All Things Fishing Rods Ft. Rod Builder Josh Cooper (Podcast)

Hey everyone out there Thank you so much for tuning into another addicted fishing podcast Excited about today guys because we're gonna get super in-depth into fishing rods We're gonna talk all things fishing rods and we have a special guest here. Who's who I would consider Probably one of the best rod builders that's come out of the northwest in a long time People could try to argue with me on that, but he's created some of my favorite rods that have ever been made and so Introduce yourself, dude josh cooper with okuma Been uh building or well designing rods for quite a while and long time. Yeah long time long time Just some of you guys may know he came from back from the llamaglass days So he was part of the llamaglass company and designed Still what I think is he still hasn't been able to top it, which is the freaking the si Si will forever go down as one of the only it's the only llamagass rod that I still own Yeah, I wish I still had one actually to be honest. I got two of them Those original ones guys are calling all the time asking you any chance you still have one of them sitting around Yeah, those are all I don't even use them. They're just kind of like now hang wall. Yeah type thing. But but yeah, so Background just talk a little bit about your background because you've been in the fishing industry for damn near whole life, right? Yeah, yeah, I was 19 years old started at fishermen's marine worked there for a year and a half or so with jason hamley back in the day and then Went to llamaglass to run their First I ran their upfront sales they had a little upfront sales shop there and then I ran their warranty department for like two years and uh became a rep for two years and then became the rod designer and pretty much finished out my My career there as a as a rod designer So I was I think about 14 years or so and then went to well you did you had some stuff in between? But then you went to okuma. Yeah, so I was at cousins there for a short time Um, I think it was four years. I was at cousins that that company kind of Slowly dissolved or quickly dissolved, uh overnight really. Um, and uh, nothing that josh did guys. Yeah. Yeah it was an interesting that was an interesting one, but uh okuma is funny because when I was thinking about leaving llamaglass, um I actually was talking to okuma for a short time and then ended up going taking this other deal and then uh, i'm actually if i'm a factory sailor i'm a Sales rep so i'm i'm technically not an uh okuma employee but um It worked out that I get to still get to you still get to play with them to play around the design side of it and okuma is really good to me on uh, Letting me have a lot of a lot of leeway on building what we want for the northwest. Nice. That's really cool That's really really cool. So I wanted to kind of get Really? Let me get my timer started here because I know i'm gonna forget addicts and i'm gonna go over i'm gonna go over the my time so i'm gonna Get this crack in here really quick actually, you know what i'll just do i'll just stop watch it um So I wanted to just really get kind of get as depth as we can in 30 minutes to just cover some like rods stuff and so start out with I'm gonna ask just some questions that I think people should know when they're looking for fishing rods out there So if you guys didn't know guys, we're sponsored by okuma We love those guys. We've been working with them for over 10 years now So shout out to okuma for sponsoring today's podcast and just being huge supporters of addicted a lot of cool stuff coming in the future with those guys, but What does power mean? Like what is the power of the rodman? So there's a difference between action and power The power of the rod is what does it take to flex it basically? Okay, so And it can be relative to the fishery. So like a You know a heavy powered bass rod isn't going to be the same power as a heavy powered salmon rod So it's going to be relative to what it's designed to do. Yep so if you go into the salmon rod world a light salmon steelhead rod will be Uh, you know will basically be typically it'll fit within a perimeter of like six to ten pound test Typically is so is your light medium heavy. That's your power. Yep. Okay. Yep, and then like Slow moderate and fast would be your action. Yeah, that was gonna be the next World the next question the follow-up is going to be what is action? Yeah, I used to do a seminar back in the day and I forget what the title was. I think it was Uh, there's no such thing as medium action. That's what it was called. Okay, and so it's like medium is a power Moderate is an action. Okay. So so the flex of the rod where the rod flexes is the action What it takes to flex the rod is the power. Okay, so that's that's the two things. That's a good easy way to describe Yeah, so so if you're talking about action you're talking