[georgemro]

This past season my son and I made a conscious effort to improve our crankbait fishing abilities and one thing I am sure of you need the proper rod. The problem is I'm not sure which that is. I feel like I can guide a crankbait thru cover better, without hanging up, using graphite and I can feel the crankbait vibrations better. I learned how to fish with Garcia & Shakespeare fiberglass rods when I was a kid but haven't used glass in years. Can anyone tell me what type rods you think are best for crankbaiting ; glass,composite,graphite,length,action ect.?

 

[Texas Bass Pro]

For crankbaits I would use a 7' to 7 and 1/2' fiberglass rod. This is just me but I seem to be able to get a better hookset with a fiberglass rod when using crankbaits.

It just feels right and I am comfortable with it.

 

[dave0331_69]

Texasbasspro hit the nail on the head! Took me awhile to get the feel for glass for crankin, because like you I hadnt used a glass rod in years, so took some gettin used to to, but worth it. dave

 

[Jared]

Fibreglass all the way for crankbaits! Main reason is that the rod give more when the fish first hit and again if the fish runs. This "give" will help prevent the small hooks on crankbaits from being pulled free from the fish.

 

[imonembad]

Wal-mart has a 7 foot berkley cherrywood that is not much good for any thing other than cranking it sells for $18.00 its hard to beat the price.

 

[Texas Bass Pro]

Wal-mart has a 7 foot berkley cherrywood that is not much good for any thing other than cranking it sells for $18.00 its hard to beat the price.

You cut me real deep imonembad. :'( LOL I own 2 of the 7' berkley cherrywood and use them for all my fishing and I do quite well might I add.

 

[KeithsCatch]

Well, it seems I am the contrarian again haha. I would say graphite all the way. I used to own a fiberglass rod bought for crankbait fishing. It was a BPS rod with Mark Davis name on it. This rod was the heaviest rod I have ever owned and whippy. It was so bad that I had to return it. I know own a Falcon medium light rod that I use for crankbait fishing and believe me has all the so called benefits of a fiberglass rod yet with the real benefits of a graphite rod.

Besides, there are some applications where you will want to use a medium heavy action rod for crankbait fishing. For instance in Garcia where I have been fishing lately. If you had a fiberglass rod and where throwing a rattle trap like me you would not be catching fish. You would be catching grass and would be frustrated. I am able to rip the bait out of the coontail and hydrilla most of the time because I have a stiff rod and I also am using braid. A friend of mine came down and fished with me a couple weeks ago and had the exact same lure but on flourocarbon line and with a softer rod. He managed 1 bass in the flats while I caught 15. His setup was not able to take advantage of shallow lipless crankbait speed fishing like my setup is. This is one example.

If you do buy a glass rod keep the receipt. You might be returning that heavy rod later on. Oh there is a reason "glass" was popular back in the old days. It is all we had. Now with better technology no way would I want to go back to 1960's or 1970's technology.

Oh and forget about Shakespeare ugly sticks. Those are the worst rods known to man. I wish someone would have told me the truth about them when I started fishing for bass seriously back in 1996. I was fishing lake Fork in Texas and hooked up with the biggest bass of my life and because I was using a fiberglass rod I had NO BACKBONE to move this fish at all. My rod looked like a upside down U and the fish ran me into a tree and broke my line. Had I had a graphite rod I would have had enough backbone to lift this fish before she ran me into a tree pile and would have landed a teen fish. This is the problem with fiberglass rods they just do not have enough backbone for bigfish.

