travel casting rod?

Question

I am in the process of purchasing a 5 piece Stow-a-Way fly rod from Cabela's in order to try and build a 4 or 5 piece casting rod. I need one this short to pack away on my motorcycle. Anyone out there ever attempt this? Any and all answers, tips, etc. gratefully appreciated! Thanx in advance-flyfisher

Answer 1

Very interesting question. I have 2, 5 piece 9' blanks, one 8wt and the other 5wt. I played with both of them after reading your question and if I were to do this for you I would use the 8wt and use the top 4 sections and try to make it a 7' rod that would fish reasonably 6-10# line. You could cut the tip slightly but I would cut at the butt section to bring it down to 7'. Sections will be uneven in length, but no way around this. For guides I would use a Fuji or Pac Bay casting guide with a high frame, to minimize the number of guides needed. Start with a #12 and work down to a #6 or #7. I would guess that 9 guides + tip. I'm basing my answer from your question and that you are attempting to convert a fly rod into a conventional bait casting rod.

I will add that most of my attempts at doing this type of rod have not been overly successful. If you have any further information please feel free to contact me directly. This is a fun question, and interesting project.

Answer 2

Yes ive built dozens of rods in my time fishing and have only ever built one travel rod but it was for fly fishing. I will advise that you select a quality blank, the one i used was a sage, although it was 12 years ago and its been discontinued, but they do have some on offer
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/product/standard-item.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/item-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20431-cat410034_TGP&id=0042989319531a&navCount=2&podId=0042989&parentId=cat410034&masterpathid=&navAction=push&catalogCode=IJ&rid=&parentType=index&indexId=cat410034&hasJS=true
The 4 piece should do well, also what i would advise is use quality snake guides and strong whipping thread and slow drying epoxy so that it does not set should you make a mistake, the reason for the quality materials is that if you are to be fishing with no tackle shop near by the last thing you want to happen is a guide to become damaged and ruin your fishing just to save a buck, try these aswell
guides
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/index/index-display.jsp?id=cat410035&navAction=jump&navCount=1&cmCat=MainCatcat20431&parentType=category&parentId=cat20431

quality threads
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/pod/horizontal-pod.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/pod-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20431-cat410036&rid=&indexId=cat410036&navAction=push&masterpathid=&navCount=8&parentType=index&parentId=cat410036&id=0003579

http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/pod/horizontal-pod.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/pod-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20431-cat20368&rid=&indexId=cat20368&navAction=push&masterpathid=&navCount=12&parentType=index&parentId=cat20368&id=0017532
I recomend you use cork seal on a travel rod as very recently the quality of the cork even the expensive stuff seems to be going down. Some less expensive blanks are
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/product/standard-item.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/item-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat20431-cat410034&id=0017241316074a&navCount=14&podId=0017241&parentId=cat410034&masterpathid=&navAction=push&catalogCode=IH&rid=&parentType=index&indexId=cat410034&hasJS=true

You will also need a good storage case to prevent it from being damaged, try to get one of the aluminium tubes if you are travelling with it.
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/links/link.jsp?id=0004280312042a&type=product&cmCat=Search_Results_NYR&returnPage=search-results1.jsp&QueryText=rod+tubes&N=4887&Ntk=Products&Ntx=mode+matchall&Nty=1&Ntt=rod+tubes&noImage=0
This might help if you have any problems in building your rod
http://www.rodbuildingforum.com/index.php?s=7dd8d17bcea3bdc342214a18c39c43bb&