To Orvis or not to orvis, that is the question?

Jim wrote:

... The only real way to fully evaluate a rod is to
take it to the river for a few trips.

That's a bunch of hooey. An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

--
Ken Fortenberry

"Ken Fortenberry" wrote in message
gy.com...
Jim wrote:

... The only real way to fully evaluate a rod is to
take it to the river for a few trips.

That's a bunch of hooey. An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

--
Ken Fortenberry


My local shop doesn't have a stocked pond out back. The rods cast fine. One
of the things I dislike about them is that the tip is so fast, I tend to
snap a lot of tippets on the water. Don't have that problem with other rods
I own. Not sure that this is something possible to evaluate except under
actual fishing conditions. But you are correct about evaluating its casting
characteristics - a few casts and I am pretty sure whether I like the action
or not.

Jim Ray

From: Greg Pavlov

The trick, in many cases, is to
bypass the dealer if necessary and go directly to
the company.

Absolutely. I am not "Orvis Boy", (is he one of the superheroes?), but I do own
several Orvis prducts. I had a problem with one set of two year old waders I
got online, but I am within a reasonable, (2.5 hr), driving distance of their
corporate HQ in Manchester. I drove up there, brought the waders into the
company store, and explained the problem to the young man at the flyfishing
counter. He checked the size and brought out a new pair. There was a four year
depreciating warranty on the waders, so I pulled out my wallet, expecting to
pay half of the purchase price. He said, "No charge, waders aren't supposed to
leak." I call that good customer service. I have had no problem with the
replacement waders, or any of the other Orvis products I own.

I suspect, however, if I had gone the mail order replacement route, they would
have charged me, and there likely would have been a long wait, and I wouldn't
have fished the Battenkill that afternoon.{;-)


George Adams

"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of
youth that doth not grow stale with age."
---- J.W Muller

Ken writes:

That's a bunch of hooey. An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

if you had thrown in the caveats that:
1.Said caster could evaluate it fully with
the given line type and weight at hand
2. Said caster could evaluate the CASTING
(as opposed to fishing) qualities of the rod
and
3. casting quality is but a small portion of
the overall nature of a rod.
then, I might have agreed. That said, some rods take time for one to adjust to.
Some rods with limited casting ranges are great fishing tools for certain
intended purposes.
In the final analysis, the qualities of a flyrod are WAY more subtle that
casting qualities, and of such a personal nature I would hesitate to steer
anyone toward any given rod maker or especially specific models.
Tom
p.s. Just play with lots of rods, buy one or two and enjoy. If you don't like
the rod, that is why they created EBay....unload it, and try something else.

On Fri, 02 Jul 2004 14:11:42 -0500, Tim Apple
wrote:

You know, since I've been flyfishing I've heard allot of smack talk against
Orvis, not but a little while ago I became the owner of a used Orvis rod,
and I think it's one of the best casting rods I own. I went to Bass Pro
today and looked at some of the mid range orvis rods, and it seems for rods
in the 100-200 dollar price range, the orvis rods looked better all in all
and seemed to use nicer hardware. So the question really is, what is the
beef? Is it strictly a stereotype....i.e the Orvis Boy....Or is the stuff
crap, because it seems pretty much like damn nice equipment to me?

Tim Apple


Orvis is no better nor no worse than the rest. Buy what you like and
ignore the BS.

Peter (multiple CFOs, one BBS, one Green Mountain, multiple
Superfines, Clearwater waders, and a two-handed rod and not a problem
in the bunch)



Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

Tom Littleton wrote:
Ken writes:
... An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

if you had thrown in the caveats that:
1.Said caster could evaluate it fully with
the given line type and weight at hand

I'll grant you this caveat. At the least, I like to cast three
lines, the stated weight, one weight under and one weight over
to fully evaluate a potential addition to the arsenal. (I can
do this in 5 minutes or less BTW.)

2. Said caster could evaluate the CASTING
(as opposed to fishing) qualities of the rod
and
3. casting quality is but a small portion of
the overall nature of a rod. ...

