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Who designed it?
Post 03 Mar 2020, 13:22 • #1 
Guide
Joined: 12/20/19
Posts: 101
Location: Christchurch, NZ
I see all sorts of glass blanks offered on the big auction site and l know a lot are made in the east.
Not much info on who designed the rod or credit to whoever did.
Are some blanks simply reverse engineered? It can’t be a secret .

I know a bit about the history of my glass rods. A Morgan or Steffen etc. and that for me adds to the fun and pride in ownership.
I’ve not heard or read anything negative about any glass blanks. Are they all great?
You never seem to hear about any duds in the lineup either. What’s going on?

Michael


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 03 Mar 2020, 14:13 • #2 
Piscator
Joined: 08/10/05
Posts: 19078
Location: downtown Bulverde, Texas
some may not be engineered at all - no, of course not all rods are great regardless of the MOC.

But different rods do different things better than other rods, picking the right tool is always important no what you're doing.


Last edited by bulldog1935 on 03 Mar 2020, 15:07, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Who designed it?
Post 03 Mar 2020, 14:25 • #3 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 03/16/08
Posts: 3540
Location: Upstate-NY
fiberglass as a fly rod material is just REALLY forgiving.

the only rod I own (or have handled) that I consider a “dog” is my restored 1960s era Wright + McGill “Featherlight” (metal ferrule). To me the rod seems mis-matched: a light tip section married to a pretty stout butt section. Fine if you are just making short casts off the tip, but there is a weird transition when the butt section begns to work harder.


Last edited by corlay on 03 Mar 2020, 18:05, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Who designed it?
Post 03 Mar 2020, 15:53 • #4 
Administrator
Joined: 01/10/06
Posts: 7811
Location: Holly Springs, NC
I'm going to evoke Sturgeon's Law here - 90% of those online blanks are crappy. The numbers may be higher, but not lower. We don't buy cheap blanks because they are outstanding examples of glassy goodness. We buy them because they are cheap. They can give a flavor of what a glass rod can be. They are made into cheap/semi-disposable fly rods and other projects. Every rod doesn't have to be an instant classic.

Were the blanks reverse engineered? Maybe. They might be QC rejects. They might be overstock. They might be "out the back door" extras. Most likely they were tossed together to use up extra material or to meet a low price point. Whatever the origin, it won't be marked on the package. Don't have high expectations and you won't be disappointed.


Tom


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 04 Mar 2020, 09:58 • #5 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 04/20/07
Posts: 8920
Location: US-ME
Darn. All these years I felt blessed to have had a high quality, space-race inspired education. And now, come to find out, Sturgeon's Law was not in the curriculum. Damping is probably what separates the "good" from the great. But the basic technology is pretty well known over decades. Nowadays people want "fly" rods for fishing styles that don't involve a lot of fly casting and they want rods so "light-line" they flop around like a button on an outhouse door. If it has a tip about 5/64 and tapers from there, it will work better than a bankside willow. Seriously, hats off to the contemporary inexpensive blank producers. More refined products, more purposefully speced are available. But usable, inexpensive 'glass has an important niche, just as it did in the post WWII recreation boom. Especially if you can check them in hand, you can find a good serviceable utility rod, and no apology needed for that description. I think it is probably as it was in the most popular lengths and lineweights in the heyday. 7 1/2' to 8' 6 weights (D) were the glass wheelhouse. It became "easy" to make a good one, with pricepoints delineated by the level of fittings/hardware. But it was hard to make a great one. I think the same is probably true today. Plenty of wheelhouse configuration 'glass that will work OK, but great ones not quite so easy to make or come by.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 04 Mar 2020, 12:42 • #6 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 06/23/05
Posts: 4966
Location: US-MT
The handful (only a handful) of overseas blanks I have handled have been too soft and floppy.

That said, they make a rod you can fish with and have fun. Am pondering a overseas blank currently.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 05 Mar 2020, 11:15 • #7 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 09/03/07
Posts: 2055
Location: Marble Falls, Texas
I’ve built on a few, it’s a cheap way of trying different things and getting practice. None have been standouts but all have been useable and a couple pretty good. They do make good gifts to fiberglass leery fishing companions.

I have been able to pick up a couple of four piece blanks that way and in the lighter lines/shorter lengths they have utility A 6.5 two weight four piece will fit in my shoulder bag along with a couple of reels with little weight added. If I walk in with a Bass-O-Matic and find its a sunfish kind of day, I swap out.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 07 Mar 2020, 07:18 • #8 
Piscator
Joined: 08/10/05
Posts: 19078
Location: downtown Bulverde, Texas
I'll sneak in again my evaluation of CGR. It's a really strange taper as a whole rod goes. They made the 7/8 with enough butt to turn inshore fish. The tip has wonderful control for casting any line and the leader alone in close. But the mid has such a freaking soft spot, it takes a very narrow range of grain weight to get past it and shoot the rod to distance.
They didn't engineer it that way - but what they ended up with.

Likewise, Corey's reference to W&M Featherweight. It has the same strange dead spot in the subsequent tip-inside plastic ferrule. The reinforcement required in the bottom section female sleeve absolutely kills the rod dead there. You have to cast like a one-armed paper hanger to get past it and load the butt.

