Spinning vs Casting

[fish-aholic]

Ok, so I was over at my parent's house pulling out all my equipment. Well I looked at one of my 15' Diawas spinning rod (which needed a reel to go on it) and then at my 10' Tica casting. I decided to try my spare Tica Gemini 350 on the Diawa Spinning rod.....So.....everything lines up, fits works just fine. The only difference I really noticed was the size of the guides. Is there really that much difference between the two??? I don't think I'll mess anything up using the casting reel on the spinning rod, so I'm kinda confused as to the real difference.

[Sam]

They are made to bend differently. A conventional rod has smaller eyes and bends with the eyes up and a spinning rod bends with the eyes down. The spines are opposite.

[fish-aholic]

I had the feeling that the spine was going to be the answer that I got. I read up on rod building and read that there was no real wrong position to place the spine when building a rod, and all it determined was the action of the rod...so if that is true, couldn't I feasibly use a spinning rod with a casting reel as long I got used to the feel and action of the rod? Not that I intend on doing it permanently, but for tomorrow it'd be nice to throw both my Casting reels instead of having one sit.

[Charkbait]

I think it's fine, just don't throw a spinner through a casting rod...bait goes about 6 ft. They both have to bend both ways under load when casting right? I would say that with a big chark it'd be more likely to snap during a fight.

[8nbait]

if it is a factory rod it is not spined anyway so it doesn't matter.

just about every rod i build these days has two spines typically 180* apart but one is usually stronger than the other.

my dad caught some nice 40+" stripers a few years ago on one of my conventional rods and his spinning reel. they casted nicely even with the smaller casting guides although when building spinning rods with small guides they start further from the reel. you should have no problem going the other way spinning rod with conventional reel.

gary

[Sam]

Wow, thanks for the info, Gary.

[Randy Stinchcomb]

Originally Posted by Sam

Wow, thanks for the info, Gary.

X's 2 I always wondered about this, I have several Bassin' bait casters(combos) and do not like the "trigger" type rods that normaly come wth them + the smaller guides hurt my casting performance. I might just replace a couple of them wth a spinning rod and see if it helps.

[flame thrower]

The Rod has 2 spines as Gary stated there are many opinions on where to place the spine to achieve certain results. You can ask 100 rod builders and get about a 50/50 split on what’s best. But here’s what the books say. One side is stronger then the other and the strong side aids in fish fighting. While the weaker side aides in casting distance. I have made many rods and tried both ways and have not noticed any appreciable difference in either casting or fish fighting ability.

So in theory if you want the rod to cast better then it fights a fish on a conventional rod it should be built on the strong side of the spine and a spinning rod on the weak side of the spine and vice versa if you want it to whoop a fish quicker. As I stated above there is no right or wrong way to spine a rod. Ryan from Hatteras Jacks puts the spine at o degrees, while other builders put it at 180 degrees. It’s more important to have the guides on a spine then trying to determine the strong and weak side.

You can always use a spinning reel on a conventional casting rod. With the use of braid many guys have dropped the reducing guide down to at 30 to 20, as long as it’s in the right spot. The new concept guides even aide more advantage to this setup. But I would caution using a conventional reel on a rod set up for spinning, not because it will damage the rod but because if you hook into a big fish the line may rub against the blank under stress. Resulting in the line parting due to heat, friction, etc. When I build a convention rod I do a lot of stress testing to ensue that the guides are placed on the blank so the line does not touch the rod.

As I said before this is a preference thing, I build all my rods at 0 degrees.