Rodfather Colorado Rides Again 02Apr23

The Rodfather Colorado Series 2 (RFCO2) is repaired from it's section 2 breakage suffered on its 1st fish last fall. The 9' "5 wt" CTS Affinity X blank piece was finally replaced by CTS after 4 months and machinations where under I had to ship the broken piece, then later ship the tip and 3rd sections, to Auckland for review. Unfortunately too, despite the fail clearly being a manufacturing defect, CTS charged my US representative, Flyspoke, $60 for the replacement. Flyspoke themselves ate this charge and understood the breakage stemmed from the rod's mis-manufacture, likely arising from CTS's only recent entry into ground ferrules. I likely will not buy another CTS blank and hope the rods I do have based on their blanks remain solid.

I remeasured the rod and while the overall weight, swing weight, and rod power (ERN 6.8) were consistent with its initial build, the speed of the rod became much faster with the new section; it now is faster with AA of 76° (up from 70°)!

So, again, this rod is substantially line weighted higher than at which it is sold and will be my wind-cheating, streamer-savvy, heavy river rod ~ as such it is mated with the Orvis Mirage III reel loaded with Orvis Hydros WF7F when fishing floating and with a spool of 6 wt full sinking line for streamers. I am not saying the RFCO2 isn't a gr8 weapon, it is; I am saying that it is much different than how CTS sells/positions it and loading it correctly requires much heavier "ammo" than a 5 weight fly line.