Mr.Morton's article in the latest Rod Maker is quite interesting. Since I have plenty of thinking time as I recouperate I've come up with a ? or so.
On page 26"spinning butt guide" the line coming off the bail roller is checked for contact on the butt guide. Mr.Morton further describes quite clearly what to look for when accomplishing this procedure.
In an old Outdoor Life Book"How to Make Your Own Fishing Rods by Mel Marshall he gives almost the same advice with one difference, have the bail open,the reel spool as far "forward" in it's travel as possible then string the line to the tip and tape it,then remove the slack and tape the line to the lip of the spool so that it's at the 6 o'clock position, then take your 1st guide and move it until the line just touches the out side of the guide ring.
To me this should make for less guide placement time because the guide position is set for the actual casting configuration. I've been doing this since 1978 and it has worked well for me. In fact just before this surgery I rebuilt a 71/2ft spinner applying the New Guide Concept but went with Fuji Hardaloy Hi frame guides of 25, 16L, then 10 YSG Alconite and the rest 7mm fly rod guides. The increase in casting distance was unbelievable almost double and the only change in anything was the guides.
Since spool designs can create some hefty variations in spool diameter I've found that changing the guide height if the ring size won't work out is frequently more productive than moving the guide fore or aft.
As far as locating the butt guide initially I load the blank by hand and mark the point on the blank where the flex either 0's or close to it. I do this with both conv and spinners.
Now am i wrong in the way I do this or just doing things a bit different and admittedly stone age?
I always test cast and load or stress test each time I change guide styles or locations: push comes to shove I'll accept a little loss in distance to get even loading under a fish fighting load. I know I've probably left myself open to some heavy duty criticism but so be it; "Lay on MacDuff" Warren

When the line comes off the spool it tends to flare out a bit so Don's way might be a bit more accurate. But just as has been written in the magazine so often the line flexes or bends so a quarter inch here or there may be of little real importance. I have stayed with the earlier set-up shown on the New Guide Concept and it is working well for me. In fact, I can lay out the Concept system in about 3 or 4 minutes and do some test casting. Then play around with various other set-ups and test cast them and I have yet to improve my distance over what I did with the original set-up.

Maybe I'm getting lazy, but I get such good results with the system on the Concept thing that I am starting to think I am wasting my time test casting. Just set it up like the article says and go fishing!!! I have yet to place a bad set-up there.