Should You Spend BIG $$$ On a Fly Rod?

what's up guys it's Alex with Taylor Fly Shop is this Rod worth 850 Dollars More Than This rod let's talk [Music] all right so today we're going to talk about price points and rods so we got rods ranging from 150 all the way up to a thousand dollars and a couple rods that are in between so um we got 150 bucks we got 400 bucks we got 650 and we have 995 dollars so why are they so expensive or why are they so cheap well here's uh let's start on the low end here's the Reddington path this Rod retails for 149.95 it is not a saltwater specific Rod even though this is an eight weight but it will handle most saltwater applications so why is it so cheap and how do they do it well the first thing that they do we talk about the real seed okay it's an aluminum reel seat but it's not fully anodized again it's just kind of a a cheaper base reel seat it does have a double up locking screws on it which is which actually is really nice and there is this little Notch cut into here but uh the Cork's not going to be a real premium cork the blank's not going to be a super high modulus blank so the guys in this are going to be more of a standard just a stainless guide so you got the two um you got the two stainless stripping guides up to the stainless steel snake guides on here these are going to have a ceramic insert on them very similar to a spinning rod would have but um you know these these guys are going to rust if you don't take care of them and definitely not definitely not the highest ink components but hey it's 150 dollars this Rod's gonna be pretty slow in terms of the fast moderate or slow it's going to lower moderate end so it's not going to really handle great in the wind but hey if you're just looking to have something to Pond top with or you're looking for a starter rod and you don't want to break the bank Reddington path can help you out next price point we're going to jump up 250 dollars to the 400 Axiom 2x from TFO so this is actually going to have a carbon reel seat on it so instead of aluminum reel seat they actually do a carbon reel seat it's going to be a little bit lighter um help them save some help them save some weight a little bit in that it's going to have a double A blocking real seat on here a little bit of a smaller fighting butt a little bit higher quality cork still not the best but this blank is going to be extremely fast on this Rod so it has really fast tapers on it not the lightest Rod that there is uh definitely not the most premium but they do add some premium components to it they do have the recoil stripping guides that are a titanium alloy so not full 100 titanium but these guides are going to be a little bit more durable you can see they they bend a little bit and there's two of those as a stripping guides and then you get up into your normal snake guides so TFO also has amazing warranty so again when you buy this Rod they're going to back it quality is really good it's a great rod in the 400 price point all right so we're going to jump up another 250 dollars from 400 to 650 and we're going to get into the uh the sage Maverick so this Rod obviously Sage known for making very high-end rods this is Sage's mid-priced Rod so it's going to be on the upper end of that mid price range where the TFO is going to be on that lower end of the mid price range but starting with the real seat this this Rod has a few other things that the other rods haven't had so this is a full fully anodized corrosion resistant aluminum reel seat which is going to be really nice just because if you're using this Rod mainly in salt it's going to help because when that reel sits on the rod and you don't take it off like I'd never take my reels off my rods it's you're not worried about it corroding underneath there or anything like that with the two metals touching but double up locking real seat again which is nice but should be pretty standard on a rod at this price point then we move into the to the cork so this is a pretty you know this is a premium cork so this is the same cork that you're going to find on all the different Sage models whether it's this or whether it's a thousand dollar Rod this is their you know their grade a cork moving into this really nice deep blue looking blank and then we get into the components so this is where Sage definitely has kind of separated themselves as mid-price Market these are going to be full titanium Fuji guides with a ceramic insert so these are gonna just hold up really nice as your shipping guides you're really going to notice these guides more than you're going to notice any of the others and they've really put the higher quality guides into this it's a really nice looking Rod actually so yeah but this Rod's 650 it's gonna be really fast it's going to be is it going to be the most technical Rod that is out there no but it's going to be really fast it's going to be great as a second setup or as a backup Rod especially if you have you know more expensive one and if something were to happen to it on a trip you have a really nice Rod that you can use as a backup now we're going to jump up we've jumped up 250 each time now we're going to jump up 350 dollars to the Hardy the Zane Pro so uh this Rod retails for 9.95 we'll just call it a thousand bucks um Again full anodized double up locking um real seat which is really nice one thing I really like about the Hardys is they do put the right like the the weight of it um right on the back so when you look down into your Rod Locker in your boat you can see like this is an eight weight uh which is which is awesome grade a cork I really like the this grip shape too because it's a little bit skinnier at the top which is nice you can kind of put your thumb up if you want to if you're someone that does that if you're powering stuff in but this Rod is going to be really fast but the nice thing about this Rod is it can be extremely technical so tailing Bonefish tailing redfish little short shots in the mangroves where you're trying to put your fly into you know landed on a frisbee right this Rod is going to be extremely stable extremely accurate and then you get up into these guides okay in my opinion these are the best guides that are in the business right now it is the best of both worlds it's the best of a ceramic titanium Fuji guide and The Recoil guide so it basically has a floating insert in it and these guides can I mean does that scare you when I do that yes um yeah it's a little bit scary right but they have all the great things about recoil guides but they're as they're really smooth just like um you know ceramic guide is and this if something were to happen to this insert right here like it cracks you can just pop it out and put a new insert in which is really nice because when you're standing there on the deck of a boat and the salt dries on your line the worst thing is uh that fly line on a metal guide so it's really nice to have this ceramic insert here Hardy has a really good really long reputation for building super high quality things it looks nice it looks like it's you know a thousand dollar rod and now we move up further faster stripping guides because this is the first Rod that has been worth moving up past the stripping guides okay these are full titanium snake guides this is the only rod that's sitting up here that has full titanium snake guides everything else has stainless this is a full titanium snake guide and what that means is it is going to be rust proof so no matter what you do this with this Rod no matter how much you abuse it you know that these are not going to rust so is this Rod worth 850 More Than This rod well here's my thought if you spend 150 on a rod you're going to need to spend 150 again on a ride really quick and then you're going to want something a little bit nicer and a little bit nicer where if you jump up and you spend a little bit more money you can get quite a bit more rod and then once you get into that premium price point with this uh with this Hardy I mean you're kind of getting all all of you know the Best of Both Worlds you're getting a great warranty on this Rod it's a limited lifetime for for the original owner this Rod comes in two one piece as well as four piece so that's another great option for these where all of these other rods are more they're just four piece models but the Hardy I mean they they've taken the highest end components put them all together with a really great blank and have made a rod that I can justify uh you know selling it a thousand dollars all right guys thanks for watching um make sure to like And subscribe put in the comments hey what's your favorite rod uh do you think that it's worth uh spending the extra money to to get something uh a little bit higher end or or do you think that there's uh rides out there in the lower end price point that do uh just as much let us know let us know what your favorite rod brand is um and your favorite rod and we'll see you next time [Music]

Channel: Tailwater Fly Shop

Views: 35,659

Keywords: fly fishing, fly rod, trout fishing, fly fishing for trout, saltwater fly fishing, inshore fly fishing, tarpon on fly, snook on fly, redfish on fly, permit on fly, bonefish on fly, best fly rod, hardy zane pro, sage maverick, tfo axiom ii x, axiom 2 x, best saltwater fly rod, best 8wt fly rod, cheap fly rod vs expensive fly rod

Id: j8FccnGf0EI

Length: 9min 27sec (567 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 11 2022