Micro guide rods

[stackenem]

I need some info on micro guide rods. Give me your pros and cons on these if you would please. Thinking about upgrading some rods this year.

Thanks
Stack

[thedude]

pretty much all my rods are micro guides. In general, they at a minimum perform as good as conventional guides and weigh much less. In some cases - like using braid or light, limp line on spinning gear - they will cast a good deal farther.

They do freeze up when the air temp is below 32 - however its been my experience that the line guide on my reel will freeze up as well as many of the regular sized guides and there is no changing that.

i have micros on spinning gear that i use with braid/leader - works great, however you don't want to too small. A typical guide is a size 6, micros are any where between 2-5. Most factory rods use something near a 4, and these pass knots pretty well.

I also use them on flipping sticks with 65lb braid, jig rods with 17lb floro... etc etc.... no issues.

[bob o]

The only problem i've had with them is getting the line tru the guide. i must be getting old 

[Waterfoul]

I only own one micro guide rod... and it's a Palehorse Custom rod made for me by thdude.  Only issue I've had is with the tip losing it's insert... but we've since put a better quality one and have seen no more issues.

I've heard some bad things about the white Ducket micro rods though... losing inserts and simply cracking off the rod.

[stackenem]

Has anybody heard anything bad about the Falcon Boocoo rods?

[thedude]

looks like they are american made blanks and have good fuji micros on them, can't complain about that.

[Lightningboy]

Micro guides are great, but unless you use a spiral wrap on baitcasters you won't see their full potential.

Micros are much lighter than standard guides, which is their greatest asset.  But they are also shorter than standard guides.  That requires placing them closer to each other to prevent the line from touching the blank.  That means more guides, so you gain back some of the weight.

Spiral wrap them, and you get to use less total guides.  The result is a remarkably lighter, more sensitive, and more responsive rod.

Downsides?  Well, they are a little harder to thread line through.  Going too small may cause problems with a knot passing through if you use a fluoro leader. 

BTW- since they are smaller and use less raw material, micros are less expensive.  This allows the use of much higher quality guides, like titanium frames & SIC rings.

I've got 4's on several type rods; spinning, crankbait, worm, and flipping stick.  Don't see any reason to go back to regular guides.