Yuku free message boards

I think the original question here is really the wrong one. You may not be able to identify a rod as hollow when you pick it up and wiggle it by itself because there are so many variables in rod construction, taper, fittings, etc. The true test and right question is the difference between two rods that are identical except for the hollowing. Then you can evaluate the effect of hollowing alone. Any comparisons using Howells and Winston, fine rods that they are, are also not especially helpful because those rods are hollow in the BUTT ONLY. That reduces weight, but has far less effect on action and damping than hollowing in the upper section(s). The lighter the line rod, the greater the change in action by hollowing for a given length. There will definitely be a noticeable difference in a 7 1/2' 3 wt. and it will be even more pronounced than in a 7 1/2' 5 wt. Removing a given amount of weight has an obviously greater effect the closer to the tip it is. Reducing the weight of a ferrule (especially the upper one on a 3 pc. rod), using lighter snakes and even reducing the weight of the tip top by using two parallel "feet" straddling the rod rather than a full tube will also have a similar effect. Rods that are both hollowbuilt into the upper section(s) and use some of these other weight-reducing techniques mean, as has benn well said above, that the rod has less of its own weight to recover and more energy to put into the line.

The proposition that "the fish can't tell" I take to be a joke because the FISH can't tell much of anything - whether the rod is hollow or solid, whether the angler knows anything about hatches, whether the angler is a competent caster - but all those things probably will have an effect on whether and how consistently the angler can deliver the right fly to the fish. To have never cast a hollow rod and make that kind of statement seems to me premature conjecture at best. Having cast hundreds of hollow rods, I am convinced that hollowing has a significant effect in improving action. There are plenty of outstanding solid rods and a lousy taper on a hollow rod won't be made good by hollowing, but the combination of a good taper and hollowbuilding, in my opinion, makes for a superior rod. There are plenty of well-fished E.C. Powells around that are 50+ years old (he died in 1967), so worries about durability may be misplaced depending on how a rod is constructed and hollowed.

The makers I've talked to who build rods hollow into the tip - Reams, Brandin, Wojnicki, Karstetter, Peterson, etc. - are not in any way trying to duplicate graphite. They aren't stupid enough to think they can somehow "out-graphite" graphite, a material that has 6-10 times the bending strength of bamboo. They are just trying to make a better bamboo rod, and, in my opinion, have succeeded.