The HT6 was the first HT blank to go into production. I’d been looking to produce a rod series for quite some time and approached various blank manufacturers, but couldn’t find what I was after. On the third attempt I made contact with my good friend Alejandro who designs rods for the Maxia factory in Spain. This connection saw me travelling to Spain for a weekend with the Maxia owner, Alejandro and Aitor (who helped translate). A few early prototypes were made, none of which I was very excited about!
My main trout fishing rod for the last 25 years has been a 9ft 6-weight, so I knew exactly what I was looking for in this regards; I need something that is fast, has a strong but flexible butt and a completely stable tip. Numerous prototypes and 9 months later I got what I was looking for and took it to the Sexyloops Scottish Meet where Stefan Siikavaara broke it after beating the hell out of it for two hours in a snow storm! The rod went back to the factory and the entire second section was strengthened. This had a remarkable affect on the rod and transformed it into (in my opinion) a quite amazing rod. Now we had the rod I was looking for.
The last thing I want is a problem with breakages, so this rod (like all the Sexyloops rods) went into distance casting competitions and passed through some 500 anglers’ hands, including many top distance casters who like to hit the rod as hard as they can. I took it to the World Championships, I took it to Malaysia. Basically we beat the crap out of it! And then I placed an order…
And that’s when I had to look for a rod builder, because the finish didn’t live up to the blank’s performance. The rods were stripped and rebuilt by a Hungarian rod builder. The Hot Torpedo rods were finished in Hungary for some two years, before we moved the rod building to the UK with Trevor. Trevor was (and still is!) a fantastic rod builder, but he had to leave to go live in New Zealand after a year, passing on the Sexyloops rod building mantle to his great friend Lee Martell. Lee is an awesome rod builder, all rods starting with serial number 100 and up have been built by Lee, on the 4, 6 and 8 series. And on the 10 WT they start with number 1.
The sort of fishing the HT6 is designed for is New Zealand style fishing, large heavy nymph combos, medium-sized tungsten streamers, sinking lines when necessary, big fish, tight loops and everything has to be done with finesse. It’s a wonderful all-round fishing tool, our best seller and if it wasn’t for the HT4 would be my most used trout rod!
The reviews on this rod speak volumes, I think.
