Carbon quality...

So far in my return to fishing I have bought cheap and budget rods; sub tenner and twenty something quids respectively. The former can be bent double and still have no feel; the latter are great value. So, willy-waving aside, why spend 2-3 times as much?

You can't road test them like you can most cars that cost thousands of pounds so either you suck it and see or rely on other's opinions.

So... Apart from more corkage/lightness and rings that don't wear out what do you really get?

Does it feel better playing a fish for example?

I'm looking at a Shakespeare Mach3 Micro pellet wangler 11'[£79] to replace a Abu Enticer 10' match[£28] for general small river fishing. I will be sorely vexed if it is just lighter and slimmer...

You can of course spend an enormous amount of money on a coarse fishing rod. There are rods by Hardy, Daiwa and Normark (not made any more?) that can cost up to £700.00. Are they better than cheap and nasty obscurely named rods? You can bet they are. You only have to pick one up or use it, and honestly you will not want to put it down, especially if you have only been used to cheap rods.

But you don't have pay a fortune to get a quality rod. In fact the mid range prices of say £100 to £150.00 have some of the finest rods around that are real value for money. Rods by the likes of Drennan, Greys, Shimano and Daiwa in the price range noted are well made, have the finest fittings and are produced on good blanks.

A quality carbon rod will feel right the first time you pick it up. The action will not be "floppy" and it will not possess a significant "spine". A spine but the way caused by the end of the carbon cloth wrap, is responsible for a "preferred plane of bending".

A quality carbon rod will also exhibit excellent dampening properties (important in fly rods), as well as the elimination of "locking up" tendencies. Rod's which "lock up" will bend to a certain point and then refuse to bend any more.

By the way, NEVER bend a quality rod double. You are likely to break it. You will find that rods which are more suitable for fishing, become less suitable for beating down nettles or getting crushed in car doors.

Agree with the forgoing, as with most things in life, you get what you pay for.

But would add, the true quality and delight of a superior rod may only be completely apparent when you first hook up with the quarry that it was designed for.

If you can't tell the difference or don't have the money, don't buy the expensive stuff. However, don't presume that there can't possibly be differences. There's an awful lot of cheap stuff, that people rave about on forums, that I've thought was poor kit. On the other side of the coin, there are the odd bit of top end stuff that's not really worth its price tag.
I tend to pay good money for my kit. I then make it last, and not just a season or two. However, just because I tend to pay good money doesn't mean that I can't acknowledge that there's some fine gear out there for much less outlay. There is, but you need to choose wisely to avoid potential junk, at any price level.

I'm constantly amazed by forums and how obvious it is that some folks change their kit as often as their underwear. Now that's certainly not exclusive to the budget concious buyers but it does seem quite prevalent amongst them.

I'll bet that there are folks that have never spent much more than fifty quid on a rod that will end up spending far more over a number of years of chopping and changing than I will buying a two hundred quid rod and making it last at least ten years.
Right now I'm a tackle tart because I've just renewed all my ten to twenty year old rods, reels and pole. In ten years time I'll be back to being a tramp with outdated but quality gear.

As for your experience of a ten quid rod being better than a twenty quid rod. Perhaps it really is, perhaps it's just meant for a different application. A two hundred quid rod being used the wrong way in the wrong application is likely to feel worse than a twenty quid rod being used as intended. It doesn't mean that the two hundred quid rod is worse.

I wouldn't get the pellet rod for river fishing if I were you. It's not its intended application and there's a chance that your cheap Abu will outperform it in that use. You'll then think that your eighty quid Shakespeare wasn't worth the money when the reality is that it probably is worth it, if used in the manner it was intended to be used.

P.S. I have a short match rod for my occasional forays onto a small unheard of tributary of the Tees. I struggled to find a short match rod, of the tip action variety, ideal for trotting. I'm not sure which model it is, but it's definitely a cheap Abu. I'll continue to use it rather than try my expensive 11' pellet waggler rod because it's better suited to that particular application.

I must agree with Sam on the getting what you pay for,i know what i expect,from the rods i buy and one of the biggest things for me,is the feeling of the rod being part of me,which comes from balance,weight and the crispness of action,matching the rods use....this combination is rarely found in cheap rods,more's the pity.

I too agree with Sam ,although we may tend to differ on certain ‘brands’. The last rod I bought (prior to a Greys 3 piece 1.75 some five years ago for easy travel) was the original Prestons Carbonactive match rod circa 2000. Prior to that I am happily still over using 6x Harrisons and 3x Normarks for most of my fishing requirements.
Jerry

Do you know Jerry,i bought my first Harrison,just over a year ago,an 11ft 1.5lb t.c. Sulis with an avon and quiver section,not a bad rod but a little soft for barbel imo,ive looked at the chimera,torrix,plus a couple of others and wasnt keen on the action,or the feel,then i got my hands on the old 1lb6oz t.c. Avon and thats a beauty,i know what im looking for in a rod,but its what suits me,not necessarily someone else.

