Two Old Rods from Craigslist

[fishmeluck]

I bought two old fishing rods off Craigslist in November. One was a Penn Custom Power Stick P270-8C 7'10" 12-30 lb rod, and the other was a Penn Special Senator SS 3140 RW 6'6" 30-50 lb rod. The Special Senator has a roller stripper and roller tip, plus three regular guides. The rods were in "almost good" condition, and they cleaned up pretty well, except the Power Stick needed three new guides and a tip. I didn't mind, because I paid only $50 altogether for the rods.

It wasn't hard to find information about the Special Senator, but i could not find much of anything about the Power Stick. And, I wonder if Calstar, Seeker, and Penn were all making similar rods from similar blanks at the time the Power Stick was made, because of the "270" in the model number and the line rating.

Yesterday, I used the rod at Catalina, paired with a rebuilt Penn 140 Squidder and tried casting a Carolina rig with a 1 oz sinker and curly tail. The rod felt really good and I was able to toss that 1 oz pretty far, for me anyway. I think it would make a good anchovy rig.

Can anyone tell me more about the Power Stick? Before the Internet, it would not bother me not having information about something. But now that I can find information online about almost anything, it really bugs me when I can't!

[SoCalAngler]

Well I don't know if this will be of any help, but yes Calstar, Seeker and Penn all made the 270's at around the same time.

Several manufactures started using the same numbering plan for their blanks so people could compare, say the 270 blank from one manufacture to another.

For Calstar rods the first number, in this case the 2 referred to the mandrel used to make the blank and the second and third numbers referred to the rods length, in this case the 70 meant the rod was 7' in length.

Of course Calstar, Seeker and Penn did not use the same mandrel's but they were trying to make similar rods for the line test used. Also machines used in the process, the experience of the manufactures and materials used all played a part in the quality of the rods built.

Leon Todd the owner of Calstar after working for Roddy Rods and later Sabre tried to stream line the numbering of the blanks he made. If you have seen old Roddy Rods and Sabre's their numbering system was all over the place and made it hard for someone to buy a blank for a certain line test if they had not pulled on that rod before buying it.

IMO the quality did very in manufactures, Calstar and Seeker were very close in this regard but I think Seeker rods were softer in the tip and often ran about one line test lighter than the Calstar rods at the time. As far as the Penn rods...well lets just say they didn't match up well to the Seekers and Calstar.

Even Accurate Reels adopted this type numbering system to match their first generation of reels to the blanks being made at the time. A 197 was meant it should be used on a 15 lb test blank, a 270 for a 20 lb test blank, 870 on a 30 lb stick, a 665 on a 40/50 lb rod and so on.

Edit: Yes I know Calstar and Seeker never made a 197 blank but I have talked with Accurate about this, the 197 reel number it seems as there may have been some confusion at the time when they came up with that number because both rod builders had 196 blanks, both had 196's in 7' and 8' lengths so the number of the 197 reel may have been written down wrong when they came up with that reel number to match to a rod.

[fishmeluck]

Well I don't know if this will be of any help, but yes Calstar, Seeker and Penn all made the 270's at around the same time.

Several manufactures started using the same numbering plan for their blanks so people could compare, say the 270 blank from one manufacture to another.

For Calstar rods the first number, in this case the 2 referred to the mandrel used to make the blank and the second and third numbers referred to the rods length, in this case the 70 meant the rod was 7' in length.

Of course Calstar, Seeker and Penn did not use the same mandrel's but they were trying to make similar rods for the line test used. Also machines used in the process, the experience of the manufactures and materials used all played a part in the quality of the rods built.

Leon Todd the owner of Calstar after working for Roddy Rods and later Sabre tried to stream line the numbering of the blanks he made. If you have seen old Roddy Rods and Sabre's their numbering system was all over the place and made it hard for someone to buy a blank for a certain line test if they had not pulled on that rod before buying it.

IMO the quality did very in manufactures, Calstar and Seeker were very close in this regard but I think Seeker rods were softer in the tip and often ran about one line test lighter than the Calstar rods at the time. As far as the Penn rods...well lets just say they didn't match up well to the Seekers and Calstar.

Even Accurate Reels adopted this type numbering system to match their first generation of reels to the blanks being made at the time. A 197 was meant it should be used on a 15 lb test blank, a 270 for a 20 lb test blank, 870 on a 30 lb stick, a 665 on a 40/50 lb rod and so on.

Edit: Yes I know Calstar and Seeker never made a 197 blank but I have talked with Accurate about this, the 197 reel number it seems as there may have been some confusion at the time when they came up with that number because both rod builders had 196 blanks, both had 196's in 7' and 8' lengths so the number of the 197 reel may have been written down wrong when they came up with that reel number to match to a rod.

Thanks, SoCal. That's much more than I've been able to find on my own. At least now, I know that the Power Stick is similar to rods being made by Calstar and Seeker at the time, but probably was not made from the same blank as the others.

[whalebreath]

I have a couple old Powersticks PC3821 7', 1-6OZ, 30-50# line.

They were used principally for live bating Sailfish w/30# and I wouldn't trust them for much heavier line than that they are a thin walled blank.

I remember trying them for bottomfish jigging here in BC and they were an adventure to say the least much too parabolic to be effective.

FWIW-they are nothing like any Seeker I've ever used or owned not nearly as solid feeling.

[SoCalAngler]

Correct fml Calstar and Seeker make their own blanks. Penn did also for a short time, but that did not last. I'm not 100% sure but but from what I remember Penn outsources their rod building. They have rods built to their specs and put their name on them but I don't think they make blanks or wrap rods.

I'm not trying to say that Penn rods are bad, and they hit a good price point for many fishermen which is a good thing. I just don't think Penn has a factory them self that builds rods.