ok, let's then say I'm done with handles.
I never liked the apparent gawdy of Livre handles, but especially after fishing two of them last weekend, I'm sold on their function - things like dialing in your pitch, and the feel of the knobs.
The next brings to mind maybe the only good dialogue from the movie North Dallas 40.
"Wait, I haven't gotten to the weird part." "The Weird part ?!!?" "Yeah, it gets weird."
What on earth is the purpose of a Japanese reel stand.
OK, they say it's to protect the reel frame and bail when you lay your rod down.
https://www.hedgehog-studio.co.jp/page/146If you look this up, note there are different spinning reel handle attachment designs and threads, which need different matching reel stand attachment.
But it can also work as a hook keeper, line stopper and reel balancer.
The hook keeper function is pretty obvious here - in fact, two to three ways to grab different-sized hooks.
The the two O-rings form a line stopper. You can also remove the outer portion if you want it shorter.
This one is made by Dress and called the Origin.
Here's the shortened version, used on the smaller Tica SX1500
as line stopper....................and hook keeper
But this Hedgehog Type C was so cool matching the Tica accent orange anodize, I returned the Dress Origin to its original length and application on the larger reel.
At first didn't think this was going to fit, because it bound on the reel frame. But I had 3mm nylon shims that came with the Origin - one of those and a No. 6 nylon washer I already had around made the perfect shim.
I've already exclaimed I had no use for this,
at least, until I fished one last weekend, kayaking with a rod that had no other type of hook keeper, rigged with a lure that had plenty of hooks to keep.
Here's the Livre version, which has spring-tensioned weights inside you can add/adjust to balance and offset the handle weight.
The line stopper let me paddle with the UL rod loaded with PINS minnow and its two treble hooks, out of sight, out of mind, and out of worry.
It was easy to grab it and deploy the lure and line to fish, and easy to put it away again.
The line stopper function works particularly well with braid, and is easy to adjust the tension of the braid on either side of the stopper.
And one more design to show here that I thought was cool - The President made by Tsubaki
It has an obvious rotating hook keeper, and a stack of o-rings for a versatile line stopper function.
The two stands I show on my reels above are both "assigned" to rods that don't have hook keepers, and I can think of 6 other rods I own that don't have hook keepers - two of them full-time rigged in a rod rack.
But it's easy enough moving these around and swapping the simple matching handle screw caps along the way.
OK, received this and it's too cool, with a rotating hook keeper, and 4 or 5 choices on line stopper -
- offshore Halco C-Gar surface walker, and exactly how I wanted to use this