about when when the rod does flex What are the characteristics of the flex does it flex at the tip first and then slowly progress down the blank? Well, that would be a fast action rod Okay If it Flexes throughout the whole rod as you apply Pressure to it and it kind of flexes further deeper into the rod, but that would be a slow action rod Okay somewhere in the middle middle is going to be a moderate action rod and so and then there's the moderate fast and Moderately slow and all that in between so so power is going to be what are you going to do with it? Do you need to pull really hard? Do you need to hold up big heavy leads? You're going to need a heavier rod a heavier power rod for that the actual fishery that you're doing And whether you need sensitivity or you don't need sensitivity or you need to hold up big leads will also be decided by the action So you'll decide what action you want based on that. And so that's a big thing Um, we'll probably get to talk about this here in a few minutes. Maybe That you see in our market today is everybody loves fast action rods because they feel better in your hand they're not always the best for everything that you do and that is That is what I think I would say okuma is doing very well right now and I kind of give myself, you know a little bit of credit for it and I don't mean it that way but but is that We're applying the right action to the right fishery and so a lot of times you can pick up a rod and it feels really good in the store and But it's absolutely wrong for what you're going to do with it And so knowing what a 360 rod should be versus a twitching rod In action and we're going to get into that because i'm going to ask you some specific questions All right. So say we get a rod here like this one, for example and it says eight foot six m h action mf So it's a eight foot six medium heavy Moderately fast rod. Okay, good float rod or not a good float rod Eight foot six is where is where you lost me already on a float rod. Yeah Um, I like a moderate fast rod that's the right action for a float rod So if you're small smaller river, it'd be a great float rod. Yep, you know, but if you know, you want to be able to keep Line off the water cast long distances, you know pick up a lot of line quickly So when you're setting the hook on a float rod, that is that's important to have that extra length Okay, another example would be this one, which is a seven foot six rod and it says power m action f Eight to fifteen pound so that's that's your twitching rod, right? So it's a it's a medium Action or medium power, excuse me Um and f you said so it's a fast action rod So it's gonna have a light tip lots of power in the backbone, um, but it's gonna have that real light tip Yep, so this one was going to be designed for specifically for like bass trout kind of crossover small. Yep. Yep So, okay, cool so does line affect action like does Braid mono leader like anything like anything on the line or the reel like affect the action or power of the rod the Not necessarily not not really. No what what it affects it does affect sensitivity of the rod Okay, you can take time. You can take a dead rod. That is really not that well designed And run braid on it and you it's amazing what you can feel But then you feel you take that that same braid and put it on a sensitive rod and it's you know It's light years Braid is more sensitive period than mono it for for 10 reasons I mean the the belly that you get in mono is one of the things but obviously The no stretch in the braid is just it transmits vibration. Yeah, that's why all of us I mean in almost all of our fisheries, we've all pretty much switched to braid Yep so you see a lot of bass guys still on a lot of different scenarios like I see cam having A lot of his rods like just straight fluoro Yeah, like, you know for like jerk baiting or whatever. Yeah Yep, and and even like there's even an argument to be had for for plugging with mono, um that extras give that it gives you that belly in the line, um that it could help you hook up a little bit because a really especially if you're if a guy runs a fast rod, in fact, we see it a lot because Companies like to design fast rods for plugging and they really aren't right Real fast rods for plugging isn't isn't really the way to go Even though that's the majority of the rods you see on the market and You combine that with uh with braid and it's like the worst thing you could ever do You put mono on that rod and you're starting to get there a little bit Whereas you can design a rod to be ran a little bit more moderate and softer And run it with braid and it runs right which is the way I want to do it Yeah, I don't want to run mono. No. