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Lower hand versus upper hand

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sms
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Post by sms »

Paul,
Yes, it is different. Your ICR go thru a different path compared to each other - and more simply you start and stop at different positions compared to casting direction. Rod bend shapes will be different too (so if you did an overlayd rod bend video rod butts being static in the video framework it would be really obvious).

Magnus and Paul,
When my dh spey goes to haywire, I sometimes correct it by starting casting eyes closed. I close my eyes when I have gotten to the end of the lift. Then back cast, forward cast, open my eyes. Quite often I can dial in the right rhytm and can continue casting my eyes open. It seems that sometimes processing the data we get from our eyes "does not compute" the right way.

Magnus,
1) Yes, and in addition I would say that we also use our body as extension to the rod (or vice versa) in some cases (especially some distance styles). Eirik uses that probably most visibly from all casters I've seen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh1hsDHtFAM
I think the MacKenzie/Ness backcast is also like that - first it is lift lift lift, then arms are basically locked and back cast is made with quite flat rod and body rotation until it turns into drift. I've seen some beginners tying to use their bodies quite a lot. The problems are with control and synchronizing.
2) This is one of those big problems with distance casting. One needs to develop the interpreation of the senses with high, changing loads that last very short time. And since it goes to nuances in really good vs. great cast, one basically has to do it over and over again so that it comes from the spine. I know by feel, especially with DH rod if the cast is good, really good or great way before I can see any sign how well the cast is going to fly. But, I do not think I can make changes mid cast depending on feel. I can quit a cast if there is something badly wrong early in the FC, but that's basically it.

Magnus and Merlin,
Yes, my example is limited to a massless rod (and certain force directions for a set rod bend). Rod inertia will make the balance go towards the upper hand - unless the butt is super heavy. The reel will have its effect too and it depends where it is located between hands and how much it is accelerated in the cast and which direction.

It would be nice to know how the forces between hands in real life (ie Merlin's 15' rod, 50g line and reel) situation would be when IC is in 1) bottom hand 2) halfway between and 3) top hand (or at any point we want to define, ie halfway between the chest and rod when reference points for ICR are grip points) . The boundary condition would have to be KE in (velocity of) the line. That would mean different angles, bends etc so it would be quite a major task to model for computing.

Merlin,
For 15', non bent rod, the leverage of top hand CR is 89% od the bottom hand CR. So the degrease in inertia is just a bit more than degrease in leverage.

Cheers,
Sakke
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Paul Arden
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Post by Paul Arden »

When did you stop calling yourself Sakari and start calling yourself Sakke, Sakke?

Cheers, Paulski
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Post by sms »

Hi Paulski,

I've been pretty much been called Sakke by my friends (and by myself amongst friends) since I was less than 10 years old or so. At the office we have three Sakaris at the same end of the floor I sit in. So it works at work too to know when I am referred to and not either of the other two. And no, Sakari is not that common in Finland.

I changed it here too since I think Sakari is quite formal. And I don't like to be that formal outside work - and not there either at least all the time.

Cheers,
Sakke
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Post by Merlin »

Hi everybody

I took me more than a couple of hours to read both threads (this one and the one about the fulcrum). The small study I did has little value by comparison with real world casting. It seems that casters use various "fulcrums" along the cast, plus a large body motion. On Sakke's video, the end of the cast uses the butt end as a fulcrum, for example.

I did other scenarios like identical rotation and acceleration in all cases, which still gives an advantage for the lower fulcrum (13% higher speed by comparison to the upper one). This assumes than someone is able to perform such theoritical casts with a broomstick. Probability remains negligible.

Merlin
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Post by Alejandro »

Bernd wrote:I have been teaching two hand casting for more than ten years now. Mostly I taught casting with shooting heads in length of 8-11m. Teaching the "Andersson" style worked pretty well for those lines.
One of the main goals to success was to teach my students to increase force via bottom hand while decreasing force via top hand.
A lot of instructors are still thinking the main force input is done via bottom hand.
So I personally think we really have underestimated the force being added to the rod by our top hand.
For sure my main goal in teaching is helping the student to be successful in his casting.
But I also want to make him understand what really happens.
I have had time for the last days to think on their message, while I practiced with very different spey’s equipments (rod from 12' to 18' and lines with heads from 21' to 95') in the Nalón river (in the place that you know).

I know that the underhand style (to the way of G. Andersson, because we can see in Internet very different "underhand cast”) works pretty well with short heads. I think that there is not anything bad in teaching it, if we have clear that a style can be a good way of making the things, although it is not necessarily always the best way of making the things, and we explain its advantages and its limitations. But, in my opinion, the reason for which the underhand is effective is not to give more importance to the lower hand.

To characterize a casting style is not always simple. A meticulous description of the complete movement is not practical, and you can only apply to a caster (and if the description is absolute only to a cast). People are not machines.

