Frustrating Issue with 3 Sage Rods in a Row

Skol_Engh said:
The convenience of having a rod fully rigged for a post work session is priceless. I would hope that leaving an American made rod in a rodvault wouldn’t desintigrate it but that might be the case. I haven’t had issues with Scott rods left up there, though.
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Famous last words!
 
You'd think a $1000 rod would use decent cork, but I've seen quite a few Sages with filler falling out. You won't find that with a Meiser/Burkheimer/Loop, etc....because they don't give their customers low-grade cork covered with a wash to cover it. Next time in a store, have a close look at new Sages sitting in the rod rack. I could be wrong, but the grips look like imported, mass-produced ones.
 
Skol_Engh said:
The convenience of having a rod fully rigged for a post work session is priceless. I would hope that leaving an American made rod in a rodvault wouldn’t desintigrate it but that might be the case. I haven’t had issues with Scott rods left up there, though.
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Its not country of origin issue... very few adhesives take heat well. In fact, if you google how to remove a reel seat I'm pretty sure the top results are "stick it in boiling water" and "use a heat gun". It doesn't help that Sage may not be using enough adhesive.

If a car can reach 143* in the sun, I see no reason why a rod vault/etc can't do the same thing. Its not enough to make it fail immediately(seems it takes about 15 minutes at 212* to significantly weaken the adhesive) but its still weakening it the longer it sits in those conditions.

If you have a rod with half a tube of epoxy holding the reel seat on, and another with a pea sized amount... the one with less will fail faster. Make no mistake, all of the adhesive is degrading at those temps and it's just a matter of time before it fails.
 
I can't justify the money top brand rod manufacturers want for their products. For a fraction of the topend rods price, there are some good rods built by smaller companies that care about their products.
 
HauntedByWaters said:
Back when I would buy and sell 10-15 rods per year searching for the holy grail I never settled on a Sage for any purpose. I did this from 2008-2013 or so and then I settled on my quiver. My favorite brands from that searching ended up being Winston, Scott, Burkheimer, Meiser , and Echo (Ordered from favorite first). I tried all the brands anybody recommended on WFF. Amazingly, I had a Sage pro deal at the time and yet I never even used it. I do own a Sage SP, and DS2 I bought in high school in the late 90s that I really like and I always felt they were better than the newer faster rods Sage is making.

I never had any issues with Sage build quality, but I will say that it was pretty obvious which brands I vibed with and it was never the newer faster Sage rods. I feel like Sage diverged to techy sounding names and advertising and fast designs 20 years ago and it has cost them the business from the crazed anglers like me who know what a really good setup feels like. They have a lot of brand name recognition and coast on that but I think it’s hype at this point. I’ll bet if you had a well set up Winston and a Sage and people didn’t know which was which they would choose the Winston almost every time.
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Never fished Burk or Meiser, but my list chips in the same order. My prized sage is my 476 DS2. I’ll also add my Lamson Center Axis rods as my favorite “beater” set ups for $300-350 each. I like the idea of a “blind” cast comparison, unsanded, and uncolored blanks with matching generic nice cork and reel seats, I think folks would pic the Winston as well. As I’ve beaten the horse a dozen times, Winston has amazing craftsmanship and fantastic product support!
 
Scottybs said:
Never fished Burk or Meiser, but my list chips in the same order. My prized sage is my 476 DS2. I’ll also add my Lamson Center Axis rods as my favorite “beater” set ups for $300-350 each. I like the idea of a “blind” cast comparison, unsanded, and uncolored blanks with matching generic nice cork and reel seats, I think folks would pic the Winston as well. As I’ve beaten the horse a dozen times, Winston has amazing craftsmanship and fantastic product support!
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I think this would be such a better format for a rod “shootout”. Take the bias/marketing/incentives out of it. A snowboard magazine that’s out of business used to do this every year. The manufacturers would send boards in stripped of any graphics and logos and pros would congregate for a weekend in Mammoth and test boards and truly rate them on their performance, not their logo.
 
mcswny said:
I think this would be such a better format for a rod “shootout”. Take the bias/marketing/incentives out of it. A snowboard magazine that’s out of business used to do this every year. The manufacturers would send boards in stripped of any graphics and logos and pros would congregate for a weekend in Mammoth and test boards and truly rate them on their performance, not their logo.
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Manufacturers probably wisened up and realized it’s not a good idea.
 
Absolutely! Rod vaults are the reason these Sage flyrods failed! Bad rod vaults! My brand new Sage X failed with nary a moment spent in a rod vault or even a hot vehicle.

Sage fan-bois gotta find that some how, some way, the beloved wonder-stick failed due to owner negligence! 😆
 
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krusty said:
Absolutely! Rod vaults are the reason these Sage flyrods failed! Bad rod vaults! My brand new Sage X failed with nary a moment spent in a rod vault or even a hot vehicle.

Sage fan-bois gotta find that some how, some way, the beloved wonder-stick failed due to owner negligence! 😆
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Like I said, the Scott rod left in the same conditions never failed.
 
Herkileez said:
You'd think a $1000 rod would use decent cork, but I've seen quite a few Sages with filler falling out. You won't find that with a Meiser/Burkheimer/Loop, etc....because they don't give their customers low-grade cork covered with a wash to cover it. Next time in a store, have a close look at new Sages sitting in the rod rack. I could be wrong, but the grips look like imported, mass-produced ones.
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I actually think that the cork on a new sage is way better now than it was on the RP, RPL, and LLs from 30+ years ago. While I own a boat load of Burkies, the cork falls a bit short in comparison to Scott's, Winston's, and Thomas and Thomas's.
 
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