thanks for the report friend.
(old is relative, that was a tagged mint rod when I found it - grin)
Sounds like you're using it exactly right - a small, big hardware, big fish rod.

See, this photo could be the final proof that my photos are never staged - grin again.

Bulldog, if you considered my asking you for an explanation about your unusual statement that "all short graphite are parabolic by definition" was feigned and not looking for an answer, you would be wrong. The thing is, IMO, you have a habit of stating your sometimes controversial and usually terse opinions as facts and that's why you get challenged. Then you take offense and make statements like "collaborated challenges" and "feigned questions that really weren't looking for answers". You may not realize it but comments like that are frankly rude. I really did want an explanation because all of the short (under 7') graphite rods I've ever cast were progressive pokers, way too fast to be useful and most certainly not "parabolic". I simply could not understand why you would write that. You seemed to also say that short rods made from bamboo had to be based on para tapers. I also don't understand that statement since my experience has been to the contrary. I have owned two bamboo rods under seven feet and they were both progressive with soft tips. I sold my progressive bamboo 6'6" #2 brookie rod but still have a 6'9" #3 built by Dominic Croce, a maker and rod highly thought of by Per Brandin. The Croce was also designed for eastern brook trout and has very fine sensitive tips. It cast a short line very well, but having a relatively firm butt, has enough backbone to throw more than enough line for its intended use. It is an excellent little rod and is without question purely progressive and not in the least parabolic. Over the years, I have cast other short progressive bamboo rods as well so from my experience it is certainly possible to make them.

The funny thing is that my original question has yet to be definitively answered in almost 10 years, although CrustyBugger might have had the answer in post #7. That is, if the Berkley Parametrics are indeed true parabolic rods, and there seems to be some question that they are, how did they accomplish that in a mass produced rod when an extremely talented maker like Mario Wojnicki is thought to use multiple blanks for his fiberglass para rods? I can see how a three-piece parabolic rod can be constructed by using three different blanks but aren't Parametrics usually two-piece? (From his asking prices, Mario is in a "cost is no object" situation admittedly.) Like CrustyBugger, I am thinking that the Berkley Parametrics must have been built with a tip one line weight heavier than the butt which might make them at least approximate the feel of a parabolic rod as we have come to think of them. But here's the thing: Back when I started this thread I was very curious about everything connected with fly rod actions and was trying out all kinds of fly rods. I'm now closing in on 74 and to be honest I really don't care anymore if Parametrics are parabolic or how they were made.

I wrote this last night and let it (and me) cool off over night. Reading this over today, I still want to post it but have to smile. You have to admit that fussing over ridiculous things like this is completely nuts in view of what's happening in the world ... but still, it's kind of fun. Now, I know I have probably opened a can of worms here, not to mention criticizing the Piscator, so as they used to announce over the 1MC on my Navy ship during rough seas, "Stand by for heavy rolls" ... or not.

I rest my case.

All I know that my 6'3" PM is a pure joy to fish...especially small streams as it's incredibly versatile, but I'll fish it on lakes too. My 7'6" PM is a helluva lot of fun too (also incredibly versatile).

Cheers

A.J. McClane in Field & Stream:


Duff, frankly, I'm sorry I brought this thread up, I thought I had figured out what some of the jargonese used here meant, and the quote above says one thing while all that replied say another.
I am now more confused with the jargon than before- progressive action clearly describes what McClane calls a parabolic taper, he says so. Yet every rod I have ever seen fits both descriptions. It doesn't really matter. The feel or performance of a rod under load varies so much from user to user that I don't believe either can be described, after reading the replies here.

if you start with a tube of uniform wall thickness, you change diameter and wall thickness along its length to turn it into a rod.
Just about everyone has cast a Fenwick, Phillipson or Fisher, which define progressive taper.
This older post still works to describe how you go from there to change tapers to get different actions.
viewtopic.php?p=338343#p338343
A para has a thicker tip and a thinner butt than a progressive taper rod, making it load and cast differently than the forgiving progressive rods most people are used to.
For the most part, paras are shorter niche rods than progressive rods, but are often able to develop just as much line speed.
In longer rods, paras tend to be faster, and they're built to cast extra distance.

BD1935. in your posts you sometimes mention "wet fly" rod or taper; what makes a "wet fly rod" ?

Gearboy, I feel the same way. I've had all the sizes of the Para/Metrics over the years from 6'3" to 8'6" and have never felt a single one was the least bit parabolic, especially the 6'3". The Ritz's I've had were indeed parabolic, much like Young and Ritz cane tapers I've had. BullDog must have had an unusual 6'3". I've cast about 6 or 7 of them and none of them were parabolic. All the PM's were progressive. I stick with what I said 10 years ago in this thread about Para/Metrics being closer in name to parabolic than the taper.