 

[CHADWLY]

One thing I've never understood about "crankbait fisherman", guys will spend 150-plus for a jig rod and 20 dollars for a crankin' stick.   ???  You wouldnt buy a G-loomis, team it up with a zebco 33, go out and flip buck brush on Rayburn, would ya'? Back in the previous posts, mentioning better technology, their ARE some excellent fiberglass sticks out their.  Don't get a bad taste for fiberglass because you've never spent over 20 - 30 dollars for a crankin' stick!  You get what you pay for.  The only time I will not use a fiberglass for crankin' is when I'm throwing a small crank (1-minus  -  footloose...etc..) in place of a spinnerbait and need pinpoint accuracy in and around cover. Thats when the American Rodsmiths 6'6" and 6'8" Zell Rowland signature rods come out to play.  (Just my preference).  My suggestion: respect the crankbait, they have in the past and will continue holding "title belts"!!

American Rodsmiths David Fritts cranking series rods are available from 6'0"  -  7'11"  (all fiberglass) and are priced for only 79.99 in the 2007 BPS catalog.

SORRY BASSHOLES, MY FIRST POST WAS "TO-THE-POINT". BUT COME ON, IT ONLY MAKES SENSE!      

 

[Ouachita]

Chad, that's a great break-in post! Speak up. I happen to agree 100% with what you wrote, too. A good glass rod like that one is fine. I wouldn't go any lower than that. This is much like buying any tool. I can buy a $2 screwdriver, or get a Craftsman and not have to buy another.

Since 1959 I've had plenty of choices in rods long before graphite was used. I've owned a couple of 5' bamboo casting rods, several steel rods, and of course mostly glass casting and spinning rods.

I've watched the crankbait experts like Fritts since they first made headlines, studied what they do, at first convinced they were just marketing stuff. But over the years I've fished right behind several top pros and attended 11 Bassmaster U's. I've learned both glass and graphite have their places. Mark Davis promoted a graphite Falcon rod, while Fritts promoted the American rodsmith glass, but emphasized long length to cast as far as possible, and do most other pros. Cast way out to keep a crankbait in a strike zone as long as possible per cast.

The problem with graphite is to get one with backbone you can't really have a good long distance casting tip. It takes a limber tip to get distance, especially using light lures. Graphite won't load up like glass rods. But graphite is more responsive. When digging a long-billed crankbait on a shallow bottom it's nice to feel every little pebble and feel true bites.

Mark Davis is another pro pretty good with crankbaits. He uses graphite, a heavy G Loomis around weeds, a Falcon LowRider in open water. When using graphite it's best to diversify rod types to meet different conditions. One 7'6" or 7'11" quality glass rod will handle a wider range of conditions. Glass rods don't have "action" classes like graphite. The whole rod bends evenly from handle to tip (parabolic bend), yet has backbone to hoist impressive loads without breaking.

We also see the middle of the road rods, composites. Fiberglass blended with graphite. It takes a lot of shopping, but I've used a few that were really good rods, having responsiveness like a graphite rod, but forgiveness like a glass rod. Which way to go? If your bass often tear loose, you might benefit from more glass in a rod. If you can't seem to feel bites in time to catch a bass consistently, more graphite.

So what to do if you have to go with IM8 graphite to feel a bite, but it's very stiff, difficult to cast light lures? Switch to a spinning rig for the light lures, and use sensitive line on the stiff rod that's a little stretchy to add forgiveness.

Jim

 

[KeithsCatch]

Chad,

Thank you for clearing up something. Your quote:

American Rodsmiths David Fritts cranking series rods are available from 6'0" - 7'11" (all fiberglass) and are priced for only 79.99 in the 2007 BPS catalog.

Is exactly the rod I had. I couldn't remember for the life of me whose rod it was but it wasn't a cheap rod albeit not all that expensive either. I don't buy cheap rods anymore. The Shakespear Ugly Stick experience fixed that for me But that rod which had David Fritt's name on it was not worthy of anything in my opinion except to be taken back for a refund and a purchase of another graphite rod.

I have a falcon Original FC4-166 rod in medium action that is the bomb for crankbaits. It casts quite far for me. I am good at long casts and is quite limber yet has power to move fish. It is a perfect topwater rod and crankbait rod. It weighs 1/10 as much as that fat David Fritt's rod I had. That things was huge in the blank and was cumbersom. It just wasn't for me.

