Hi everyone,

This is my first topic and the one i'm building is my first rod. I hope you guys are doing good!

I will probably open a can of worm with this subject, but here's how i balanced this rod i'm building:

Basically i cut a piece of a scrap rod blank and used it as a mould for lead. what do you think?











Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/23/2015 07:56AM by Fabio Liguori.

I'm just curious as to how much weight you had to add? I built two spinning rods recently, and only needed to add the weight of a 4" piece of an old rod blank, plus the foam reel seat arbor that I glued the scrap piece of blank into, and then that assembly, into the butt of the rod. My guess is it was less and 1/4 oz.

My latest build, a 7'2" casting rod, needed a bit of weight to get it balanced nicely. I used a 1" portion of a foam reel seat arbor and a 3/8 oz tungsten worm weight glued into it. It worked quite nicely and the rod has a nice balanced feel.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2015 07:41AM by David Baylor.

well it obv depends on the type of blank, the power, the number and type of guides, size of reel etc. But more importantly where you've allocated your reel seat and how close to the bottom end of the rod you could concentrate the weight to obtain a good counter balancing on the leverage.

This one is a MHX S842-2, 9 k-guides, split grip, size 1000 reel allocated quite low on the blank, i reckon i had to add circa 20gr of lead.

by the way, i still haven't glued the rod, i want to move a couple of things around to remove at least half of theat weight, as 20g is really too much

One of the things you find as you build rods as light as possible, is that balance becomes less of an issue. Any weight you have to offset by hand becomes so slight as to not matter very much.

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Thanks Tom. Yes, I'm still not sure about the subject to be honest. The friend for which i'm building this rod wants it like this. For me balancing became an issue only on my ML st croix walleye rod, which is very tip heavy, and i use it to jig for zander with my rod at 10 o'clock position.

Does the amount of weight necessary to balance a rod change with the reel you are using and the amount of weight you are casting?

If you're going to balance a rod, do it with the reel installed. The casting weight isn't really involved as most of the time you're handling the rod the weight won't be hanging from the tip - it'll be in the water.

There are a great many opinions on whether or not balancing is a good thing to do, but much of this really depends on specific type and use of the rod. For some techniques it's help to have a rod that's tip heavy. On others butt heavy or neutral. There's a great many variables involved.

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Fabio,

One word of advice. Balancing by shoving weight into the butt of the rod isn't the best way to get the job done. On a typical freshwater spinning or casting rod, the butt grip is only 15-25cm long. You are using the torque of the weight added to the butt to balance the rod. As you shove weight inside the blank, the center of mass of the weight gets closer to the fulcrum reducing the torque from the weight. Try to keep the weight as far back on the rod as possible. For the amount of weight you are needing to add, try to find some lead tape. A place that sells golf clubs, or the pro shop at a golf course may have it, or you can find it online as well. Wrap the weight around the very butt of the rod. This will minimize the amount of weight needed to balance the rod.

With something from the spinning line of most manufacturers, the rod will be a bit whippy feeling, and adding weight will exacerbate the issue, as it will take longer for the rod to damp oscillations. With that said, if you explain and show your friend the trade offs involved and he still wants it balanced, add the weight. Some people like their rods balance certain ways for certain techniques, and that is what makes a rod custom.

Phil,

The amount of weight needed to balance the rod may change as different reels get used. For an angler that changes reels often, removable balancing options can be devised that are either easily removed or involve little more than regaling the butt cap in place.

Fabio,
As Joe said, please do NOT balance a rod by putting lead on the inside of a blank. To get any weight at all, you start to shove more and more weight further up the rod blank and with no lever arm, simply make the rod heavier with out any real balancing.

If you do add weight, which is normally NOT a good idea, put mass weight at the extreme butt 1/2 inch. This gives you the maximum lever arm for balancing.

Rather than add weight, use lighter guides at the front of the rod, use a bit heavier reel and move the reel seat an inch or two more forward on the blank when you build it.

Think - LIGHT weight in components, correct reel weight and butt length and you are normally better off than adding any weight to the rod.

Be safe

p.s.
I have balanced rods in the past for folks who demanded that I balance the rod by using lead tape wrapped around the butt of the rod blank. By using 1/2 inch wide lead tape, one can generally add enough weight to get the rod balanced, and then slip a butt cap over the tape to hide the tape and have a nice finish on the end of the rod. When I used this method, I used rubber chair leg tips for butt caps. On lighter rods, I generally used butt caps that had an outer diameter of one inch and an inner diameter of 3/4 inch. Then, for lighter blanks, the difference between the od of the blank and the id of the butt cap allowed for the installation of lead tape in the aft 1/2 inch of the rod.

I would use the lathe and an appropriate sized mandrel inserted into the chuck to slip the rubber chair leg. Then, I would spin the rubber butt cap, and using coarse sand paper and a backing board turn and shape the rubber chair leg to have a flat bottom and an outer diameter that matched the rest of the rod. Then, I would use a razor knife to trim the cap to a length that gave me about 5/8th inner depth that would nicely slip over the blank butt with the weight on it, for the final balance and finished appearance to the rod.

Hi everybody,
Thanks for the precious bits of advice.

I've used the lightest guides I could for the budget, Fuji alconite (KR concept).
I've customized the rod on the reel my friend has bought for this combo. I've moved the reel seat up to the maximum height I could, per my friend's personal taste, which is quite high up, 30cm on a 7" (up to 10gr) spinning rod.
The weight is circa 1 inch long inside the bottom of the blank.
I will try reducing this by using the lead tape, good shout thanks!

If the weight is only 1" long, you won't pay too big of a penalty in this case, as the center of mass of the weight will only be a few mm closer to the fulcrum than if you use the lead tape. However, the weight gets longer and the grips get shorter, and weight needed gets larger you will run into issues with putting the weight inside.

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