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah for sure. Okay, cool. That's good So, what do you think the biggest mistake people make and we'll just say actually i'm gonna ask this question more particular when we get into these species because i'm gonna ask you this will be a follow-up question as we start talking species, but When people make mistakes choosing a rod, so i'm going to ask you that question into each Part of these fishing so we're going to get into so what for steelheads particular because we're going to talk about steelhead We'll talk about salmon and we might touch on trout if we have some time But what do you think makes a good float rod? Like if a guy's going to the store right now He's gonna get into float fishing. I mean right now we're going into you know There's some great summer steelhead fishing right now guys are going to get into winter steelhead before too long So what are they looking for if they need a good float rod? So I if i'm picking a float rod, it's going to be nine and a half to ten and a half feet I like right in the middle at that nine nine Nine ten right in there. Um Just because I like it to be a little bit Ten and a half gets a little unwieldy or it can get in certain situations other times It's perfect on big rivers and and stuff like that But so I like that nine ten nine nine right in there It's kind of the sweet spot lengthwise where you can still have a rod that feels really good um, but doesn't doesn't uh Get unwieldy. Yeah, but yet you're not really giving up a lot on mending line and stuff like that Yeah in the x series guys, they make a nine ten. That's like probably my favorite float rod that's out right now That's my favorite. Yeah, it's just in your hand. It's just feels perfect It casts how it needs to cast like, you know One way I always know I have a crappy float rod is if I go out there and I try to cast like a fixed Float a jig and it goes like two feet out, right? like and I don't know what's causing that you could maybe explain that to me, but like I immediately i'm like this like i'm not gonna say the brand of the rod, but someone handed me they're like Oh, check out this new rod. I got they're so sick Dude, it's like a 600 rod or something and I went to cast and the thing was like Terrible. I was like this ain't it man like here cast my rod So so that goes to like and I don't mean to get ahead of you But the the big mistake that everybody makes yeah, they go too fast. Okay, so in a float rod There's no reason to go really fast So what when you go when you think about what that means you're gonna have a light tip and tons of power up the rod well We do need the power for setting a hook But you can do that in a moderate fast or a moderate rod And still be able to set the hook plenty with plenty of line out and everything but um when you're casting a fast rod You basically the tip is going to collapse and and we are used float fishing. We use a pretty big variety of weights The faster the rod gets the narrower the window that it will perform on casting gets and the narrower the window it'll perform Insensitivity actually too. It's kind of weird how that works Okay, and it might insensitivity perform better than anything else where its window is but that window gets real narrow and so When it comes to having a float rod, you'll be throwing a variety of different weights on there. Obviously, um as as conditions change, but that that float rod You have to be able to flex it deeper into the rod and get it to load deeper To get it to cast for exactly and so and that is the biggest thing and so a fast rod is not going to load deep It's going to the tip's going to collapse. You're going to have just a stick once it collapses and that's probably i'm guessing how that rod Was yep, they feel amazing you pick them up They'll feel super light with a light tip and you shake it in the store and it's it's it's awesome But when you actually go use it, it's not right for the it's not the right tool for the job That makes a lot of sense. Okay Um So another follow-up question, I think you kind of might already answered this but tip softness versus backbone Like what's more important in a float rod? So I would say not just tip softness. It's where It's soft. So you don't want it to bend in the first quarter of the rod just in the first quarter of the rod You want it to flex very progressively down about the first half of the rod? Okay, so if it just the tip bends again, it's back to that back to that being too fast It'll load up in a very small window of weight So you want it to flex deeper into the rod? At some point you're going to need to hit Something solid because you got to set the hook with a lot of line out And so what we found is like especially with like bobber dogging and stuff nowadays We're going heavier and heavier. The rods themselves are going more and more and more powerful Um, but as they go more powerful we have to build them actually more moderate in action um, because then you won't be able to load it and so um The the having a lot of backbone is getting easier for us because we're not using Six to ten pound