This is a brand new rod that I finished for a customer but things fell through on his end, so here it is. Truly a spectacular rod in all aspects, able to throw a whole WF#9 line and has fantastic cosmetics from the special rod tube to the cosmo spar varnish.This is the big brother of a 7’4″ #9 rod I made for myself two years ago and on which I landed a whopper salmon this spring on the Gaspe (pictured above). Flamed cane with 3 up node pattern. Mirrored tips. Wrapped in green olive silk with signature wraps and brown olive intermediates. Flawless spar varnish. Oxidized potbelly step ferrules. No keeper. 5 1/2″ 11 cork western or Payne-style grip that is slightly fatter to match its use as a salmon rod. Shop-made black anodized uplocking screw lock seat which is stamped “Aroner, Maker”. Black anodized Payne style aluminum acorn at the bottom of the seat pulls out on a nickel silver ferrule to allow insertion of a 5″ long black anodized aluminum fighting butt. Mortised, varnished cherry root burl reel seat spacer. The fighting butt stores in a specially fitted compartment of the bottom of the 1 3/4″ polished aluminum tube. The brass tube hardware (also shop-made) is heavy-duty, enough tofendoff a charging Grizzly bear! The olive poplin rod bag has a storage pocket to store the Payne style finial ferrule plugs when not in use.All in all, I see this as the pinnacle of the rod maker’s art, no shortcuts or outsourced hardware have been used anywhere.