hersh,

Oh yeah, I do have to be careful with my Bandit in that once you get over 400gr, it just deadens it too much. Plus, I limit my fly size to 8-9" max when using that rod. Even with just a 30' head, a 60' cast isn't too much of a problem. Since I fish out of a boat, I can always move closer, but I'd say that the vast majority of my casts are in the 50' range with some up to 75' and some as little as 20'. For that style of fishing, it's just a waste of energy to false cast more than a time or two (actually it's a waste with any type of fishing) and with all of that weight in the 30', it's just far easier to fire it away after minimal false casting and still make throwing the larger payload easy.

I've noticed the same with my Gowdy (mine's a 7'6" 6/7), but it's a damn rocket with virtually any streamer under 4", not to mention a damn fine dry fly rod with a standard 6wt line. For my trout streamer fishing (and smallie and surfperch), my BAG Quickshot 7wt has way more guts to throw junk when necessary.

My fisher rod has a 5-8 wt window and throws all of them very well. It is like having 4 rods in 1. The fly or whatever line I have determines what is used. The line wt will correspond to distance but for me that is not an issue as most of my cast are within 40 ft.

For rods I build I do not put line wt on the rod anymore. Line wt is very subjective. Even for me the 5wt line used one day with excellent results will seem to suck the next day and changing to a 7wt line is better. Then the next day the 5wt line just seems to feel better than the 7wt line.

That has been my journey regarding over lining.

ijuin rods are in a class of there own. im really impressed with tomo's blanks, they load up close like they were made to do just that one job but then they turn around and will lay out 55' casts with out feeling stressed out. i under line them, over line them. just a special blank. as for line weight on rods and lines, unless the maker specifies a make and model with the weight i don't pay any attention to what they say. so many different tapers load so many different ways and paying $100 for line doesn't guarantee your getting the best match for the rod.