tests with a marabou jig and a yeah fixed float like we used to you know Yeah, and so yeah, it's weird how much fixed float like we still sell a lot of our fixed floats And I still use a lot of them, you know in certain scenarios, but man it seems like it's not near as much A lot of anglers have just gone to Sliding floats weights, you know You can you can fish almost every scenario using it and the cool thing about the way that we're doing rods now a little bit More moderately in the float rods is you can still run that fixed float. Oh, yeah, and it'll cast just fine It just doesn't have because these rods have that bigger window a moderate rod has a bigger window, but it'll cast and so So, um, you can still run that and just be fine. I would would you say it's like the absolute perfect rod for it? No, we'd probably go a step lighter. Okay, but it does it great It still does a great job at it. And then what are we doing most mostly and that's you know, bobber dogging or Beads or whatever and that requires a little bit more powerful rod. Okay So now for the guys that may be drift fishing still because there's a lot of drift fishermen What makes a good drift fishing rod? That's where that is where The industry went wrong and is that everyone wanted to build the best drift rod and they built a lot of really good drift rods And now still a lot of companies are building trolling rods that are good drift rods so fast action You want you want a lot of power through the butt you want it to to be a very light tip to pick up a lot Of sensitivity and transmit it down the blank and you need a very fast action and and actually stiffness transmits vibration um So you don't want a long Section of the rod that flexes a lot you want a very short section of the rod You can see that vibration, but also feel it but you You basically you'll get more sensitivity out of a fast action rod. Okay, and so like faster extra fast So so give a guy an example like what he's looking for for like length action power. So nowadays nine foot to nine foot Eight nine ten somewhere in there. Um, I would say the sweet spot in my opinion is like nine two nine foot to nine two action wise is going to be Uh fast or extra fast and then power is going to be medium. Okay. Yeah So that's like the drift rod as far as i'm concerned. What about spinners and spoons? They fall for me. They fall in the same category as a good drift rod. Honestly, I was gonna it's it's it's almost identical I mean I what I like in a drift rod is what I like in a spinner rod and you I will find guys going a little longer In their spinner and spoon rods and and getting away with it still, you know, because as you add length you lose sensitivity and so You don't need quite as much sensitivity for a spinner and spoon rod. So Uh, you can get into that like 9 10 or Even 10 foot and have a really good spoon rod out out that long. Okay, perfect Last question when it pertains to steel i'd say there's a guy out there listening right now and he's like man You're talking about all these different rods Is there a rod that someone can buy that will just be versatile for all those techniques that we just talked about? Yeah, I would say you'll get away with more airing on the Moderate side. Yeah, so so you can still get decent sensitivity Especially if you use braid like we talked about earlier if you're using braid a nine foot ten nine foot six medium power moderate fast action You can do it I'm bobber dogging tomorrow for chinook and i'm gonna bring my steelhead rod and nice nine foot ten inch just yeah lucky. Yeah Once in a while, what am I doing tomorrow? Definitely not fishing. Damn it. All right. Okay Let's go to salmon now, let's talk to sam We talked about 15 minutes about so what do you think makes obviously most of us right now? And really the big popular fisheries in the northwest has been the trolling. It's been the 360 fishing It's probably what most anglers do out there. So what makes a good trolling rod? So a good 360 trolling rod or a good troll, okay Yeah, so so a good 360 trolling rod is actually moderate pretty moderate in action Um, that's the biggest mistake I see on in in our marketplace right now Is a lot of our competitors are making very fast action trolling rods and the tip collapses They don't hold up the lead because we're using you know 12 to 20 ounces like depending on where if you're above the dam guys are using 12 If you're below the dam everybody's using 16 to 20. Yep, and You can't build The stiffness you need into a fast action rod Still give and give that give that a flasher that 360 flasher a pop so to get it to turn over And run the kind of lead we need without the tip collapsing Yeah So like you need a moderate action rod and and it's funny because you pick them up The the right rod and it does not feel as good in the hand as the wrong rod does So you pick up a fast action ten and a half foot ten foot nine