Down with "poodle grips" !

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Fishingelbow
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Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Fishingelbow » Fri Sep 14, 2007 5:10 pm

Split rear grips are the "in" thing and it's getting to the point where it's difficult to get a quality rod that doesn't sport them.
Yet removing weight from behind the balance point is one sure way to make a rod tip heavy! Lighter, sure, but just as surely not good for balance. Please stop it with the sexy stuff, I want my rods to be as close to balanced as possible!
P.S. Of course, you can always add weight to the very end of the rear grip, but then, you increase the rod's moment of inertia and that's BAAAD (says my "fishing elbow"). :(
What do you guys think?
Last edited by Fishingelbow on Fri Sep 14, 2007 8:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips"

Post by Basshunter0135 » Fri Sep 14, 2007 5:23 pm

For me, the split grip fits perfectly in my hands. I had a custom made split grip made for me on a Lamiglas blank. I love it!! The cork behind the reel seat is only 1 inch long, and allows the whole back portion of my hand to fit on the blank.

After handling a split grip rod, it is pretty tough to switch back to a full grip rod. My next step is to take my Helium LTA in and have the grip split and a Fuji reel seat put on it.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips"

Post by brokeneye » Fri Sep 14, 2007 6:32 pm

i like the idea of splits...but, the stocks just don't work for me...the powerlifts were a lot of fun in my younger days but, am now paying for it with recurring hand and wrist issues.

if i went splits, personally would go custom...to get a much better balance...fished some ltx's recently and it was like wormfishing with a 7' pistolgrip...and i paid for it the next three days.

tip-down doesn't seem to bother me...the ltx 6'8" jerkbait seems to nail it...(don't know that it's $329.00 worth of nailing it but, it does nail it)...that lets me know that, for tip-down, there are some decent splitgrip stock rod options out there.

this is not a flame against anyone's choice of rods but, for that small market with problems such as mine, the stock splitgrip options i have used for tip-up kinda suck.

fwiw, used a 50mg/mbr783 all day last week and breezed right thru it.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Nitroman77 » Fri Sep 14, 2007 9:33 pm

MB split grips are stunning and well balanced. 8-) ;)
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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by BassFreak » Fri Sep 14, 2007 10:37 pm

I agree with you FishingElbow that rod balance is very important. I have rods with conventional grip and split grips that are well balanced, so I really cant say that split grips are the culprit for unbalanced rods. Although balance is subjective as some techniques, I like a certain "balance" i.e. tad butt heavy for worming and plastics, while balanced or tad top heavy for topwater and jerkbaits. So I guess were back to personal preference about rods. and we both know there is no end to the discussion about personal preference..

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by greatbarracuda » Fri Sep 14, 2007 11:00 pm

I like the look of well-executed split grips and all but really...

aren't "balanced" split grips just grips that had weight removed (cork) then re-added (in the form of balancing weights)?

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by GamblerHydra » Fri Sep 14, 2007 11:30 pm

I think split grips are overrated. Cosmetically the look kool, and you can add a flair for the exotic with it, and shave some weight. However, I have had a chance go back and on fish some full grips with some jig rods and it was just a lot more comfortable for me . I am digging the old school sticks these days. With my trout sticks the same thing, I prefer a full grip.
Last edited by GamblerHydra on Sat Sep 15, 2007 1:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Wachtel » Sat Sep 15, 2007 12:56 am

I have both, but all the split grip rods are used for "tip down" ´style of fishing. For casting, jigging etc I use rods with a full grip.

Especially for heavier casting (3-4 oz), it's much more comfortable with a full grip that you can hold between your arm and body when cranking heavy lures.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by BassFreak » Sat Sep 15, 2007 9:30 am

greatbarracuda wrote: aren't "balanced" split grips just grips that had weight removed (cork) then re-added (in the form of balancing weights)?
Not necessarily, The length of the handle (reel seat to the butt) also makes some of the difference.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by raul » Sat Sep 15, 2007 9:36 am

Fishingelbow wrote:Split rear grips are the "in" thing and it's getting to the point where it's difficult to get a quality rod that doesn't sport them.
If you said that you can no longer find a good quality rod, that every single rod manufacturer makes his rods with split grips then that "it´s getting to the point where´s difficult to get a rod that doesn´t spotrt them " would be correct, which is very far from the truth.

