JON: COUPLE OF ROD QUESTIONS

[LTM]

Hello Jon,

Ive a couple of questions for you:

1. Ive read in several places on the web that there is a movement back to stainless steel guides (ie Perfection, etc) for using braid. I KNOW that SIC guides are the hardest/smoothest surface, so what are your thoughts on this matter?
2. What are your thoughts regarding using "U-40 Cork sealer" on cork grips to seal/maintain cork? What do you use?

Thanx,

Leo

[Jon Vadney]

Hey Leo!
I hate stainless guides.  They break alllllllllllll the time.  The soldering on where the frame meets the ring is the guide's weak point.  So....it really doesn't matter to me how they perform with braid because I won't use 'em for my rods due to the fragility. 

Cork sealer is good stuff.  I like the U40 brand cork sealer that you had mentioned.  Do I think it's necessary?  Not really, but it is a nice addition and it does help keep 'em clean.

[Jeri]

Hi Leo,

Firstly, sorry John for jumping in on a question to you.

In the world of rings there are a couple of very high quality companies – Fuji & Kigan, and then there are the rest. The rest are mostly made in China, and are obviously trying to get in on the market with somewhat cheaper products.

They achieve this in both components of the rings – the frame and the insert. Frames are generally made of stainless steel – for sea use, though there are obviously differing grades of stainless. The inserts in current times range from basic Aluminium Oxide right up through to Silicone Carbide, with a lot of other materials in between.

There are also a lot of rings that have plasma coatings over Aluminium Oxide, hence all the pretty colours that you can get. However, even from the lowest grade Aluminium Oxide rings right up to SiC, there is a strong cost element of diamond polishing, to end up with various levels of final smoothness. This smoothness is at microscopic level, but is critical to the final performance of the ring, along with other factors like strength and hardness; as well as thermal conductivity.

In the early days of fishing with nylon, unless you were fishing for Wahoo or Sailfish, the likes of SiC would give you very little benefit, as the nylon line wasn't tavelling through the guides quick enough to warrant the added cost of these guides, as their only real benefit was in thermal conductivity, dealing with the friction heat of the nylon stripping off your reel.

The additional point at the time, was that we were using a relatively cheap product as the main line, and even if lines did get slightly scuffed by the coarser grades of rings – it wasn't a financial crisis.

This all changed with the introduction of braided spectra/dyneema lines. The first casualties were the all metal rings, especially the tips, as the metal ring, even with hard chrome plating would cut and groove, because the line was so tough. This started a salesman's dream, as they could then sell you 'braid compatible' rings on your new rod, and charge appropriately, but all they basically did was provide guides with ceramic inserts – even cheaper Aluminium Oxide. That started a whole 'gravy train' of salesman's dreams, hard aluminium oxide, zirconium oxide, Alconite, and various SiC, even 'Japanese SiC'. However, all through this period, Fuji and Kigan maintained their position on having only 3 levels of ceramic insert for general usage.

Good quality Aluminium Oxide rings and above will all suffice with braided lines, however, what happens, is that as the grades of ring inserts goes up the scale of smoothness and hardness, so does how the guide look after the braid. SO, here w end up with the ultimate factual trade off, in that you potentially can pay a high price for your rings, and save on the costs of replacing braid, but the big factor is usage of the braid, how frequently is it fished, as opposed to just being used as backing to increase the capacity potential of a reel. You could take the instance when general fishing with mono top shot for bottom fishing with braid backing, and use Aluminium Oxide rings on your rods – and be happy for a considerable amount of time. On the flip side, I surf fish with braid straight the way through in salty and sandy waters, so SiC rings save me a fortune in braid replacements due to the heavy direct braid usage.

Ultimately the decision is yours, you have to decide, whether your braid is going to be a seriously active part of your fishing or otherwise. Even the option of fitting say Fuji Alconite rings is going to improve the situation over Aluminium Oxide rings where braid is frequently used through the rod.

In closing back to your original question about metal rings – microscopically commercially produced metal rings are too rough to be kind to the braid, and certainly too soft to give a lasting solution. Even hard chrome plated guides are just like some of the fancy plated ceramic aluminium oxide guides, they are only as smooth as the core material, as whatever plating you put over the top only replicates the inaccuracies of the underlying material – rough!!

The point is 'braid compatible' should these days represent being 'friendly' to the braid, not 'proof against it'.

Hope that helps.
.
Cheers from sunny Africa


Jeri

[LTM]

Thanx Jon and Jeri,

With this info I can now make an INFORMED decision regarding what "level of quality" of rings to have on my rods.

Thanx for the valuable feedback,

Leo

[Newell Nut]

I was shocked to see a package recently of Fuji parts and in very small print it said made in China. I think it may have been a package of reel seats.