WHEN it comes to short stroker rods there is one brand that many companies have tried to copy, and in the main they have failed. That brand is Sabre. Sabre have been leaders in the short stroker market for many years. During this time they have seen little changes in the range which stands true to the quality and performance of these rods.
The Sabre short strokers have a good fast action with give in the tip and power down the butt section for putting hurt on those big stubborn fish. The transition section of where the tip gives way to the powerful butt section is where most copies have failed.
One of the most popular Sabre blanks that we build up is the 655H, listed as a 15 kg blank. The blank measures 1.65 metres long and is just at home fishing 10 kg as it is 15 kg. Thus the rod serves as a ten or fifteen kilo outfit without any problems.
Last year I made a pair of this rods which were fished on the boat “Assegai”, skippered by Greg Edwards. Fishing off Townsville, anglers Denis Cafferky and Bill Yap tagged and released 36 billfish in one day on these two rods. This still stands as the current World record for tag and release. Talk to either of these two anglers and they have nothing but praise for the performance of the outfits.
While many anglers only use stroker style rods for game or sportfishing, chasing the likes of tuna and billfish, they do make up into a mean little reef fishing rod. A tip light enough to feel the bites and power to quickly pump that fish to the surface.
There is nothing too complicated about building this rod up other than gluing the components on securely so that they don’t move after continued heavy use.
When it comes to quality components that last the test of time it is pretty hard to go past the range offered by FUJI.
As far as guide choice go you have several options. We build the models in our standard range with heavy duty boat guides - BLRLG with a UST silicon tip. If you want to spend a few more dollars then place silicon guides all the way through, namely LRSG’s. If money is not a question then the rod looks superb when finished with FUJI’s gold cermet guides BLRGG.
You may notice that in the specs we have used a number 10 tip. This is to allow the sometimes bulky knots used when connecting heavy leaders to doubles to pass freely through the tip.
Before gluing the butt components in place, score the blank where the grips will fit with some heavy sand paper. This will give the glue additional bite to hold the grip onto the blank.
FUJI produce a standard game grip which is tapered at one end, these come in 10” and 14” lengths. For the butt, one inch is trimmed off the fat end of the grip which goes against the reel seat. The other tapered end is trimmed a little and once again shaped slightly so it fits nicely against a FUJI graphite gimbal. This will give you a butt grip on around eight inches by the time that you push it onto the blank.
A FUJI FPSH 24 reel seat is used which is more than strong enough for this job, along with being durable and light weight. There is no corrosion problems with the stainless steel foot of your reel against and alloy fitting as the FUJI reel seat is graphite throughout.
The foregrip is left the full 14” length to give plenty of length to hang onto with both hands as they strain under the load of a thumping fish long into the battle. Make sure that you have a good covering of glue here as you don’t want your grip to start twisting and letting go on you.
All of your guides should be underbound and double overbound. “A” thread is nice and strong and gives a good finish on the end product.
Thread colours are (of course) up to you. As the outfit is not a cheap one make the effort to add a few trims on the ends and centre of all guides and tasteful colours to do the rod justice.
Metallic trims always look good with black as well as some of the Gudebrod regular threads such as cobalt or candy apple.
The rod recipe listed offers the guide spacing as per the butt specifications shown here. Should you change the butt lengths I recommend that you have another look at the guide spacings and perhaps rearrange a few guides to suit your changes.
SPECIFICATIONS:
Blank : Sabre 655H;
butt 10” X 5/8 EVA
game grip - cut as suggested;
reel seat FUJI FPS H 22 thread down;
foregrip 14” X 1/2” EVA game grip;
gimbal - FUJI BCGC 25G;
Tip - UST 10/3.6;
Guides - FUJI BLRLG 10 - 8.5 cm; 10 - 9.0cm; 10 - 9.8cm; 12 - 12.0cm; 12 - 13.0cm; 16 - 14.0cm; 20 - 18.5cm.