A fly rod does three things. It casts, it controls the line and
it plays the fish/protects the tippet. Of these casting quality
is BY FAR AND AWAY the most important. Casting quality is not
but a small portion of a fly rod's nature, it is the ESSENCE of
a fly rod's nature. Furthermore, the other two attributes can be
easily inferred by first, the rod's length, and second by the
nature of its casting quality.

--
Ken Fortenberry

"Ken Fortenberry" wrote in message
gy.com...

A fly rod does three things. It casts, it controls the line and
it plays the fish/protects the tippet. Of these casting quality
is BY FAR AND AWAY the most important. Casting quality is not
but a small portion of a fly rod's nature, it is the ESSENCE of
a fly rod's nature. Furthermore, the other two attributes can be
easily inferred by first, the rod's length, and second by the
nature of its casting quality.

--
Ken Fortenberry

While that may be true for some flyfishing styles, it certainly isn't true
for all. One of the best dry fly fishermen I've ever encountered (and who
by the way was mostly responsible for Winston's excellent reputation, having
owned the company for many years until a crippling disease forced his
retirement and sale of the company a few years ago) was a master at getting
close to the fish and rarely casting over 10'. For such fishing a noodly 10'
rod that could only flip out the leader would serve superbly.


--
Bob Weinberger
La, Grande, OR

place a dot between bobs and stuff and remove invalid to send email

Well, we all know that you're **** outta luck then!

Mark
"Ken Fortenberry" wrote in message
gy.com...
Jim wrote:

... The only real way to fully evaluate a rod is to
take it to the river for a few trips.

That's a bunch of hooey. An experienced caster can take a fly rod
out back of the fly shop, cast it and fully evaluate it in five or
ten minutes ... or less.

--
Ken Fortenberry

Chester the Molester wrote:

Well, we all know that you're **** outta luck then!

Go crawl back under your rock, you filthy, white trash
cracker, you have absolutely no business attempting to
associate with the decent sportsmen here.

--
Ken Fortenberry

"Tim Apple" wrote in message
...
You know, since I've been flyfishing I've heard allot of smack talk
against
Orvis, not but a little while ago I became the owner of a used Orvis rod,
and I think it's one of the best casting rods I own. I went to Bass Pro
today and looked at some of the mid range orvis rods, and it seems for
rods
in the 100-200 dollar price range, the orvis rods looked better all in all
and seemed to use nicer hardware. So the question really is, what is the
beef? Is it strictly a stereotype....i.e the Orvis Boy....Or is the stuff
crap, because it seems pretty much like damn nice equipment to me?

Tim Apple

Orvis is looked down on because they're trying to survive as a business by
expanding their markets beyond flyfishing and hunting gear. They are
becoming a marketing machine (like LLBean and others) and are the catalog
choice for east coast yuppie flyfisher wannabes, but that doesn't mean their
gear is substandard. You should look past the shtick and look at the
products. I think their mid-priced rods have been a good value for the
money - my go to stick is a Silver Label 4 wt. - that rod matches my cast
perfectly, and that's how you should pick a rod. Not brand name. I have a
couple of Battenkill reels and I think they are also great bang for the
buck. They stand behind their stuff too. I lost a screw from the drag
adjustment knob on a Battenkill reel and they gave me a whole new frame.
Mine was all banged up from years of use. Needless to say, I'm a repeat
customer. I also buy a lot of my tying material from them - I stop in
whenever I'm in southern VT.

So, when you're shopping, don't buy any rod you can't cast first.
Appearance, brand, hearsay are worthless. If you can't cast it for ****,
you wasted your money whether it's an Orvis, a KPOS, a Sage, or whatever.
My second favorite rod is a $60 KPOS 3 wt. I bought from a friend who has
them built in mass quantities. It doesn't look fancy, but the finish is
very nice and it casts great.
--
Stan Gula
http://gula.org/roffswaps