time for a new stick, what are your suggestions ?

[mastercaster]

Hi ya'll ,

As time and tears go by...a friend just broke my B51SD on a very heavy Amberjack yesterday,got in the coral, (my monster Amberjack spot here in Bali), my buddie is inexperianced ,this break was definitly operator error & I find myself in need of a new stick...4+ years of good service I got out of this rod...gonna miss it , but it isn't the first to go to rod god.....

I am sure you tackle maniacs out there have some good info on what is availible in Singapore these days...I'll be there 24-26th April (a few weeks for now), I look forward to hearing your input...

Mikey, Mark , Saimee & the rest of you carbon heads out there what do you say guy's ?? Good vaue for $$ , light ,short & can handle 500-600gr jigs and turn the monsters head when needed...something unfortunitly my friend could not do yesterday : (

I think eventually I will have Benji put something together for me ,a 2 - 3 month wait, untill then off I'm looking off the rack & matched to a Ocea Jigger 4000 .

Thanx in advance & tight lines, Aaron

[rodbender]

Try Sabre... go for a Calstar... cheap and bloody good.. Mike's a bit busy now.. give a call and see check on his schedule...

[MarkR]

Hi Aaron,

Think the big sticks would be best for Bali...

The Sevenseas Oriental VX500 is a beast but might be a little hard to obtain these days...4'8" great for heavy jigs...works 650g pretty well...will need a good fish to put a bend on it...I feel this stick is perfect for Bali waters...

A JM monster 500g also a great blank but no longer in production...Excellent for Bali waters, strong currents and heavy jigs...more forgiving than the oriental...im happy i managed to get one of these...a lot of power compared to the 500g special and a nice tip too

Have not used a Carpenter OH52XHB but do have a OH54MHB...I think the 52XHB will be a good choice too but I hate the trigger on the reel seat...better with a PSS20 reel seat I feel...

How's the jigging over at Bali? A friend of mine did some trips last year without getting into many good fish.

tight lines,
mark

[DaFrogman]

Master Nasatir,

Hey its good to see that you are out on the water and playing tag with the Seriola clan.... My commiserations on the broken 51....

Sadly, my fishing time has been eaten up by work and I have not stayed as current to the jig scene as the many jig gurus here.... I reckon if MarkR gives you a recommendation, then it would be a good one.

I doubt if you will go wrong with a big name brand thats around 5ft long and rated to PE10....

Good to hear from you dude.

Regards

Saimee

[mastercaster]

Hey ya'll , Mark thanx for the insight...you know well the conditions here , so I appreciate your imput...any idea if any of the Singapore tackle stores are handeling any of those you mentioned ? Or perhaps you have one you want to sell ? : )

Kind of figure that off the rack will be ok ..most of the time, however looking at the Shimano sticks that broke here ... other than mine , clearly the Shimano QC dept was not paying attention in some of it's past production runs... the 2 that broke here , other than mine, had clearly a big visuall difference of around a millimeter or more in the wall thickness of the blank below the break area...the blanks were cut with a fine blade saw just below the break & visually found to be not uniform.

The fishing has been pretty much the same as always, not bad ...not fantastic....steady catches ... & their still are some heavy beasts around for sure ...a lot of Ruby's came up this last month & Amberjacks as well...kind of fearing for the Ruby's existince in a few spots as folks here have a hard time showing any control or restraint ,the fish are carrying eggs....personnaly I stopped fishing these area's for now when I found eggs....wait untill after the spawn.....

I personally don't think this concept of ramming a rod into the swim bladder to deflate it does anything but prolong the fishes death, by drowing or by infection , or becoming shark food.....no study's have been done , I guess thats subject of another thread

This month has been productive catch wise jigging and trolling....however the rains have not fully subsided , so it's a daily call to go or not to go.....

Saimee . thanks for your condolences : ) Dude, I'll never give up... you don't either.... agreed ? he he he !

I gotta say with all the producers & selection of models out there now it is the "tackle guru's" that I wanna thank for their imput ! ! Mark this means you...as well as any other that may have suggestions on the current models on the market.

I also want to thank all you moderator's & participants at FO for carrying on with this website ! !

Cheers, Aaron

[Akudou]

Hey Aaron, as Mark have said the Jigging master monster 500gms have been proven. Very solid rod i should say compare to the 500gms new and 500gms limited. The 500gms on J/M have proven their over 30kg load test and therefore should be more than sufficient on your OJ reel. I have yet to set up my own calstar GF410 but i intend to serve it for bottom bashing. An Expert blank pe5-10 will be sufficient as the cost is much lower in price compared to the J/M's but ofcos it depends on the rod builder itself and how you want it built. I have 3 models of J/M rod built which is 350gms which can do a max drag of 20kg, a 400gms model and also a 500gms new (2007 model). I think fishingbuddy is the distributor for J/M's in singapore (if im not mistaken.
So its up to you and ofcourse your budget in getting the right blanks for your purposes. Goodluck and choose wisely is my advise as i have made mistakes in the past choosing and buying rods which i hardly even use nowadays.

[MarkR]

Hi Aaron,

The JM Monster and Sevenseas VX500 will be difficult to come by these days...

I think AO has some nice overhead SMITH jig rods...there are off-the-rack JM rods too but the color schemes are pretty psychedelic, workmanship wise average- my mate's butt cap flew off on our recent trip...

Anglers' Hut has some cool Ripple Fisher rods- there are some Xtra heavy duty models, would like to have a go with a Ripple Fisher one day...AH might have the Carpenter 52XHB in stock...could also contact Sportfisherman (Pak Jon) for the Carpenter- Jon is the Indonesian & S'pore agent for Carpenter.

Otherwise could try Deep Sea for the Sevenseas...

Or...a custom Calstar perhaps?

One of my kakis a very skillful jigger who has used several JDM jig rods has finally settled on a cropped 760L as his primary stick

[mastercaster]

Hi Mark , thank you again for the imput , I will look around while I am there & see if I get lucky....I have been looking at Calstar blanks as well....their specs are good & the reports from other websites & forums are all posative, the 760L seems to be pretty popular......I found a guy here in Bali who has just started wrapping rods...mostly, JM blanks, not bad wraps , not great artwork yet ..he's only 6 months into it....price is , ya ok ......I will definitly check out AH for the Ripple Fisher rods....as well as AO for sure .got a couple days time to spend there looking around.... Have you heard any reports on the QC of Smith's high carbon products ?
Tight lines & bloody decks , Aaron