[Iain Goolager]

What are peoples opinion (experience or general gut feeling) on the 'XGrip'
style handle?

http://www.fly-fishing-tackle.co.uk/acatalog/info_LOOP_EVORODSING.html

  gimmick or revolutionary?

Iain

[Jim Eddie]

Iain

Not sure , I'd have to have a cast with one, I don't think its a gimmick though , worldwide shortage of Cork. Cork can only be harvested once evry 7 years so if there is abad harvest it takes long time to recover. Thats why most of the wine sold these days is screw top.

 

Jim

[John Reid]

I am sure you will write a review soon enough!!!!  What weight will you buy???? 

[Jim Eddie]

I am sure you will write a review soon enough!!!!  What weight will you buy????  

Probably all of them John  

 

Jim

[Kev Danby]

Good cover story Iain, were you buying the women in waders calendar in the new products section.

[Iain Goolager]

FFSake, I was just wondering if they were...............................Ok Ok I did get a 4wt but purely from a experimental standpoint.

Not sure as I only had 50 odd casts with it (hard to put the TXL down).
Initially the shape/ contour felt unnatural in the hand shortly followed by the sense that it was a larger 'half wells' profile than I was used to on a #4 (I only like slim/ish half wells on smaller # rods & have tried ones where they feel too thick) but this was no doubt due to the fact that the 'points' of the hexagon made it feel larger. Then I got the feeling that there was a rubbing against the '3rd pad'  (meaty bit that protects the Proximal Phalanx  ) of the index finger on my right hand where one of the 'points' touches - but that could just have been the bitter cold.
That said It did feel that I got used to it and wasn't left dissapointed.

Need to give it more time.

Iain

[Irvine Ross]

When Stanley starts putting flat sides on the grip of a claw hammer, then I might believe it's a good idea for rod handles.


Then again, any excuse to try out a new rod has to be a good thing.
Irvine

[Allan Liddle]

All the best claw hammer grips have had flat sides for years (Estwing still the best of them, the rubber one not the leather )  (Axes as well by the way )

Bloke played about with a grip from shaped dense foam a few years back i think.  Sure Magnus had a sample or two.

Nae cork?  Might have to go back to leather?

Allan

[Rob Brownfield]

Nothing wrong with the composition, but I do not like the shape.

It has been done several times before on the coarse side of things, but never caught on. Daiwa did a match rod with a profile the same, meant to align the rod better during the cast etc etc. They ran it for perhaps 3 years before dropping it.

Bruce and walker once did it on there "Green Dragon" range of Boron carp rods...I believe they sold hardly any , a shame as it was a truely amazing blank!

As for the Bloke rods, he was only offering the "expanded foam" handles last year, cork was by special order. I believe they were not well received by Joe Public.