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Ronan's report


Monday 10th November, 2014

Ti is away today so I'm back on strike! Currently I'm fishing with Mike north of Hervey Bay for a couple of days, having just fished with Jacko and one of his mates around Frazer Island for the past three. Jacko and his mate (also Paul) managed a couple of Tuna from the boat. I didn't have any Tuna but I had a bunch of Flathead on the HT8. Mostly this trip however I've been trying to fish the prototype 10 wt as much as possible. I'm really enjoying fishing this rod. It has had an interesting development...

Last year Lee asked for a competition 10ft rod for the World Championships with Fly Fishing Tackle. We produced three prototypes each time getting stiffer and stiffer (Lee is a strong man!). The report from one of the earliest 10ft 10wts (the 10-10) Lee tested was that it would make a great SW Flats Rod. This was the rod I took to Malaysia last winter and while I liked it, I found the 10ft length to be too long and hard on the elbow with a full line. Scotty won this rod in the Scottish Meet in Spain Shootout!

Subsequently I asked my Spanish blank manufacturers to make me a 9ft version with a few modifications. This is the rod I've been fishing most of the time here in Australia (with a Rio Technical Tarpon taper). It's been through many competitions - it's the rod I took to the World's and has been in UK and now Aussie Shootouts. It's a very comfortable casting rod, significantly lighter than my previous favourite 10wt (TCX) - which is an outstanding rod by the way - and more progressive (I believe that a rod should flex to the handle - rods that have completely rigid butt sections lose accuracy and feel at distance and are harder on the body - because you need to stop more of it at the first instance - the flex in a rod enables you to stop each part of it at the time - and one of the designs in a rod is exactly how it does this. Yes I believe most SW rods are too stiff in the butt!).

My biggest concern over a rod that does have a deeper flex was how would it handle fish fighting? Obviously you don't want a soft butt because that's where you play a large fish. But this fishing/casting/fighting compromise seems to be about right and has given no problem so far on 10Kg fish. So this is a great start. I'll be in Exmouth in about two weeks for more testing - but now it's back to Flathead on the HT8. I'm really enjoying developing rods for fishing and casting; it's quite fascinating! I still haven't made a final decision on this blank, but do have four orders. If I have ten orders by the time I leave Australia then I'll run with it, because it is certainly a Hot Torpedo!

Trev is finishing of the HT4s at the moment and they'll be in the shop by the end of the week. Everything else we have in stock. If you would like an 8, 6 or 4 HT I would recommend buying one ASAP because I have casting clinics lined up this and next weekend and we tend to sell rather a lot following these events. It sure is nice to be fishing fishing fishing - and the tide is on the turn now, so it's back to the fish :-)

Cheers from Australia,
Paul


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