Anyone have experience of using braided line with Dynaflow guides?
Hi
As no one has grasped the nettle on this one – here goes. Diawa Dynaflow guides were a development introduced a good few years ago – perhaps the first to start trying to reduce weight by plasma coating the traditional frames with a hard chrome or metal surface. It was not a great success for them at the time.
However, the concept has been picked up by the likes of PacBay with their Minima series ( 3 & 4), which apparently are braid friendly. This series of guides are in widespread use in a lot of spinning situations, and I haven't heard too many negative reports.
However, the big issue here is the smoothness of the stainless steel frame before they apply the plasma deposition. The smoothness is a factor, but at a microscopic level, as a lot of guides are usable with braid, but are so rough that after a few outings the braid is starting surface fray. It is only when you get up to say Fuji SiC guides that they are truly 'braid friendly'.
Hope that helps
Cheers from sunny Africa
Jeri
Thanks Jeri. Do you what the plasma coating is? The older Dynaflow guides frayed my braided line badly.
Hi
Sorry, don't know, as they are a very old ring style, and never really stayed around for long. The point with all plasma coatings – is that it is only as good as the base ring that they are covering – in this case it was the metal of the ring/guide frame – probably not very smooth at a microscopic level, hence the fraying that you will get on the braid. A bit like running your braid over microscopic 'sandpaper'.
We have the same problem with all these new 'pretty colour' rings/guides which have ceramic inserts. The colours and effects are very pretty, but when the plasma coating is done over a cheap aluminium oxide ceramic insert – it is very rough at a microscopic level – irrespective of which plasma coating is over the top. In the case of these rings/guides, they are 'braid compatible', but rarely treat the braid well, and soon fraying is an issue.
Have been using a surf rod with braid – casting extreme distances as a test bed for a new design we are working on, and after 2 years of seriously abusive use, the braid had only discoloured slightly, no fraying what so ever. The rings were ceramic Silicone Carbide – which is much more expensive than 'normal' rings, but is certainly seriously 'braid friendly'.
Back to your Dynaflows – I would only use them with nylon, and they should work fine, nylon is more abrasion resistant then braid.
Hope that helps.
Cheers from sunny Africa
Jeri
Many thanks.
Thanks, received a bit of education today!
:)