Tailwater Outfitters Toccoa Fly Rod: High Performance 4 Piece, Fast Action IM8 Graphite with Rod Tube.

Good rod and tube. I first tried one of the "go to" recommended rods for a beginner and it was nice but it broke in the first 4 weeks which was a disappointment so I got a refund and decided to try something cheap. I was afraid that all fly rods were just very delicate things and that I would probably give it up after this cheap rod broke. I do not treat it any different than I do any other conventional rod I have. I leave it outside on the porch, I drop it sometimes, lay it down in the mud, on the rocks, or in the water. I am a bass fisherman and I wish I had just gone with the 8wt rod but I went with the 5wt because all I was catching at the time was small bass and panfish. Now I have been catching larger bass and really stressing the rod. I use 6wt line and max out the largest flies I can manage to throw, which is about a size 4 hook wolly bugger. I throw some streamers with size 4 hooks too as long as they do not have too much water absorbing materials. This is NOT a cheap feeling rod. It IS a fairly fast action rod and it is sensitive. Normally, the cheap rods have a medium action. There are cheaper rods out there but Matt is a good dude who stands behind his stuff so if you do have a problem I am sure he will take care of you. I have smashed it with flies and I still put a lot of stress on it daily since I live at a lake. I would say I have landed more fish with this thing since I bought it than most guys do in a year. You can buy this rod with confidence. You could buy it 3-4 times for what you would pay for a lower end name brand rod. I am not poor but there is no way I am spending $800 for a rod reel combo. You probably get what you pay for but guess what you can get a great rod for less than $70.

I bought this 5 wt. rod for my beginner fly fishing daughter. She has been struggling to learn to roll cast with my 6 wt. rod. I put my old reel, already loaded with a 6 wt. line on this new 5wt rod and she was roll casting great at about 30 feet on a small lake with trees around it. The line laid out straight all the way to the fly. I told her to keep taking line out and to keep roll casting until the line started to pile up, just so we could see how good she could do with it. She was able to roll cast over 45 feet, with a nice straight line all the way to the fly. It started to pile up on itself at about 55 feet. This was so much of an improvement over her past trips to the lake with my 6 wt. rod she fell in love with the new 5 wt. rod. She continued to cast great with the rod for over an hour, but since It was a bright sun shine day and there was no surface action, I switched her over to a strike indicator and a small split shot and some fireball salmon eggs which is harder to cast due to the weight of the eggs and the indicator, but she did great again and still loves the rod. She caught several fish on the salmon eggs and loved the way the rod felt with 12 to 13” fish on it. The workman ship of this rod is very good and the performance is great. We received an email from the seller asking us to let them know if there were any concerns and to feel free to contact them if we had any problems with the rod, which I considered good customer service, but since my daughter loves the rod I did not contact them. I would not hesitate to recommend this rod to anyone.

The finish is above par for the price point, and the handle is much better quality cork than I was expecting. All of the connections are properly fitted, and the aligning dots are a helpful feature. The reel seat is machined well, and the rod is overall quite aesthetically pleasing. I chose this rod, and in a 5wt, because I planned to use it for panfish and small bass, and I didn't see that necessitating a high end rod. With that said, it loads and casts very nicely, and it is a true 5wt. (Most lower priced rods, I've found, are a heavier weight than what they are marked as) I ended up hooking into a 14lb common carp, and this rod performed well in what most would call an under-gunned fight. This would make a very nice rod to learn on, or as a backup, and I haven't found any faults in it yet!

I paired this with the Piscifun reel and weight forward floating line. I have been having a blast with this and feel like even with my lack of experience I have been getting about 3/4 of the cast distance as my friend with a rod/reel combo in the $600+ range. I previously owned a cheap walmart combo which price-wise this setup wasn't much more money but it by far exceeds the value, I can't attest to how well the rod will hold up to age but it seems well made and has a really nice balance with the piscifun reel. I can say I have already had more success with this in the first 2 weeks of trout season than my previous 2 seasons combined. https://www.amazon.com/Piscifun-Fishing-CNC-machined-Aluminum-Gunmetal/dp/B017H38HPC/ref=pd_bxgy_200_img_2/134-2216663-0538967?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B017H38HPC&pd_rd_r=eb9c6289-5a0d-11e9-8ded-c79105bf1765&pd_rd_w=oa8YJ&pd_rd_wg=7G8VK&pf_rd_p=a2006322-0bc0-4db9-a08e-d168c18ce6f0&pf_rd_r=2CFZPG2DPJVCNPFEQXR1&psc=1&refRID=2CFZPG2DPJVCNPFEQXR1

I can't believe the value of this thing. Took it fishing today and felt like one of my $300+ rods. I even have a hand made rod my uncle made for me and this rivals it. I guess manufacturers have come a long way. Great value.

On the first outing with the new rod , I snapped the tip in half as i was loading my kayak. Very disappointed I contacted the Seller on the weekend, to see it was possible to purchase a tip section. They had a new tip in the mail Monday morning.I purchased the fly to replace may old trusty 30 year old rod secondary rod. The quality and performance this rod has made it my primary rod. It is a great rod and look forward for a long use of it.

Beauty of rod. I bought the 5 weight and used it for the first time last yesterday. Cast very well, especially cutting into the wind at Clear lake in Oregon. I got stuck into some big rainbows there, the smallest a 15", and was able to horse them away from the submerged tree stumps with no problem.Nice Chinese made fast action rod and great price.If you're looking for a 9ft, fast action 5 weight, this is a good one to buy. You get a great rod and not out a lot of money.