2wt. fly rod build

That's all I use for natives.....  I built mine on a Batson 4 PC and used a Custom Titanium Cap and ring reel seat with a cork insret....  And to further keep weight down I used recoil guides.....  The only thing I would change is the length of the grip  I went 7 inches but would rather have a 6 inch....

  

I have a pac bay downlocking model 3 on mine with a cigar grip. I prefer the full sized cigar because it fits my hands better. The little dainty grips don't do it for me.

The slide bands are nice. I have a band and cap on my 8' 3/4 wt and it cuts the weight down to nothing. I have a double band on my short little fiberglass.

For guides, I'd suggest the recoils. I don't normally like them for everything, but in this case the reduced weight is kinda nice. Without recoils I'd suggest going to really small guides like 1'2 and 2's but with recoils you can stick to 3's and a 4, the benefit being easier lining and easier to get the line out when you pull the leader back into the guides.

I know you have blanks, but the Forecast 662-4 is a sweet one. The 662-2 is also excellent. I have the rainshadow 662-2 RX7 and it is okay, but not a 2 wt. Even casting at normal trout distances it needs a 4 wt line. If you measure it with the CC system it comes out as a moderate action, light powered 4 wt (4.25/62 or so).

Thanks
Rick

Well I managed to get all my supplies for my rod build. I also decided to turn my own grip. It really wasn't that hard. I made my own cork clamp (Because I'm cheap) that was the toughest part. It's 6 3/4 inches long and blue cork accents.




I was kinda hopin to get it done before steel season but I'm probably gonna be headin up sooner than I expected.

Drill and all thread. And about 45 min. At the wood shop at work. Its alittle beefy but I got big hands so.

See I told you there was nuttin to it  LOL

my 9' 2 weight is about all I fish in pa. for trout dries or nymphs for nymphs  I over line it with a 3 weight

Did you have your 2wts custom built? I need a mountain rod under 8'.... thinking like you PAFRA... 6'-6" no more than 7'-0" - 2 wt. Would like to get a matching one built for my son when he's old enough to hopefully get into it also.

Rainshadow and Dan Craft make some excellent mountain stream blanks....

my 9' 2  weight is built from a Dan Craft blank the FT series great blank

I got my rod almost ready to wrap, seat and grip and blank all together. Buy the way PC 11 is awsome. I need is to put on the check and layout my guides and I'm gone! I'll be fishin' dry before the end of the month.

I finally got all my guides wraped. It's bin pretty busy my way so I had to miss most of the steelers game just to get the color perserver on my thread today. From the score looks like I didn't miss much. But I also got my reel seat cap back from the engravers. Thats the last thing I'm gonna have to put on my "2".

I should have it ready to go next week. I'll have to get a couple of natives on it before steel season.

I did learn 1 thing the longer you let your rod sit after you get the wraping done the fuzzer the wraps get. The next time I'm gonna wrap a piece and color perserve as i go.

I caught the rod building bug. I got plans for a 8ft. 7wt. I'm gonna put togeher for the east side streams. I'ts a fiberglas blank. I have a 9.5 foot 8wt. stick for erie now it's a pain on the smaller creeks.

A guy by the name of Jim Flamming from Mich, has bin building shorter heavyier wt. rods form fiberglass spinning rod blanks for years. I picked his brain about what I wanted and he pointed me some what in the right direction.

Rock out dude!  looks good!