You won't find these types of bad habits in a Phillipson or Fenwick, though if you want to roll cast, consider the former.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 07 Mar 2020, 18:39 • #9 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 11/06/17
Posts: 2498
Location: South of Joplin
The W&M rod I compared the CGR to was a Sweetheart with that tip inside ferrule, I thought the two cast exactly alike. Not my ideal rod, even if useful in some circumstance.
On the other hand my W&M Denco in brown glass and metal ferrules is a favorite all around rod.

It seems to me that most of the "design" work on vintage rods was as much (probably more) trial and error as it was calculated engineering. The very invention of the tip over ferrule was basically accidental when Green was trying to combine the actions of two differing rods according to the story I read.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 07 Mar 2020, 20:07 • #10 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 09/18/09
Posts: 5561
Location: Relocated to the Drought Stricken West.
Some of the best oversees blanks were the ones that a rod builder designed, worked with the manufacture and got the taper right. Then the manufacturer sold them separately at a much lower price. This hasn't happened recently because the rod builder's have learned.

Also, these blanks don't have good quality control. What you buy today may not be what you buy in a couple of months.

The higher end blanks have tapers that they have designed and tweaked and quality control so they are consistent. You get what you pay for, but there is a place in the market for a cheap blank.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 07 Mar 2020, 21:51 • #11 
Master Guide
Joined: 02/04/12
Posts: 705
Location: SE Pa
Quote:
but there is a place in the market for a cheap blank.

Agreed. I've build numerous rods on the inexpensive 7' 3/4 wt glass blanks and people like them, they fish surprisingly well. Not the quality of better made blanks, but not bad at all to fish with.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 07 Mar 2020, 22:43 • #12 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 02/27/16
Posts: 2327
Location: US-IL
The products made overseas are constantly knocked off in the sense that XYZ sends their manufacturing to be made overseas using this process to these specs.The quota of product is made.Then the same equipment is used to make a VERY similar product that might nave some slight variations but is basically the same thing.I see it with tools,fly hooks and other products.There is no way to stop it.The equipment and materials and no way to enforce infringements make all this easy.I have no doubt that the same plants rolling blanks for name brand rods are just relabeling the same and cutting out the middle man as they see it.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 25 Mar 2020, 13:58 • #13 
Sport
Joined: 06/24/19
Posts: 39
Location: US-CA
What do you think of the Ijuin Yomogi? IMO, that one's a winner.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 13 Apr 2020, 15:40 • #14 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 03/30/09
Posts: 1525
Location: Hamilton,Ontario,Canada
I have a glas 8ft. 3 pc. 5 wt. that wont throw a 5wt. very well at all. I tried it with a 4 wt.line and for me its a winner.It is from china.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 13 Apr 2020, 16:40 • #15 
Glass Fanatic
Joined: 01/26/07
Posts: 1385
Location: Ada, Oklahoma
kilgoretoast,
I don't think the Ijuin Yomogi or any of the other top line Japanese blanks can be considered cheap knockoffs. These blanks are all designed and built to strict specifications.

Larry


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 30 Apr 2020, 12:17 • #16 
Sport
Joined: 06/24/19
Posts: 39
Location: US-CA
Hi Larry,

I completely agree that Ijuin Yomogi are not cheap knockoffs. Just to clarify, I never said they should be considered as such! I own three Yomogi models.

I was asking if anyone had any opinions on them. I realize the original post started veering toward discussing cheaper, overseas-made blanks... but the originator mentioned his Morgan and Steffen glass rods, and then asked about who designs some of the overseas-made blanks. Right?

It's all good...

:)


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 30 Apr 2020, 15:18 • #17 
Guide
Joined: 12/20/19
Posts: 101
Location: Christchurch, NZ
Kilgoretoast
It is all good. No issues buddy and thank you for posting.
I’ve never cast a Yomogi but would love to fish one.
Did you build from blanks?
I like his website and his builds look really nice. Truely high end and top of the line as well as a fine contribution to the enjoyment of our game.


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 01 May 2020, 12:26 • #18 
Sport
Joined: 06/24/19
Posts: 39
Location: US-CA
Hi Michael,

I'm not a rod-builder, and purchased all three of my Yomogi models from U.S. builders, who obtained the blanks from Ijuin. You should really try casting one! Better yet, fish one!

When I obtained my first Yomogi (7.5-ft, 4 wt), I was uneasy about what I'd gone and done... did I just buy another fly rod?? Out of the box, the wiggle test didn't convince me I had made a good purchase. Sort of the same when I lawn cast it. Then I fished the rod, and experienced the "wow" factor. Never thought I'd be regularly using this little rod on a western river flowing thousands of cfs, but that's what I do! One qualification is that cutting and using a tree branch would probably be better than using a Yomogi to fish with split shot on the leader. :)

I began fly fishing ~50 years ago, couldn't afford cane, so started on old glass. Then, we all experienced the near extinction of glass rods, so I fished graphite. I am very happy I recently purchased and fished a Yomogi. If someone has no knowledge of what is meant by "parabolic" action in a fly rod, put one of these in their hands!

All the best,

Kilgore


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Re: Who designed it?
Post 01 May 2020, 15:52 • #19 
Guide
Joined: 12/20/19
Posts: 101
Location: Christchurch, NZ
Kilgore...you remind me of me! You go to the river with the rod you want to fish and enjoy and then find yourself perhaps asking a bit to much from it . Shot or a bead head perhaps a bit to big?
Maybe it’s just part of the light line addiction as the rods are certainly able to handle large fish.
Michael


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