I’m sure like me you’ve had it happen, you go to cast to that long distance spot then snap! the line has frapped around the butt eye and you’ve lost everything! there is no worse feeling apart from losing a fish!
So what causes fraps to happen is slackness in the line during the cast, so instead of the line being pulled through the butt eye it gets tangled around it because there is more line that what is needed coming off the reel.
heavy lines like fluoro, lighter leads, rods with softer tips, not being smooth with the cast, guide positioning, holding the line incorrectly and overfilling the spool are just a few things that can cause fraps on the cast.
These are tips from Terry Edmonds on casting, He knows his stuff when it comes to casting long distances.
When setting up to cast have 3 fingers in front of the stem of the reel, and trap the line as close to the spool as you can, towards the end of your finger. when you release the line to send the lead on the way, because the line is trapped near the spool it will eliminate slack. especially as I have seen people trapping the line against the rod.
Don’t soak your mono before casting as it will absorb water and then it becomes heavier, heavy line creates slack in the cast.
Soft-tipped rods tend to over-recover badly when being cast hard, the tip pulls line off the reel during the recovery stage then straightens to recover. This leaves slack in the cast firmer tipped rods perform better for overhead chucks.
Heavier leads keep the line tighter to the spool.
When casting progressive loading is the key, start the cast slowly and finish fast, nice and smooth.
Finish the rod with the tip pointing towards where you want to cast 45 degrees is perfect.
K- series guides haven’t worked that well for Terry, He has found better success by reversing the butt eye.
Never overfill your spools this is something I’m guilty of this I’m always overfilling my spools then end up with a mess of line or fraps around the butt eye. My thinking is I’d rather overfill than underfill. But it does cause problems!
Here’s a good video of Terry going through the Basics of Casting
A common problem when casting, rod twist.
why the top section of the rod has twisted around the usual explanation I get is that they think the spigot or overfit is wearing. Now, this can be a cause especially with spigot joints as they begin to wear but there is more going on that has a massive contribution to this common problem.
If we think what is going on with an overhead chuck at distance, we are trying to create power and accuracy. To achieve this we need the lead to follow the same plane as the rod this will lead to maximum blank performance and accuracy.
The problem comes when the lead doesn’t follow the plane of the rod this not only reduces the performance of the rod and accuracy, it can twist the top section of the rod causing all sort of casting problems.
When we set up to cast with the rod high above our head the guides are pointing up to the sky with a fixed spool set up, and the line usually starts in line with the rod going through the guides. As we cast if we don’t keep the lead in plane with the rod the line will go to one side of the guide pulling on the blank, and begins to twist the rod, if it pulls hard enough the rod tip will twist around, The lead has gone off plane somewhere usually because our body movements are wrong, especially the arm holding the reel and body twist.
This is an indication of a problem in the technique that can be improved, all my biggest casts have come with the lead in plane.
High standoff guides on the tip section of any rod can cause real problems with this, so I prefer higher standoff guides on the butt section to keep the line of the blank, then lower standoff guides as we travel up the tip.
If you have ever cast a multiplier rod you will hardly ever get any rod twist as the guides are never facing the opposite way to the lead in the cast so can’t really twist the blank.
Next time the tip twists on your rod, think about why this has happened somewhere in the cast the lead has been thrown off plane and the performance of the blank will suffer. It’s looking at all these small details, and getting them right that will produce the biggest and most consistent casts.
Finishing The Cast, Input of power.
The end of the cast is always going to have a big influence on the distance that you are going to achieve. This is the stage of the cast where we are about to fire the lead towards our target. To gain the greatest distance, we must have the highest lead speed at this point, and very importantly we must utilize all the energy in the compressed rod that we have transferred into it, through the earlier stages of the cast.
Fly casting demonstrates what we are trying to achieve with a carp rod very well. When fly casting the rod is progressively loaded with a long ‘stroke’. This stroke allows us to deeply load a fly rod, it begins slowly and we increase the speed to the fastest point at the end of the cast, this compresses the rod and energy are stored in the blank. This energy has to be released efficiently so it can be utilised by the fly line but how do we do this?
A good fly caster knows how to utilise this energy and transfer it to the fly line that’s why it goes a long way, but somebody with a lesser technique struggles for distance. The usual reason for this is the fly caster with the lesser technique has either slowed down before the release causing the rod to decompress and lose its stored energy. Or he hasn’t correctly stopped the rod, this leads to wasted energy and poor transference of stored energy.
If we think about what is going on before we cast the rod has no inherent compression or energy to cast our lead weight, we have to apply this energy to the rod. Through the cast we are applying more energy and compression; the faster the lead goes the more energy is created. Towards the end of the cast, we have a rod that has stored all of the energy we have created during the casting action, ready to be unleashed. We need to transfer all that energy rather than waste it.
The way to do this is very simple it’s a case of just stopping the rod, by doing this effectively all the compression and energy we created has to go somewhere. We have stopped the momentum, the compressed rod now wants to straighten, as it does it fires the lead as fast as it can towards the target, faster stiffer rods do this more effectively.
Once the lead has gone you will often feel the rod pulling you towards the ground, this is the rod over recovering and any energy in the rod dissipating. This over recovery can cause frap up problems, so once the rod is stopped, having softer hands and a looser grip can prevent this.
This is part of the cast can have a huge effect on casting distance and really pays not to overlook it.