Not so hardy Hardy rod

This weekend, just as I was getting my casting back, with a crack like a rifle shot my Hardy Sirrus snapped clean in half.

The break was under the lowest middle-section ring, and was as clean as if it had been sawn in half.

Anyone else had this problem? The website says the rod should have been registered to qualify for a lifetime guarantee but it was a gift, and I didn't get a registration form or details of this. So I've sent it registered to Alnwick today, and I am waiting hopefully for a positive outcome.

I thought that modern carbon fibre had got over this problem.

Had you been swishing it backwards and forwards with no line load Mark? Doing this can put incredible stress on the blank.

Or were you over lining the rod?

What model of Sirrus was it?

Ron. No, just casting as I had been for an hour or so. And in answer to Adrian, it's a 9ft 6in Sirrus #7, using a 40+ Airflo #6.

From the break, it looks like the age-old problem of poor cloth wrap on the mandrel, because around the break there wasn't even evidence of a few carbon or glass fibres.

Mind you, the Sirrus is the Hardy 'entry level' rod and built in the Far East, I think. I cannot accept that a poor Chinese worker earning 50p an hour will take anything like the care a north-east craftsman would take. As Ron might say, you get owt fer nowt....

'twill prove expensive I fear.

I managed to lose the top section of my seven piece Smuggler (and no, not telling, just too embarassingly stupid....) on holiday the summer before last - ?65 to replace !

Mind you, any other rod company would likely have not kept spare sections for a rod that old; you pays for what you gets.

But I would be very very surprised indeed if Hardys didn't honour the spirit and intention of their lifetime warranty in the circs you describe. Again, you gets what you pays for too, and Hardys have always been second to none in quality of customer service. So hopefully not as expensive as my piece of stupidity in the end....

I know the Sirrus is their entry level range but I would be very surprised indeed to find that it is Chinese built to be honest. Sad day if it is...

The plain truth is that by far the majority of fishing rods today, even some of the top names are manufactured in South Korea or China. I do believe that Hardys have a manufacturing facility near Beijing.

Harrisons also have a number of rods made for them in the Far East.

Hope Hardy's do as well as Drennan did for me.(The thread about the 13ft team England carp Feeder that you all ignored!! Snarl).

Although they do not normally deal direct with the public they had the particular joint in stock, even for this old model, and supplied me by return of post. Drennan brilliant....oh gosh that's product placement...I must be morphing into a fishing magazine!!

Good luck Mark, I hope it wasn't needed for the Lozeres!

(The thread about the 13ft team England carp Feeder that you all ignored!! Snarl)

Have you just come from a parallel life at the Beano forum, Posh Paul?

Thankfully, my Lozere tool remains intact. David Norwich #5, dontcha know.

No Mark,

Surely there can't be a Posh doppelganger, be scared, be very, very, scared!

mark to register life time guarantee you have to register whith in 21 days of purchase you can allso register via internet i have just purchased two hardy angel rods one for my son and myself first time out at rutland it broke while i was false casting ?

Sorry to hear you've had the same problem. No sign of a response yet from Hardys, but I live in hope.

I see from your profile that you used to make all the floats for the Trentmen. Did you ever write to me in the 1980s when I was on Angling Times? It may not have been you, but I remember getting some superb sticks from someone who made them for one of the top teams at the time.

I loved getting some hand-made floats. Topper Haskins sent some of his quill Avons - still got them somewhere.

Finally I get a response - ?45, for heaven's sake. Anyone want tip and butt sections of a Hardy Sirrus?

I snapped the top section of my 2 piece ultralite plus and sent it back to them for a new section. Same cost ?45ish and took about 2 months without any warranty or registration. Not bad considering the rod rrp was ?450. I had to send the broken pieces to them so they could size the ferrule correctly.
Hardy do keep winning after sales services wards in the press (ok at a cost and a wait).

Neil.

Ron; Hardy took over Greys some years ago. I think the Hardy rods are made in the UK whereas the Greys ones are made in abroad, China?

?45 ? For a whole middle section ? when I had to shell out ?65 for all of 15 inches.... :-(

Seriously tho, I am a little surprised they haven't honoured the spirit as opposed to the technicalities of the lifetime warranty.

Plus did you send the broken section bits back for them to check if it is / was a latent manufacturing defect ? 'cos they're liable for those under ordinary sale of goods act principles + latent damage act etc....

Yes, the whole rod went back to them. I was wondering the same - whether, as it was a manufacturing fault, the rod is 'fit for purpose'? I'll drop them a line, I think.

Unfortunately it seems there is an ever-present risk with carbon fibre that something somewhere will give with no warning. The likelihood of this happening should be considerably less with top of the range UK-built carbon (I have heard that some Hardy rods are now built in Alnwick on overseas blanks) but it seems it cannot be ruled out completely.

I've seen carbon rods of every type, make and quality fail at one time or another; whether through impact damage from a flying weight or lure, contact with unyielding surfaces etc, or through a simple manufacturing fault. Impact damage is the most common, as the rod can appear perfectly sound immediately after such a knock, but the resin matrix is damaged at the point of contact; this is made worse through flexing and the rod can fail a week, month or year later, by which time one can have forgotten all about the original cause.

I have seen several instances of brand new rods failing and inspection of the broken part often reveals little or no fibres present. A friend recently broke a ?200+ Normark float rod; the fractured end had the appearance of a thin plastic tube - which is more or less what it was; a ?200 plastic tube. The problem is worse with fly and match rods, presumably because, in an effort to reduce weight (a big selling point with these types of rod) the blank walls are made excessively thin. Carp rods (good ones at least) don't seem to be so prone to fracture as the blank walls are made quite thick; carp anglers don't buy rods simply because they are light.

To my way of thinking, I'd rather have an ounce or two of extra weight and the reassurance that the rod is not going to explode at any moment, but maybe I'm in the minority.

Hardys are all made in china, unless you are prepared to pay for a bespoke rod or a split can rod.

Hardys were using far east blanks for a while and building them in Alnwick.

Bruce and Walker are possible the only manufacture who roll all their own rods in this country.

When you think about it, the cost for a company to import the carbon cloth from china.

Its stands to reason that most companys will import the blanks from china for a proportion of the cost of the scrim and then have to employ a team to manufacture the rods in england.

I have been advised by some body in the fishing trade a lot sage, loomis, ovis rods use blanks from china now.

When I have fallen foul of the forgetting to register fo guarantee I've simply sworn blind that I sent it in at the time and they must have lost it, result! They apologise, take the details down retrospectively, and problem solved!

hardy angel broke

















because of postage cost i was told at hardys you just send about 10cm ferrule end to hardys. because when i asked if they had look at the section which was still intacked when it broke which i took back to the lodge were i bought it from they just sent the ferrule to hardys so if they dont want the full section how can they find out what the cause is

I know that in the early days of carbon rods the striking of the rod by a heavy fly, i.e. a leaded nymph could set off a stress fracture. You wouldn't notice anything until snap! Happened to my David Norwich and cost me ?80.