eleven foot, you know Rod and it has a nice light tip and lots of power in the backbone and It's it's the wrong rod for what we're doing and there's a lot of them out there now um we but basically You got to think that you're holding a lot of weight out there and you can if you flex it over a longer distance So that means moderate it's going to flex over a lot of longer distance Not only are you going to support it better, but you'll still have a lot of give When a fish grabs a hold it'll give deeper into the rod and let some turn and you know Not only that allows your flasher to freaking allows your flasher to pop and so so We actually it was funny because I I was running a test of some prototypes that we did when we did the x-trolls and I made One rod that I was like, man we it reminded me of what we were using when we were herring fishing extra heavies with 20 ounces of lead back in the day and you know a Fish flash, you know and I was like, ah, we'll take it out. I literally would troll that rod next to my the what ended up being our 910 which is our Go-to, you know x-troll and I would troll it next to it. It wouldn't even allow that That so it had like a small window that the flasher would turn over And literally as I slowed down To even the right speed it wouldn't allow a flasher to turn over because it wouldn't give enough It wasn't giving deep enough into the blank and allowing it to if you watch how far those things are actually moving um They give a lot to allow that flash and so so what you end up doing is you end up being able to troll slower To get your flasher to turn over and you'll have a bigger window that the flasher will turn over in A different it's bigger speed window. Okay, and so yeah, and then and then when a fish does grab hold You want it to give you want it to to flex fairly deep and then you know, we get them to the boat and We have to high stick them Pretty much because we all have too long leaders and yeah, you know, he won't once you got everything now We got weed bumpers on Exactly, and so we're high sticking them So now now you're getting into a super fast action rod is like that's an that's a nightmare for it. And so I'm not not getting yeah, because you're not yeah, you can't get it. You can't get the fish. Yeah yeah, exactly and then on top of it the tips want to blow out so um, it's just A moderate action rod is actually better for 360 fishing Okay, and i'm all about fast action rods where they need to be because I love like i'm a hover fisherman. I love hover fishing I want that thing fast. I want sensitivity You know, I want to feel everything that happens down there and that requires very fast action rods and it feels you know Our hover x series hover rod is like my I I told somebody that I think was jason I said this rod does what it does better than any other rod we make does what they do Like this rod is absolutely perfect at what it's made to do. Yeah, and and it feels amazing because of it, you know, but um It's just it's matching the right action to what you're doing for sure Yeah, for sure and guys out there you guys have heard us talk about it a lot. But that 1092 h In my opinion is the best 360 rod on the market You guys can fight me in the comments if you want to try to argue with me, but that thing there's a lot of really really good guides that are using it now that I respect a lot and i've now used it for Since it came out. How many years is that now like four four years? Yeah in four years guys, I broke one of those rods and I think it broke because of my those rod station things that we use That you put it in there and you just jam it in there all the time all the time because it broke right there and right in that spot Landing like a six pound springer. Yeah. Yeah, so it wasn't after being used for four years Yeah, and i've never you know, you can ask cameron. You can ask anyone guys out there if you're listening to this podcast, but like there is not a more durable rod like Cameron is still using the original six that he got how many every years ago and that is a fishing guy That's fishing like 250 days a year. So There's something to be said about that because I will tell you the guide select classics They will not do that. They're great rods They're a little bit more affordable, but they are not you're not getting four seasons without like some things happening to the rod yeah, so those those it's the technology used in those planks and and literally when I I was ecstatic when I saw and I don't know if we have time to get into that We're like 10 minutes but so so I was ecstatic when I saw how those Or that we had that technology to do because when I was at llamas I actually experimented with that same Process of building a blank and when I did that The results were awesome. We could never do it For labor reproduction. Yeah, it just it's so labor intensive that there was no way And so I saw a rod in a