Stand up game rod

[Upnorth73]

Hi, looking at buying a new stand up overhead game rod for tuna, macks,trevally and up to sailfish. I am looking for a 15kg stick and really like the 5'6 Live Fibre "stroker".
What do other people tend to use, it will be for trolling and bottom fishing. I use braided lines, I see a lot more people going to 6'6 rods and even longer. I will not be using it off the land, should I just stick to a short stroker.

Cheers, Adam...

[finding_time]

Yep just stick to the stroker it will be fine! Now with regards to the braid , WHY? Mono will be much much more forgiving and all you need is 8 kg for the fish your chasing, 10 kg will be heaps! Maybe look at the 10 kg stroker as well!

ian

[Noelm]

I guess in a sort of way, the rod is almost like lots of other things in so much as it is a compromise, a longer rod is good for "steering" a fish around (say) a motor, but a nice stroker will probably land that fish in much less time than the longer one, a softer rod will be better on you, but a stiffer one will be harder on the fish, so choose well and think long and hard what you really want to fish for and the line class, and talk to some good rod builders.

[Upnorth73]

Yep just stick to the stroker it will be fine! Now with regards to the braid , WHY? Mono will be much much more forgiving and all you need is 8 kg for the fish your chasing, 10 kg will be heaps! Maybe look at the 10 kg stroker as well!

ian

Ian,

I hear what you say and it is a much debated question, Braid or not? I guess the fact is I will do a fair bit of bottom fishing with this rod and will probably just top shot it with mono when trolling to give it that forgiving stretch. I guess that's not what the purists would do, but if I really get hooked on trolling for game fish I'll buy another reel and set it up just for that.
Speaking of reels I was looking at the new Okuma Solterra. Has anyone used one yet. I haven't even owned an Okuma before so I hope they are OK.

Cheers, Adam...

[DazSamFishing]

Adam, the live fibre stroker is a good rod. I have 1 & I've used it for both bottom bouncing & trolling. I use tcurves more often these days. As for the okumas; I've owned 3 epix pros (high speed spin reels); I'm not too sure what Okuma produce at the moment, but my experience with the okumas is poor. They simply don't last... but you get what you pay for.
daz

[Upnorth73]

Adam, the live fibre stroker is a good rod. I have 1 & I've used it for both bottom bouncing & trolling. I use tcurves more often these days. As for the okumas; I've owned 3 epix pros (high speed spin reels); I'm not too sure what Okuma produce at the moment, but my experience with the okumas is poor. They simply don't last... but you get what you pay for.
daz

Thanks Daz.

Heading out tomorrow to buy a 10-15 Live Fibre Stroker, did some phoning around and our local Got one store has some marked down from $240 to $199.

As for the Okuma, I'll suck it and see. If it ends up not being much good I'll keep it as a bottom bouncer only. But you really do get what you pay for. I was looking for a good lever drag with level wind, maybe there is no such thing as a quality reel with these features.

Adam...

[sleepygreg]

level winds and game fishing reels are not good partners, more things to go wrong during a fight (and it usually the level wind that causes the problem). Silstar and Okuma bought out game reels some years ago with level wind and lever drag as a selling feature. The ones that were bought as a 'back up' for guys that usually bottom bashed or fished light line, so that they could have a go at something big if it happened to turn up, usually lasted ok. Those that were bought by fishos who wanted to try some serious gamefishing, spent more time getting fixed than they did fishing. I had quite a few guys that had spent more on repairs to their reels than they paid for the thing in the first place, before I finally convinced them to buy better quality reels. get yourself a tld 20 and educate your thumb to lay the line and stick to 8-10kg mono....unless you are going to jig deepwater.

Greg

[sleepygreg]

By the way...good choice on the short stroker, always my choice in those fishing scenarios, leverage goes your way not the fishes.

Greg

[Upnorth73]

Thanks Greg.

[the baker]

Go the Shimano Backbone Elite rods they are a bloody good rod for off the rack stuff, I use them for chasing billfish. The big sports stores have sales on the rods from time to time that stock Shimano gear.

Dave.

[DigitalSI]

About 4 weeks ago i purchased a Gary Howard 7' Sabre 8~15kg stroker from the Tackle Warehouse. It had a beautiful ALPS alloy type reel seat and an aluminium/ alloy gimble butt. I was so impressed by the quality both as the rod itself but also under load I purchased this week the matching 15~24kg one. Will be breaking it in next Friday at the 50's off the goldie/ tweed. 8~15kg was $329 and the 15~24kg was $349. The 8~15kg stroker has a Shimano TLD20 with 30lb mono and the 15~24kg rod has 50lb braid with a Trynos 30.