Gordy’s thread "Rotational KE in the rod" has shown me (thank you, Gordy) that sometimes the most visible hides us the most important. Gordy has the whole reason when he says that the force doesn't come, at least in its biggest part, of the hands, and that hence it does not have very much sense to centre only on them.
But I also believe that Sakari guesses right when comments that for us it is more enlightening the movement that the force.

The Gordy’s question (http://www.sexyloops.co.uk/cgi-bin/theb ... entry25343) "What parts of our body plows involved in producing high rotational velocities of the rod butt?" has a too wide answer: around 200 bones, 500 muscles and 250 articulations can be involved in the movement of the rod. But I suppose that Gordy refers to the corporal segments that have a leading role in the cast. I now think, as Gordy, that the rotational movement of the bony levers in the articulations can tell us more than a cast that the movement of the hands, although finally the articular movements don't have another purpose that to move the hands, and with them the rod.

From this point of view, the typical forward cast of the underhand cast differs of the classic forward cast in that the elbows remains semi-flexed and the rod moves fundamentally for the coordinated extension of the two shoulders, that only stops when the inferior hand collides against the caster's abdomen (with the time there develops a special belly that facilitates the stop without damaging the pylorus :)

Not there are wide extension movements of the elbow of the upper arm, neither a marked flexion of the elbow of the lower arm (Goran Andersson flex lightly the palm of the lower hand to accelerate the rod to the end of the movement). Therefore I don't believe that it is necessary to request to the students that increase the force of none of their hands: It is enough to take care that they maintain the elbows with the same, or resemblance, angle from the beginning at the end of the forward cast, moving the two arms equally, rotating on their shoulders. I think that it is not necessary to tie the arm as they make some instructors (because a small extension of the elbow makes easier the cast), but it is a possibility (as blocking the wrist in the one handed rod back cast).

This form of making the things is not good to achieve a long path of the tip of the rod, since the before rotation of the rod it is limited by the collision of the lower hand with the caster's body and the non extension of the superior elbow. Neither it is the best way of getting a quick acceleration, since the gain of tip speed in relation to the butt speed is much smaller that when there is extension-flexion of the elbows (because the vertical component of the movement doesn't contribute to move the rod ahead).

This is a great advantage for novice casters, that tends to enlarge too much the casting arc and to use an excessive acceleration. A soft acceleration of the tip (not necessarily so soft if rod is very rigid) and a firm stop with the rod high allows that anyone can cast in an acceptable way a short head (what doesn't mean that it is the only way of cast a short head).

The problem is that these advantages are at the same time limitations when we want to manage long heads lines or to cast very long distances. The immense majority of the fishermen is not interested in deepening their spey casting, beyond presenting the fly more or less to 100’. For them, the underhand cast, and the equipment appropriate for this modality, I think that are very useful. But for who really wants to understand in great detail the spey cast, well, I believe that it is something that suits to know as a part of a world that is very much wider.

Alejandro
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Marc LaMouche
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Post by Marc LaMouche »

thanks Alejandro :)
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Post by Alejandro »

Hi Marc, you’re welcome.

I be thanked to all that have participated in this thread: Magnus, Sakari, Malcom, Sushiuymmy, Bernd, Merlin... Of all them I have learned something.

Although the thread seems already exhausted I should give an answer to Bernd.

I also owe a video to Sushiyummy, he wrote:
“Alejandro, would you be able to transfer the path lines in your gif to a slowed down video? If you are able to, can you throw in the Point of minimum chord (shortest length between top hand and tip) so we can see where the lower hand is at at this point of minimum chord. Hope I am not asking too much, but I want to understand more of what is going on”.

The video is in http://vimeo.com/34070135 (only hand path lines) and http://vimeo.com/34069874 (hand path lines and speed vectors).

Alejandro
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Post by Bernd »

Bernd Ziesche
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Post by Alejandro »

Yes, with a bamboo cane, which is the opposite to a fast Scandinavian rod, to give the prominent role to the upper hand is a valid option.

But nothing bad happens if the lower hand moves a bit: the cane does not break :-))
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Post by Magnus »

Last cane rod my grandfather bought, Sharpe's demonstrated the quality by bending the tip to the butt. Scottish (UK) built cane fly rod were supple (soft) and slow action.

His salmon outfit was a spliced 15ft Sharpe's with a big brass reel on the butt. Spliced joints reduced the total weight and eliminating the brass ferules meant less wobble factor :D Total weight maybe 30 ounces and a far higher swingweight than any carbon rod of similar length.

Given that type of gear, a casting style where the rod butt stayed close to the body, with the lower hand supporting the weight, makes sense to me. Particularly if you want to fish all day.
Given that those slow actioned rods produce tailing loops easily, a method of accelerating smoothly is essential - a long push with the upper hand (top hand dominant style) seems to me to make good practical sense.
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Post by sushiyummy »

Thanks for video, Senor. I can't really tell for sure, but does the Minimum chord length correspond with the top hand at the bottom of the 'Vee'?

I am late responding because I just saw the video.
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