corner of an office. They had this This process the way that it's built the process that we build those extras with And I said I talked to john brezza. He's our he's a he's the product manager and I was like You can do this. He goes. Oh, yeah, we did that a few years ago It's it's labor intensive But I was like we're doing that on the salmon rod like like we had no reason to build another rod Other than the guide selects until I saw that and I was like, okay, we're doing a high-end salmon rod Like like if we can do that, we will change The way that that salmon rods are done and in a few years There's gonna be a bunch more people doing it if they figure out how to do it How to do it here with uh and afford to do it that's the big thing because it's the process is very expensive Okay, cool So let's see here We're gonna skip springers because we just get josh back in we'll talk more about springers And I want to get onto a float rod because like what makes a good salmon bobber rod because that's the season We're going into right now Everyone's gonna be hitting the rivers for tribs and you just said you're bobber dogging for chinook tomorrow Like what makes a good salmon float rod? So It depends on where you're at and what you're doing because if you go down to the oregon coast those guys have a whole Another thing. I mean they they're they're about they're nine and a half nine foot, you know meat stick that they're throwing a two ounce plus bobber with and They want what they want to be able to do is set the hook Like that's all they care about is just moving a lot of line Really really fast and get into get hooks into fish when as we get in up here Into southwest washington and all this we tend to go a little bit lighter in the way and smaller baits And I mean I I was I was blown away. I fished with a buddy who's a guy down on uh a river down oregon coast and Like middle middle coast and I was blown away at how heavy they fish like So you guys make one that that we use we loved it. We used in alaska. I use it around here It's a guide select pro. It's a 15 to 40. I think is what it traded. You're talking about the nine foot or the nine nine I think it might be nine foot. Okay, there's yeah, there's the nine foot and that rod or maybe it's nine nine I don't remember there's a nine foot 15 to 40. It's probably the one you're used and that rod is like a classic chinook bobber Yeah, it's perfect for it's what everybody wants to do Here we see guys going lighter. We see guys going almost to steelhead light. Okay, um but Those bigger baits two ounce floats ounce and a half float. That's the bigger river You know, like you need a lot of power a lot and they're big fish down there. Yeah aggressive So that that's what we see more there as we come over here guys are running, you know 12 to 25s a little bit more and a little bit lighter Floats more one ounce floats. Um, so so when you're running a two ounce float, you can cast it with anything Like anything that's that's powerful enough. You can bomb it, you know, because it's two ounces And so that doesn't become a factor like it is when you're trying to throw for sure third ounce for sure. Okay Um, okay. Let's see here Let's see here What are we gonna go to next here we got a couple more minutes here guys We got to make sure we get josh some good questions here If you could only own one steelhead rod, what would it be? i'm, actually Disappointed in myself because I would say it would be a casting rod, but it's probably not going to be nowadays because 20 year old josh would hate me right now, but um, probably the 9 10 Spinning spinning then you don't make that in a casting we make it 99. It's basically the same thing. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay What about one salmon run if you could buy one salmon rod, what would it be? Uh, 10 foot 9 extra Yep. Yep game time. Yeah, and the new one you came out talk a little bit about the new one really quick touch on it Yeah, touch on the 10-6 because I ran two of those out the back of my boat 360 fishing And this year I caught a lot more fish on my back rods Running those rods and you'll notice when you run them Even though they're a little lighter man. They really let those flashers just work. Yeah, absolutely So they give a lot more especially in a position where the rod isn't being flexed as much so like out the back exactly it will give a lot more and uh So if you're running rods at 90 degrees and the flasher pulls on them They're going to pull a lot more easier than if they're running out the back so so that's why a lot of guys talk about their back rods not running as well as as their other rods, but A lighter rod like that will do that a lot of times in that spot. I I really like our 9-5 I really like the 9-5 extra And so I run in that rod because for the same reason it gives a lot and I like fighting fish on it It's kind of short. So I used to run my 9 Those