Home Forums Fishing Freshwater U.S. Made Fishing Rods

Rooster that's interesting...which Loomis have you fished with that compares to a Scheel?

Not sure. It belonged to an old friend of mine. He fished with my Guide Series and I tried his Loomis out. He was impressed with the Scheels rod as well.

OK thanks!

Guys, I go by goodshot here on the fire. Certainly love the crowd here and am a certified rifle looney for sure. For my daytime job I am vp of engineering for fishing co. In the pnw. I was formally product mgr at St Croix and have been in the fishing industry for 30 plus years. I am a certified fly casting instructer and multi species angler and former tournement angler. Certainly happy to answer any questions you guys ever have regarding fishing of any type. Now, on the the USA made rod questions .
St. Croix makes rods in two spots , Park Falls WI and a Mexican location. They tried Asia for a short period of time by left for many reasons such as lead times, consistent QC , and many others.
G Loomis is 100% USA made
Lamiglas makes some rods in the USA and imports rods from various Asian sources.
Falcon is 100% USA made
Edge rods is 100 % USA made
Kistler rods some USA some Asian
Sage fly rods 100 % USA made
Winston, Scott, T&T 100 % USA made
There are lots of companies that buy blanks and components from all over the world and assemble here. But really very few that make there own blanks.
So does import compare to USA made.....yes and no. True composite engineers rarely choose the fishing industry for there career path, most work for defense , aero space where the pay will be a bunch more. The Asian engineers are ok, but don't anyways understand what the end goal is i.e. Not much fly fishing in China. To create a great rod takes two key elements there is the engineering side, and then the real magic is you need what we call a wiggle guy. A wiggle guy can pick up a blank and feel the action, power etc and know what to change etc. this is a very rare talent to say the least. I frankly have not met anyone from Asia that compares to our best. I travel in Asia all the time and qualify vendors etc., and with training you can get good products. We all have products we use and like that are from China, but it is American workers that make the difference. There re cultural things etc can effect quality. Annually many Asian factories turn over 25% of thee labor force which causes huge quality issues. We dont see that with USA labor. So better work force, engineering and wiggle guys means better rods. Hope this helps...goodshot

good write up. thanks

You are most welcome, and to all pm with any questions you might have. Goodshot

I thought I would come back and check this topic out again. Lot's of additional helpful info.

Most of the serious musky guys I know - all run St. Croix.

I have a St. Croix myself for all species fishing and I'll never not have one again.

I fish a lot of grubs and smaller cranks - small mouth is my most often prey - you can feel every wobble of every bait. I can feel the sand ridges on the bottom as I work jigs and Lindy rigs...

Tomorrow I'm taking off on a motorcycle ride for S&G - Park Falls to see St. Croix is stop one. Rollie and Helen's Musky shop is stop 2.

goodshot, thanks for the info. You mentioned Edge Rods and it should be noted that this is Gary Loomis' company. Gary also has North Fork Composites making rod blanks in the US.

Another company starting to gain attention in the northwest is Cousins Tackle. They're making some pretty nice rods in the US without charging quite as much as other rod makers. I'm seriously looking at a couple of their model 803 plug rods. Ward