between the Ti and stainless, when put on a 9 1/2 ft. Steelhead rod it borders on OMG. If you can live with the durability on an REC guide, these are plated to be harder to groove.

X2, 8 inches.

Miller's Custom Rods 12010 Governor's Court Woodbridge, VA. Think he has a Facebook page.

For me anyway, I've had the best quality work either applying finish by hand, or on my power wrapper. Again it's me, but I had a far harder time controlling the epoxy at 18 rpm or whatever your dryer runs at. When hand applying I built two sets of V blocks, one tall enough barely for spinning guides to clear, and one set for fly rods/casting rods. The lower V blocks put my hand in a lower, stabler, and much more comfortable position while applying the finish. It helps stop all the little shakes and jitters. I built a hand steady for the same reason on the power wrapper, pretty much just a custom height wood block that slides in the thread carriage slot on the wrapper.

You apply epoxy on your wrapper at about 200 rpms, the dryer is for drying.

Woodbridge, VA close enough?

If your just sending him "THE" blank it's going to cost you a fee to clean up the blank before installing the new components, and than the fee, time and proper packaging to get the blank safely to the builder, that's just for starts. Frankly I've been always a bit leery with building on someone's blank, I have no control over it's reliability and whether it's incurred any damage in transit or use. I stress things pretty good before I build on a blank to ensure I'm not wasting mine and the customers time building on something substandard. If it blew up while testing I'd just throw it in the junk bin and call you up with a verbal "Oh Well" and like shrug. That said the amount of blanks that have blown up is maybe 1%, but it does happen. $ 40 an hour for any work done, can't do better than that as you gave no clue to the grip involved.

The labor to remove components and put them on another rod would far exceed the cost of new components. If your doing it for yourself and are doing this for the sake of experience than go for it.

The guides we use on our rods are over engineered for the job they do, years ago when we were measuring the actual loads a Med Hvy bass rod subjected the guide train to we were surprised to find the maximum guide load on a Revolver built rod was 1.15 lbs. and most guides on a rod were 0.1 or less lbs. of load. Remember the load is spread over the entire blank and shared by all guides. A single foot #6 ceramic fly guide can hold a 16 lb. downrigger ball indefinitely with little deflection let alone guide failure. The standard bass guides found on a bass rod were installed on a 35 lb. line weight rated rod I've owned 30+ years, the rod has caught tuna, kingfish, tarpon, wahoo, etc. in Florida, and white sturgeon to 10 ft. long in heavy current in the Lower Columbia River in water that took 32 oz. of weight to find bottom using 80 lb. Tuf Line braid main line. Have never had a guide failure. Guides take a load well, but not a shock, they are damaged in transport, storage, dropping on decks, rocks, or concrete, and bashing together and/or tangling on party or charter boats, etc.

On a guide with two opposing wraps like your double foot casting guide the guide has nowhere to go when stressed, all single foot guides with one wrap are not "locked down" and can be pulled from under the guide wrap. Epoxy finish has no real adhesive qualities nor any real strength, if that is important to you, use Perma Gloss. The addition of extra guides to rods recently is the result of using limp braids and single foot guides in conjunction. Decreasing distances between the guides controls loops induced in the limp braided lines that can lasso a guide and pull it out. There is another way of doing it that decreases the size of the guides down to a point where braid is much more controlled in it's movement and can't induce loops that can grap a guide. A good analogy is, which is more accurate and controlled, a 22 caliber. bullet going down a bore of similar diameter, or one going down a 12 gauge bore? Now look at the amount of slop between your line and the guides on your rods, which analogy fits your situation? After all, why do you need such big guides when the line has already gone through a much smaller guide before it even reaches the rod on a casting design? The one on the reel.

Josh, I don't know if you noticed but the height of the REC spinning guides is lower than other guides out there for the same size, since height is our #1 concern you'll have to compensate with larger guides to make up the difference. By the way the guide suggestions I made were not mine alone, Pat Vinzant who specializes in building some of the lightest, most sensitive spinning rods on the planet originally brought it to the attention of the custom rod builders about 8 years ago. Bob McKamey than owner of Custom Tackle in TN. who now works for Mudhole and his son Hunter published their results a bit later on Rodbuilding.Org. They built two identical 6 Ft. medium power spinning rods one built Fuji NGC which has been around many years and the other their way. They got better casting results with braid, braid knotted to 10 Ft. of fluorocarbon and wound on the reel, and fluorocarbon/mono blend 8 lb. P Line. Final guide size was 3mm. Again this is all info out there for a good long bit and used by many. The test was done with a Shimano Saros 2500, nothing special others aren't using regularly. Hunter McKamey is now on a tournament winning college bass team.

Since a dropshot rod is a vertical presentation I see no reason for using such large guides as noted above. Sensitivity is paramount, casting performance not so much. Wouldn't it make sense to go smaller and lighter? Do this simple test, take your lightest powered, similar length casting rod out and install your dropshot spinning reel and line on it and take it out and cast it. This setup will have everything bad going for it, low frame guide to close to the reel, line slap on blank, etc. the worst case scenario there is. How do you like how it balances? Now that you've seen it casts suprisingly well, what size spinning guide are you going to start with on that rod that doesn't need to cast into next week? That said my dropshot rod starting with a #10 match guide/micro guide setup out casts an identical rod I built with a standard setup both with braid and the mono I use for dropshotting. The problem with the systems mentioned above by others is that they don't and can't take into account every rod type and need. Think outside the box, because there really never was a box in the first place. My factory built European match rod, rated for 2 to 9 lb. line, I've had for 30 years has a #10 match guide as the first guide, so this is nothing new outside the US. I can float fish both sides of many pretty good sized steelhead rivers with this 12 ft. spinning rod.

There's a system that was developed by Bob McKamey and his son Hunter that should work well for you that is considerably lighter and a bunch cheaper if your interested. Bob owned Custom Tackle before moving to Mudhole and his son is an angler on a championship college team. If you haven't already bought your supplies, I'd be happy to pass on the info.

Send a pic, I've still got old rods too, new doesn't always make it better. Since the guides won't go in the same place as the old ones, you'll have a bit of clean up to do, when you get there pipe up and we'll walk you through it. To start you cut the thread on top the the guide feet off with a razor blade or sharp knife, it should unravel right off, letting you remove the guide without damaging anything.

Take the tip top off and measure it with your drill set. They're are both measured in 64th of an inch. If a 5 /64 is to sloppy, but a 6/64" drill won't fit it's a 5 1/2 or 5.5 tube tip top size, for instance.

On an older rod like you have you may save about half on your guide weight going to the Microwave system, the first guide from the reel maybe of similar weight, but after that they get very light very quickly. Without knowing a lot more about the rod, reel, your comfort zone for new things and usage I can't recommend the best way to go with the Alps guides

Instead of finding or replacing the seats, just replace the cork. With a little work on your part going more minimal that that seat is easy.

The Microwave guide system comes as a kit, nothing really to order or size. The spacing is set up and on the Mudhole site. Tip size is in 64th of an inch just like drills, bet you can guess what tool will get you the right tip top. You can get a tip top sizing tool at Mudhole also if you want or need to measure half sizes also. Flexcoat I believe makes the one everyone carries.