Rod No. 5 – RX7+ 5wt

[Bob Riggins]

I just finshed my fifth rod.  I didn’t really need another rod, but a couple of buddies talked me into picking up this Rainshadow RX7+ 5wt blank and a Rainshadow RX8+ 8wt blank, at a deep discount.

This blank is the RX7+ with a metal flake, chestnut brown finish.  I used green wraps with gold trim bands.  The reel seat is a Batson gunsmoke A7 with a green woven graphite insert.  The stripping guides have gold inserts to match the gold trim bands.  Once I applied the epoxy finish to the wraps, they turned an emerald green to match the insert in the reel seat.

Just after I started the rod, I entered the drawing over at FAOL and won a Mastery GPX 5wt fly line.  The very next month I entered the FAOL drawing again and won an Elkhorn CL2 reel.  I was able to choose the antique gold finish to match the gold trim.  While the classic design of the reel doesn’t exactly match the woven graphite reel seat, it still looks nice on the rod.

Of course with all of this luck something had to go wrong.  Opps!  What wrong with this picture?

[Zach Matthews]

Good job, Bob; I remember seeing some pictures of your first hand-built rods, and while they looked good too, you can definitely see the improvement here.

[greg mitchell]

Bob – have you cast it yet? I was just wondering how it performs. Beautiful work. I built a Baston RX6 for my son a few years ago. The blank was ridiculously cheap and cast very well.

Greg

[Bob Riggins]

This is Batson’s top of the line fly blank.

[greg mitchell]

Yes I did know it was their top of the line blank. The much cheaper RX6 was good enough that I wondered how their better blanks cast. Sounds like they cast pretty well.

Greg

[Bob Riggins]

If built one rod for someone else on the RX6 blank in an 8wt.

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