guides look classic. I think it's just a 9-6 right 9-2 or 9-3 9-3. Yeah, that's what it is 9-3 That's the rod. I told you that i've had for literally 12 years of working with okuma now i've had that same exact 9-3 guide select classic I've been running it forever The only thing i've ever had to do is put a little bit of super glue on the little grip thing Yeah, but other than that dude, it's still rocking. I cannot believe it. It's pretty amazing a lot of fish that's basically our 9-5 extra Was kind of the replacement higher end replacement of the 9 because that's okay I wanted that kind of power maybe a little bit more stiffness in the tip um, but Because of the amount of weight that we're using now, yeah versus when those were designed we were using lighter weights, but um, So yeah, so that that 10-6 back to the 10-6, uh extra So basically it was designed everybody kept asking me when are you going to make a springer herring run? Yep, like like, you know davis bar type area just classic, you know, eight ounces in a herring and you know, and That's kind of why we did that. But when we tested that rod, we didn't have springers around So cameron got one, uh, jason hamley got one to test and I got one And so we tested those, uh, basically buoy 10 and it was like, okay. Yeah, it's like it's like it's like but We didn't see breakage. They they handled, you know, I fished up to 16s with it. I think they did too. Um, The sweet spot is like teens with it. The sweet spot for that rod is like 8 to 12 ounces Is where it really fishes real well Um, but it handles 16s you said 18s. Yeah, I mean it's like yeah, it'll still handle but it definitely fished I felt better with like a 12 like when I'd run a 12 out the back and really send it it fished really nice Yeah, no, it's it's it's a sweet Forgiving it does everything that the the 10-9 does just lighter. So for sure. Yep Okay What if you could only have one fishing rod for the rest of your life? What is it? That's not even yeah, it's not even fair. I don't know. I don't know It would probably have to be just like an eight foot six medium heavy Casting rod just something that you can just versatile I do and I get catfish with it. I could trout fish with it if I had bass fish with it, whatever Yeah, I mean, that's probably that's a good that's a good answer um, okay, so Cheap rod versus an expensive rod explain to people what they're actually paying for right? So for example guide select pro X rod like why is it so much more? Yeah, you know, so what are they paying for when they're they're upgrading? You know, like are the guides getting upgraded is the material getting upgraded is the you know Did you just make it look cooler put okuma's name on it? Like why are they paying more? So it's amazing because that that you know being coming from the rod design side the cost Of where or the where the money is in a rod will blow people's minds Like if you actually break it down I wanted this question absolutely blows people's minds that the amount of material cost Between a high-end rod if we're talking about just the the blank material It might be twice as much But twice as much of a small number Yeah, you know so so Component cost is a way bigger difference in in a high-end rod versus a versus a low-end rod and we're talking like handles Grips handles, you know eyes. Yeah. Yeah real seats guides Labor is one of the higher Costs in the entire thing. So so now so you have labor as like one line that is like the great equalizer, right? Unless you start getting into decorative wraps and stuff like that Then you're paying for every tie off and and all that but um the big so so the blank material cost is not the big factor and people We got kind of tricked into that years ago um based on like the the high modulus low modulus, you know, um Intermediate modulus rods. We kind of got tricked into going if it's high modulus, it's it's expensive Well, it is expensive and it might cost twice as much but it's still a very small factor of what actual cost of the rod is so um the biggest Shortening it up. The biggest cost is going to be component costs. Yeah, and and that's going to decide what high-end rods get and so the one exception I would say What the x-trolls would be that that process? To make that blank is labor and it it adds another material in But it's really laborious. And so it goes back to the labor column, right? So so and most high-end rods don't take a lot more labor than a medium priced rod so it's not like that. That's The always the factor it's how much labor goes into it. Not, you know, not the quality of the labor if that makes sense That's why I always love you. You always hear people like oh I can't believe they're selling that raw. They're making that overseas and it's cost so much money. It's like dude people are so clueless like now just because it's made overseas doesn't mean it's not expensive to make like Take