Trev, trying to describe tubular tapers can be very difficult because, there is diameter and wall thickness to take into account at the same time. Explaining tapers is a little easier with cane but is still complex when you consider that the power fibers are primarily on the outside. But let's consider a material with an even modulus throughout the thickness of material. One good example might be fiberglass itself, but as a solid. Let's consider a hypothetical rod having a length of 8', tip diameter of .1" and a butt of .4". Let's put that on a graph. There are three basic ways to get from thick to thin. A linear (often called a straight taper) would be a straight path from thick to thin, .4" to .1". A convex taper would start at .4" and stay thicker than a straight taper all the way but still end up at .1". A concave taper would start at .4" and stay thinner than a straight taper all the way but still end up at . 1" over the 8'. Let's talk about convex tapers. That taper could start out slow and stay a lot thicker than the straight taper and then quickly go down in diameter to reach .1". That would be a stiff rod with a fast tip because the tip changes diameter quickly or fast. Another way to make a fast rod is to start at a larger diameter butt, say .5" and make a straight taper to .1". That too is a steeper slope and can make for a fast rod. Would those two rods be the same weight rod? Probably not. It's hard to say how that all turns out but suffice it to say, that that's part of the rodmaker's art and differences of thousandths of inches in diameter can make the difference in fly line weight ratings. You will often see in taper profiles where the butt is a fairly straight or convex taper then quickly decreases quickly in the mid and then has a slow tip. You will also see taper profiles that have slow butt and midsection and a very quick tip. A wet fly taper will basically be a very slow straight taper with a narrow diameter butt and a thick diameter tip. They are also slow in their action, depending on the line you put on them, although the wait of the rod itself will make it slow. The time it takes to go from forward cast to backward cast is pretty long in comparison to a faster rod. It's probably hard to imagine until you've actually had one in your hands. A Parabolic taper will usually have a thinner butt that goes somewhat slowly before tapering down more quickly. Sometimes, there is no taper at all in the butt for a while before it tapers down. An easy exercise to see how this works is to take a 9ft 6wt tip from one brand of rod and put it on a 9ft 5wt butt if you can manage to make that happen. You will have a rough equivalent of a parabolic rod. I hope that helps.

I don’t have it but regardless, a parabola and a circle are both conic sections with similar mathematics. I don’t know where the word parabolic came from to describe fly rod tapers. If I really wanted to know, Id start with the writings of Ritz. At one time, I thought it had something to do with the shape of the stress curves but that has changed. I can’t prove it but have long suspected it has to do with the shape the rod makes while stressed. If you cut the bottom of a parabola, the bottom represents the quick bend of the butt and a straighter looking mid and tip. If you turn it upside down, it would look more like a fast progressive taper. For a circular taper, it would look the same wither way. The stress curve would look fairly straight, somewhat like a Garrison taper but probably more level. The “circular taper” was a Berkley trademark.

whrlpool post #27 links the parabola curve as a cut of a cone https://www.mathwarehouse.com/geometry/parabola/
The angle of the cut determines the sharpness of the curve
Which prompted my first post at #28
Lunker75 linked McClane's article at post #37 in which the parabolic and tip action rods are described http://fishinghistory.blogspot.com/2011 ... n.html?m=1 and in that article McClane says parabolic rods are progressive. (oh, and he says the parabolic term relates to the shapes the rod takes as it loads)

My other posts have been in reference to these links, sorry if that wasn't clear.

Hey Carl. I certainly don’t commiserate over the math but think the historical context is interesting. I don’t even commiserate over what a parabolic action is or isn’t except to say I think its important to understand what they can and can’t do. Personally I don’t like them much except for a few specific applications. I don’t find them to be very versatile rods. But where they work well, they excel. I have a Scott G 908B 2pc. The B is for Bass. This rod will throw a large wind resistant deer hair bass bug as if its not even there, and throw it a long ways. For crashing the banks or long retrieves, no progressive rod can compete. I think true parabolic actions make for miserable dry fly rods when you’re trying to cast a variety of distances. Sure you can use them that way, but a good progressive rod is far more intuitive. That’s probably why there are rods referred to as semi-parabolic in an attempt to get the best of both worlds.

By the way, Trev. I think McClane’s explanation that equates a progressive rod to a parabolic is very confusing and not accurate to how we consider tapers and actions today. I think he is comingling a butt action with a parabolic action which are actually different things. These days, I’d say that a progressive rod could be described as tip action, mid action or butt action (fast, med, slow) but not a parabolic action. The wet fly taper you asked about is a slow, butt action rod with consequential slow recovery but doesn’t cast at all like a parabolic action.