How many GLoomis rods you´ve seen with split grips ? you can go through the entire catalog and you´ll see very few split grip ( if there´s any ) rods, same applies to most St Croix rods, Kistler ? half of their catalog has split grips the other half doesn´t, so you can get quality rods without split grips, split grips are a big minority in the world of quality rods.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Fishingelbow » Sat Sep 15, 2007 10:53 am

Raul, I'll grant you I went a little overboard :lol:. Actually, you have to admit there's a huge movement towards split grips: of course, good old traditional G.Loomis will stay put, but even now, St. Croix are getting their 2008 "poodles" ready and Kistler's Helium 2 LTX and Magnesium TS are all split grips already. With Shimano's and Daiwa's latest top lines joining in, if you add just about all JDMs to the mix, you have to admit the range of standard offerings is getting narrower every day.

My whole point was to express my disappointment at this trend where fashion is pushing function to the side. Balance is something that can measured (see TT's "balance point") easily enough to stop treating it like some sort of subjective mythical quality that can't be discussed objectively.

I've customized some of my own sticks and while getting rid of the foregrip is a great thing, the split rear grip is definitely something I'll be staying away from in the future. Pushing the balance point forward by 1 or 2 inches is not my idea of an improvement, even if the weight of the rod goes down substantially. :(

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Vladimir_Kazan » Sat Sep 15, 2007 2:00 pm

For two arms casting to use continuous reargrip or split reargrip it is not so important for castability of the system "man + rod".
But for the specific one hand casting with short and light rod the moment of inertia of rod around the hand as the point of rotation is a very significant factor. I.e. for design the well static balanced rod and with minimum of moment of rotation inertia around the hand (i.e. with more distant casting at less loading of hand) - it is even better to add 2oz at the middle of reargrip than add 1oz at the butt cap (for static balance the length of lever acts in first degree, but for moment of rotation inertia it acts in second degree - from here all differences).
But I underline: said refers just to one hand casting (here other muscles act, the parts of a body move on other trajectories and in the other rate, with other accelerations and speeds).

By the way, next extrashort "DN Club" rods I plan to make not with cork but with burl (rubberized cork) on continuous reargrips - at first for this reason. AND in that "DN Club", already made and shown by me, the reargrip is weighted: on the blank under the seat/cork there is tightly skewered carbon tube.
By the way, "serious" manufacturers of short rods for one hand casting use even wood and metal in continuous reargrip construction. And it is way to go for such rods... Can be the rods with a "telescopic" reargrips, i.e. with easy & quick stuffing and grubbing of reargrip extention (first at casting, second at animation and retreiving), it is the best way. Though in this way too many complexities and uneasinesses.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by tj1004 » Sat Sep 15, 2007 2:48 pm

Although I use several split gripped rods, I prefer full grip. Split grips really just dont do a thing for me because I dont buy rods to look cool; like some others. For me, the perfect rod is built like a Kistler Helium LTA: full rear grip, no foregrip. I plan on custom ordering a Kistler Helium II blank, built like an LTA with the full rear grip, this would be my perfect rod......The Helium IIs are far more sensitive than the LTAs..

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Want » Sat Sep 15, 2007 4:11 pm

I would think the handle material has a lot of bearing on the balance of the rod. Hypalon is 3 times heavier than cork. A split handle might make sense here if the rod handle is 8-10 inches long.

Cork isn't that heavy, even when acting a counterweight with the reel center acting as a fulcrum so: split or full cork handles: I don't see much difference between the 2. Any weight added to the split cork handle at the butt end to replace the missing corkwould be minimal. Either the rod has balance to begin with or it doesn't.

Me, I can't stand tip heavy rods regardless of the application. I'm having a couple of rods custom built (one has a hypalon split handle, and I haven't chosen the handle material for the blank in the other one, but cork is EXPENSIVE.

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Re: Down with "poodle grips" !

Post by Midnightrun1 » Sat Sep 15, 2007 5:07 pm

Split grips rock! :D


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