I am now upping my buy pricing on rod components and blanks in search of a Sage buster; that is, a fast mid-weight rod able to rival my better factory purchases like the Sage Z Axis or One or X. The blank I've chosen is the CTS Affinity X from New Zealand (arrival took some weeks). I got the 4wt 4pc fast action blank in golden plum. The finished rod is measured as ERN 4.5 and AA 69°.
To mate with the gold plum coloring I chose to fashion a custom grip with some serious cutting and gluing - the likes of which I've never seen and even a grip maker will find it hard to parse exactly how I did it - but I'll disclose it. The top half of the grip is a varying checkerboard of red and beige cork burl and the bottom is a variegated horizontal mix of burnt & regular cork. I cut and glued sections then cut and glued again before mounting on the mandrel for assembly in my grip vise.
I upped the buy price for my reel seat to nickel with a California cocobolo wood insert to best match the rod and grip. I built the reel seat with a removable fighting butt! That move required I trim the hardwood reel insert a bit - no faint heart can be had as one cuts into a nice piece of turned wood. I marked the blank's pieces for modality as usual and turned the custom grip with my favored full wells design, and then mounted all the stuff with epoxy to the butt section of the Sage Buster, careful to align everything. Awesome thus far!
I also upped the buy price to better materials for my stripping guide lined with zirconium as well as the snake guides and tiptop of titanium lightwire. The proof will be in the winding and casting of course but if I can make this combo beat a Sage for "just" $275 in parts and my time and skills, it will be worth it. I chose to wrap the rod with brownish and gold thread. To highlight 18" & 22" marks I used gold; to strengthen ferrules I wrapped the thread in spirals; to highlight the guides I made micro wrappings in gold to start and finish. Here they are before epoxy.
With this build I've taken a new brand name as well, The Rodfather. There are t-shirts but no builders with the name... so now there is. This 9 ft, 4 wt, 4 pc, fast action HM graphite rod with removable fighting butt in plum & gold is the Rodfather Cutthroat ~ SB 2020. It's awesome IMO; it may indeed be the Sage buster as it is light & fast & true and really strong for a 4 weight - plus I made it cool as heck. Proof will be in the field of course. Here shown loaded with the Galvin reel from my Winston 4wt but I'm getting a lighter Redington Rise reel in amber to match best.
In backyard casting, the Rodfather Cutthroat is every bit as powerful as the Sage X, and as accurate too. Sage X system with Hardy reel weighs 9 3/8 oz all in and the Rodfather with Redington will weigh 8 7/8-9 oz all in with fighting butt. Wow... I didn't really expect the power similarity, just hoped. The flex profiles are the "exactly" the same!
UPDATE 28Oct20... Got the Rise and 4 wt Mastery MPX installed. Sweet, light canon.
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