japan, for example, right? Like he brings anything out of japan It's 10 times than anything in the u.s. Right? Like just because it's made overseas doesn't mean it's cheap, right? Like Unfortunately the way american manufacturing is going Those guys are actually making a lot better ---- than we are now, unfortunately a lot of times a lot of times like it's You know, it's just the way the world's gone. Like I mean think about it We get our iphones we get everything from over there well, and I get a kick out of it because guys would be like, ah, you you know, because I I come from I you know, it's cut my teeth in the in the american-made stuff, you know, and so I get a kick out of it because i'll even have buddies that are like, ah you work for you know an importing company now and it's like yeah, I was like Every component on all those rods that you're paying are all over are all made overseas. All they're doing is Building putting the blank here, which the material comes from overseas, too So yes, it is being it's being built here, but it is really being more assembled here Because every component on it is is coming from the same same spot. So it's just so funny to me. Okay Uh, let's see. I'm gonna final question What is one thing every angler should understand before buying their next fishing rod buy for your use Case, so look at what you're going to do 90 of the time with it buy for that So so most people Again, pick up a rod. They want it to do everything They're going to be doing this one thing once in a while and they want it to do that too Just buy the rod for what you will be doing the most And you'll have the best rod for what you're going to be doing the most So it's like you're gonna get addicted and trust me. You're gonna buy a lot more so it doesn't matter Yeah, you'll buy another rod like I know sometimes it feels like Because I was at a point in my life where I could only afford a couple rods Yeah, we all are there at some point in our lives and like eventually you buy more rods. Trust me You are going to yeah, I would rather have a little bit less expensive rod. That's right for my application Than a high-end rod that's wrong for my application so so if it means for me if I had to have A salmon and a steelhead rod together in one i'm buying two ssts. Yep, because i'd rather have a good Action the right action, you know application salmon rod and the good application steelhead rod. That's not as high end Yep, so that's where I would go and before we end the podcast because again like I see this a lot too in the comments about like ssts and like I'm going to tell you right now like they're a lot nicer than what people really realize like i've used a few of them Now I have a couple of them that I love I've heard guys like robert kratzer and really respected fishing guides talk about the sst and how good it is And you always hear people be like, oh we break them a lot. You know, I broke five of them or whatever and it's like dude every fishing rod breaks like I just showed josh a bunch of x rods that I broke most of them my fault, but every fishing rod will break at some point right, right and It's funny because the ssts I The year after we did the extras we redid the ssts And so I got to completely go through every model look at every model change what we need to change They all got better quality guides. They got a new real seat and better quality real seat and handle and and so I literally that year I ran ssts for the whole year like I didn't you know I've got access to everything and I literally went and bought a set of ssts for all my trolling rods I bought a couple float rods I bought it, you know one of the twitching rods and I ran nothing but ssts for a year so when I switched to the ssts I didn't notice a lot like I wasn't like, oh man, this sucks, you know It was like it was like these are still pretty nice rods now when I switch back To the higher end stuff. I know this, you know, I know I was like, oh, yeah, there you are. That's that's what I was missing But but it wasn't like when I was fishing the ssts. I felt like I was super handicapped. It wasn't like um Yeah, I wasn't missing a bunch of fish or anything like that because of it necessarily that I knew of um, but When I switched back it was just this is just a better experience. Yeah. Yeah For me, it's more just like i'm just bougie. So I just want my yeah That needs to look good, too. All right guys. Thanks so much for coming in josh We appreciate guys. We got to go to the live stream if you didn't know every single wednesday 5 30 p.m We're doing uh, we're live so youtube and facebook, but we appreciate you guys tuning in listening Josh thanks for coming in man. Any last things you want to tell the people? I just appreciate all the help that we've got a lot of support from the addicts. Awesome, man Appreciate you. Thanks for coming in josh until next time guys. We'll see you on the river