The good thing with Harrisons IMO Alan is that they cover many different blanks to suit individual tastes. If you can find the one/ones that suit you, you have a rod/s that will last a long time. Just a quick line on the after sales service, about six weeks ago I was trotting at Barton Court and the butt cap from my GTI parted company and was lost. On the advice of PJ I 'phoned Harrisons and they posted me two stainless caps in a jiffy bag with £1.36 postage free of charge - not bad for a 14 year old rod and they hadn't a clue that I was a 'good' customer with a few of their other rods .
Jerry

Cant be bad mate,eh?

There are some good rods out there that cost around the £30-50 mark

BUT reels - I'd pay as much as you can for a reel

i've bought cheap reels (£10-30) range and had them last for a year tops

Spend £100 on a reel and it will be still going strong in 5-10 years - in real (pun there) terms you will save money

Lord Paul of Sheffield said:

There are some good rods out there that cost around the £30-50 mark

BUT reels - I'd pay as much as you can for a reel

i've bought cheap reels (£10-30) range and had them last for a year tops

Spend £100 on a reel and it will be still going strong in 5-10 years - in real (pun there) terms you will save money

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Good call Paul, amongst others I've still got a pair of Aero 5000 GTEs and a Stradic that go back some 10 years plus and are in perfect working order.
Jerry

Paul,your not far wrong,but this i will add,i have two aero match III's that are 16-17 years old,they cost £50 each,never had a problem ever,just a drop of reel oil on the spindle(cos i cant get inside without dismantling the entire reel),in fact i have seven shimano's,one i got free for a 'mag' subscription,value around twenty quid,up to stradic 4000's(2 of em) and you know what,ive never lost a minutes fishing with any one of them,you and i both know cheap rods 'can' be good(tfg compact allrounder),but next time you fish next to someone with a hardy or normark,ask to compare it to your maver abyss,then a realisation should kick in,value is fine,quality normally costs.

Seven Shimanos and he calls me a tackle tart !

Generally I'd agree with what's been said and especially with Ron's view that within the mid [?] price range [say...£100-£150] there are some fantastic rods. That said at the value end Shakespeare do some terrific rods for very little money. They may not be of the build quality or look as nice as the top end but by heck they dont half perform well. I have a 10' Shaky feeder rod that's as good as any I own and it was £25...and that was this summer.

But for some there comes a point when feel takes over from functionality. I have rods that are simply a delight to use...they may not be the best rods in their class in terms of performance [certainly not the cheapest] but they are just lovely things to own & use.For me that started to matter...as I got older I guess. Its whether or not you think the premium price paid is worth it [to you] or not. As I keep telling myself...if not now,when ?

S-Kippy said:

Seven Shimanos and he calls me a tackle tart !

Generally I'd agree with what's been said and especially with Ron's view that within the mid [?] price range [say...£100-£150] there are some fantastic rods. That said at the value end Shakespeare do some terrific rods for very little money. They may not be of the build quality or look as nice as the top end but by heck they dont half perform well. I have a 10' Shaky feeder rod that's as good as any I own and it was £25...and that was this summer.

But for some there comes a point when feel takes over from functionality. I have rods that are simply a delight to use...they may not be the best rods in their class in terms of performance [certainly not the cheapest] but they are just lovely things to own & use.For me that started to matter...as I got older I guess. Its whether or not you think the premium price paid is worth it [to you] or not. As I keep telling myself...if not now,when ?

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:wh

Lord Paul of Sheffield said:

Spend £100 on a reel and it will be still going strong in 5-10 years - in real (pun there) terms you will save money

Click to expand...

Absolutely, and when you come to sell it, because it has a good name and is quality it will still fetch a good price on fleabay.

Are these carbon reels your talking about

---------- Post added at 11:06 ---------- Previous post was at 10:07 ----------

Most influenced by the posts of 'The Hat' & 'S Kippy'. Thanks. Bought the micro today and had an hour on the river trotting before dark.

1...Not speculating on the reasons after such a brief encounter but my strikegetafishonthebank has pretty much doubled.

2... At 148grams it a foot longer and 3/4 of the weight of the ABU !

3...Playing a fish is a lot more pleasurable.

4... Only downside was hitting tiny bites I used to ignore and finding they were deep hooked

These are facts not whimsy

PS:The only difference in end tackle was using a standard 10 rather than a wide gap jobbie