Reel seats and gravity

[Bendix]

Hi Paul

I think it depends on the handle you put on the rod, whether you should consider up locking or down locking reel seat. If you have an up locking reel seat and a short rear handle, it should in my opinion balance the same as with a down locking reel seat and a long rear handle. If that makes sense?

Cheers, Bendix

[Graeme H]

I don’t fish the DHD yet, although I have one to be built. My question is are there other considerations as in where to put the weight of the reel for best performance?

There is. If you can find it, look back at the stuff Berlin was posting. He made a grip that allowed him to tune the location of the weight near that end of the rod to adjust the way the rod resonates.

When I built my DHD, I epoxied 4 ball sinkers into the butt end of the blank before final construction, tested during the build. With the reel I use on it, the rod hardly resonates during a normal casting sequence. It feels a bit freaky, but it works well.

Cheers,
Graeme

[Magnus]

Back in the day one Scottish tackle dealer I met sold Sage DH rods when they first became 'hot' in the UK. He advised new owners should have the butt stripped, the seat reversed and a lead plug fitted at the base of the lower grip. Sage fitted an uplocking seat on those 15ft 1in rods, he claimed the balance was off, so holding the rod during the swing was tip heavy - the grip was also a bit short so you ended up balancing the rod a few inches above the upper cork. And that when casting the rod could be better balanced, again less tip heavy, even though the whole outfit became an ounce or two heavier. Seemed to work.

Ken Walker, of Bruce and Walker, had a thing about uplocking seats. (got this from a couple of tackle dealers) He claimed that uplocking seats led to reels jamming in the seat. With a little play when the reel was fitted and a fairly wide reel the leverage on the reel foot in the upper unmoving socket, can bend the foot. For uplocking seats he claimed that was a common issue and a commo cause of repairs or rebuilds.

Magnus

[James9118]

This is the butt of my 15ft salmon rod (as prepared by me*) - so should I wind the tape to hold the reel clockwise or anticlockwise and from the bottom first or the top? Should I also add some weight to make it cast further bearing in mind this rod is the one used to set the BFCC S55 record? Don't fly fishers love a bit of bling and pseudo-science

* I'm surprised Paul didn't approach me for the Hot Torpedo gig given my obvious talent for rod building. However, if someone would like me to make a rod up for them I'm open to offers - just need to check I have some spare tea-towel for packing out the handles.

James

[Paul Arden]

If only I’d known!