Dobyns, Irod, Powell Rods with Micro Guides?

[Brian D.]

I'm a big fan of micro guides since buying a Duckett micro guide rod. Curious to see if the other more popular rods out there will be following this trend.

I know that Abu Garcia is going to put them on their Veritas product lineup which is due to come out in September.

[Rod Wynn]

I am seriously trying to get my guy Jeff at Phenix to make me some but he is not budging on this yet.. I like them too..

[ash]

There are some pros and cons with the Micro Guides - Rich Forhan has been using em for years - I still think its incredible to see how much he has affected the rod industry - I like it for my Blade Rod - where the cons kick in is when its freezing (ICE build up on the micro guides), and if you are fishing clear lake or a heavy alge lake where the grime builds up in the guides, and for the old guys who cant see the hole

It will be interesting to see if other tackle manufactures embrace the idea, or if it stays in a niche market.

[mattnewman]

We (irod) will be doing a limited run of select models with microcguides to feel out the market. As Gary stated there are some pros and cons to micro guides, so we are looking foward to see how they do. They should be available in about 3 months

[Tin Can]

What exactly are the advantages of micro guides?

[Brian D.]

What exactly are the advantages of micro guides?

First off.. take a look at the pic...




1 Less line slap on the rod which equates to longer casts.
2 Reduced rod weight
3 more durable - sits lower on the rod blank, resists bending due to getting stepped on by your partner.
4 Goes into the rod locker tube easier
5 the look cool..

Here is a quick write up on micro guides.

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/bass ... cro-guides





Rod companies that have micro guides:

Kistler
Duckett
Carrot Stix
BPS Carbon series
Abu Garcia (coming soon)
Irod (coming soon)
Falcon
Misc. custom builders

[offduty]

I really enjoy the micro guides but unless they are spiral wrapped to the bottom of the rod micro's dont appeal to me that much. When they spiral them to the bottom it eliminates the rod twist when fighting fish, to me this is not a big deal but if I am going micro's i feel I might as well go all the way. I also like the way it keeps line away from the blank when fighting a fish when on the bottom of the blank. I think they do go in the locker a little easier but if you just roll the guides to the bottom when getting rods in and out that solves that as well.

I have all but given up on rod companies doing spiral wrapped micro's and they are my favorite. They certainly take more time to build due to aligning. Fishing l handed reels I like mine to wrap to the left so when I lay down the rod with the reel handle side up the transitioning guides are more protected. So I just figured I needed to take care of things myself and bought a rod wrapper.

I will be surprised if you see spiral wrapped micro's offered in a stock line of rods. It is not easy to find tip guides for the heavier rods either unless you want to custom order 1000. A lot of times you have to split the tube for the heavier rods as they dont make the larger tubes for micro tips yet.

Some say they look goofy, I really love them and am looking for every advantage I can get. I am not claiming to be a great or even above average fishermen but I like to work with my hands and have been upgrading bearings and cleaning and lubricating my own reels so it was natural for me to want to deal with my rods too. I do think you get some increased casting distance, eliminate line slap, increase sensitivity due to a little more line contact with a smaller guide and they are easier to store on deck and tangle less.

I wish manufacturers would offer stock spiral wrapped micro's but dont see it happening as it takes longer to build and then you should probably offer a left and right wrap and that doubles the different models they have to make. I am not knocking any of our rod manufacturers and feel we have some great choices at competitive prices, things are a lot different if you are a guy who does custom rods in his garage or a small shop compared to a big plant with all the overhead. I would love to see the big manufacturers make rods with spiral wrapped micro's but due to logistics think it is going to be cheaper to get a custom rod built that way. I am not doing rods for others I just like to have some hobbies to keep me busy.

[brambo0311]

I have issues with the entire guide coming out. The foot on the guide is so small I don't think there is enough to wrap it on. Granted I'm tough on gear, but my other rods don't do that. I would rather see recoil guides on all my Powell, dobynes, falcons ECT... Other than a few I use braid on.

[ash]

I have issues with the entire guide coming out. The foot on the guide is so small I don't think there is enough to wrap it on. Granted I'm tough on gear, but my other rods don't do that. I would rather see recoil guides on all my Powell, dobynes, falcons ECT... Other than a few I use braid on.

I have a Rich Forhan revolver rod with micro guides (I believe he was using guides that fly fisherman use) Rich uses a "Forhan Locking Wrap" and I have never had an issue with the guides coming out. I guess its a Quality Control Issue - Rich Made this information public and did not patent it, as far as I know - http://www.rodbuilding.org/library/forhan.html


A true Genious and Pioneer to the fishing community - I admire the heck out of Mr. Forhan.

[offduty]

You may like the new Fuji K series micro guides. I like them better than the others and the locking wrap that Ash talked about is also the way Kistler does theirs. I would love to learn how to do the locking wrap, does anyone have any info on it?

Rich

[b2customrods]

Here the directions on how to do a locking wrap.

http://www.rodbuilding.org/library/forhan.html

Anyone that wants a spiraled wrapped micro guide rod just hit me up.

[offduty]

Beautiful

Thanks

[civicrr]

At the ISE Sacramento show, the guys @ the Dobyns booth said there were going to be a few Savvy models coming wrapped with micros. I didn't ask which models so couldn't tell you more than that.

[Marc]

Lamiglas has been using micro guides on several models for quite a while now.

I like them.

ciao,
Marc

[mark poulson]

I have been curious about micro guides since DL let me try his Kistler rod at Castaic last year.
I pulled the trigger on a Falcon med. heavy 7' rod with microguides that Tacklewarehouse had on sale.
I love the rod.
First of all, it has a lot of guides, so it loads really evenly, and it pitches Ikas, senkos, and light jigs great.
I am no expert, but the micro guides seem to really make the rod cast more easily.
Brian, if you want to take mine out for a test swim, let me know.