 

[hi steel basser]

I'm just guessing here, Keithscatch, Most of your crankbait fishing is shallow water and heavy cover. If that is the case, you are absolutely correct about rod choice. I currently use a ml worm rod for shallow cranks and topwaters, because a fiberglass rod is just too durn heavy for those applications, too flexible, and not quite sensitive enough. HOWEVER, if you want to throw a DD22 all day on deep points, you'd better go dig that overweight buggywhip out of the trash. These rods are designed for forgiveness, and there is no better tool for big fish on deep structure and big cranks. They don't have the backbone to horse fish, as you so eloquently stated, but if you try to horse a 5-lber on a 3/4 oz fat free shad that only has one #2 hook in him, you'll be telling everybody at the launch ramp about the huge fish that got off before you even got a look at him. This is the only reason to own a fiberglass rod, but if you plan on throwing big cranks, you'd better believe you need one.

 

[hi steel basser]

BTW, I own a St Croix crankin rod, paired with a 5:1 curado.

 

[KeithsCatch]

Good point hi steel basser. I used to use DD22's in Texas. But here in Florida we fish mainly 10 feet or less all year round.

 

[oldschool]

Rods should be picked up with reel mounted and line with casting weight or lure to be evaluated.
Back in the old days all we had were miserable 5 1/2 foot fiberglass and later graphite bass rods. The important feature of a any rod should be it's easy casting ability. Cranking rods should combine, a good strong butt section, parabolic center section and very fast action tip. Fiberglass or E/G glass blends combine these features easily and it is difficult to combine the features with high tensile property materials like graphite. Fenwick made a salt water popping rod series back in the 60's that had a trigger stick straight long handle. I started using a 6 1/2' medium action, very fast, 4 power rod back then for cranks baits and still use the same style rod today. Lamiglas makes a very good cranking rod, see http;//www.lamiglas.com/af_bass.php and there are several others.
Deep diving crank baits are similar to top water lures as far as the hook set is concerned, you need to let the bass turn with the lure to get a good hook set. With high sensitive rods you tend to set too quickly, although I'm sure with practice you can learn the correct timing.
Tom

 

[imonembad]

Texas Bass pro, I didn't mean to put you or your equipment down. I have several cherrywoods my self and I do quite well also. I like the 7 footer to crank shallow. I have an arm buster fiberglass for the dd22s. I challenge you to spend a little more money on a worm rod and come back and post how well you are doing, because if you can catch them on that cherrywood you will kick their butts with a decent rod.

 

[Texas Bass Pro]

imonembad---I didn't take it personally. I was just kidding with you.

However, I will take you up on your challenge. What would you suggest to use as far as a worm rod??

 

[imonembad]

I have fished a variety of rods from the high end to the low end. I'd be lying if I said that the are all equal because the are not. I had some of the g- loomis's and the are the best in my opinion however they are pricey to say the least. Right now I'm using a Team Diawa V I found these on clearance at wal-mart for $30.00 they were originaly $70.00 I bought the first one and liked it so well that I now have 3 of them. I fish on a budget so that is how I try to find decent rods same with the reels. Bass pro shops has some decent reels on sale in clearence but I don't like to buy stuff I can't put my hands on. I'm rambling on now. Thats my two cents worth hope it helps. Drew

 

[oldschool]

Todays state of the art is tomorrows obsolete product. The difference between a $350 G. Loomis GLX and $150 GL is about 2 years of material development. If you loved the 2005 GLX you can buy it today in 2007 as a GL for less than 1/2 the price, same blank and handle with less expensive guides. If having the very best at all times is important to you, then that your choice. G Loomis is owned by Shimano and the rods have the same materials and technology. Each fisherman has their own preferences and rods need to feel right to you, at the end of the day the right rod gives you confidence. The only competition you need to be concerned with is between you and the bass. I fish with a mix of products, some new and not so new and I'm holding my own with the bass.
Tom