Rod reviews

[Lasse Karlsson]

Ah, the composite system, the rod influence each other argument
What I think the experiment says is that there is no wait while having a cuppa with the soft rod, and be on your toes fast as lightning with the stiff one, logic should say as much but the first thing said when someone ask about a soft rod is "slow down" "it takes longer for the line to unroll" "makes big loops" "needs a bigger casting arc/angle" "more forgiving" "cast like a stiff rod, it will tail" and all other sorts of BS...

I'm not trying to shape equal loops, loops are a byproduct of throwing a line, and only tells a story of what was.
I'm looking at the huge difference between casting a soft rod and a stiff rod, because its been said so many times that its world's apart....

Thank you for the nice words

Cheers
Lasse

[Graeme H]

It's a great experiment Lasse. I've always loved this video.

Cheers,
Graeme

[Paul Arden]

I’m not quite sure what it is you are saying then Lasse, is it that casting arc gives the same results no matter what rod stiffness or line weights? If that’s not what your point is then please fill me me!

Thanks, Paul

[Will]

My take on Lasse’s video is:

1) the effect of rod action on loop shape is much less than we think
2) however, there is a small effect on loop shape (driven by counterflex) to which we are very sensitive

I think that’s it. This was/is ground-breaking because none of us would have predicted such a small difference from very different rods - and it does undermine a lot of the fantasy sales pitches around rods.

I don’t think Lasse is saying that different actions don’t feel different, or that we don’t compensate for them with different casting strokes/arcs. I’m pretty sure that I remember Lasse saying he would change his stroke if he wanted to get rid of the softer rod’s counterflex last time this came up.

The interesting thing for me is now: how much do we have to change stroke to eliminate the (small) difference in loop shape? It “feels” like a big change. But feel can be deceptive.

[sms]

I think Lasse (and Will) are right. Absolute visual evidence right there.

[Boisker]

That vid still freaks me out slightly
I’ve used the cup and tea and smoking a fag description myself... when describing just how different my little 6’ glass rod feels to my scott radian (which admittedly is 9’)....
It definitely felt far, far slower and even after seeing Lasse’s vid multiple time... it still feels slower
But in reality I am sure the actual difference is very small.... it just doesn’t feel it

[Mangrove Cuckoo]

Sorry to be a skeptic, but I don't see how there might be a middle ground where two disparate rods will both kinda work to be that surprising.

However, I do think that casting them both simultaneously would be the absolute best way to find it... especially in the hand of an excellent caster.

[Lasse Karlsson]

An old friend who is sadly not among us anymore, used to enjoy putting a soft rod in the hands of flyfishers that where used to stiff rods, and have a chuckle with all the tails in the first ten to twenty casts. And he never really came around to why I didn't get tails other than I knew how to cast and learned with a soft rod..
Our brain messes up the simplest of movements if it gets just the slightest chance,

It has got nothing to do with my abilities to handle a bendy stick, they are poor, even Paul beats me know and again, though it is rare.. Real test is for everyone to just do it themselves, 8 years on and it's still a thing to debate, no wonder climate change and vaccines have a hard time

Just get ahold of two rods a stiff and a soft, same length, get two identical lines and put the same amount outside the rodtips, and have a cast. It might help to tie the butt's together unless you have big hands.

Cheers
Lasse

[Paul Arden]

I’m a bit short of rods at the moment (I know this is ridiculous but it’s true ). But I have an HT7 and an HT4. How about I put the 4 line on the 7 and the 7 line on the 4?

For me that would be a rather wide separation. I know that both outfits will work, but I would expect to cast them rather differently.

I’ll tell you what I expect. When tuning the HT4/7 outfit the loops on the HT7 should be open. When tuning to the HT7/4 outfit the line will hit the rod on the HT4.

That’s what I expect to happen! Do you agree or disagree with this?

Cheers, Paul

[Lasse Karlsson]

So you want to change several parameters? Making it hard to make predictions

I'd predict that the 4 if it's a true 4, would slow down faster than the 7 even if it is a true 7, and cause a bit of trouble false casting.

That aside, hitting the rods will happen, but I'd be very interested to see you "tune" your casting to either rod

Doubt a big difference loop size will happen, but let's see

Cheers
Lasse