I am looking for a 8 to 8.5 ft. 6 wt that will handle heavy, dare I use the N word, and streamers bass poppers etc. I have built a Garrison but I wanted something faster. I plenty of tapers but not sure which ones are faster. Headed to Florida to get out of the cold for a few months and wanted to fix two rods I broke this year and built a fast 6 wt. (David Ray)

If you are planning on casting "heavy" streamers and poppers why are you not looking for a 7 wt or an 8 wt? "Heavy" is pretty relative but in my experience a 6 wt is sort of undergunned for the heavier bass lures. (Timothy Troester)

You can't go wrong with a Para 15 taper. (Don Anderson)

Nunley's 806, which can be easily stretched to 8.5, if desired, or a relatively unknown PHY taper with heavy tip, quite similar to Nunley's 806 but is already an 8.5. Let me know in which taper you might be interested. (Martin-Darrell)

I made a Dickerson 8615 from the Howell book. Tips were too soft, but it cast a lot of line real well. Now I'm making replacement tips from the taper posted on the Rodmakers taper page. I think it's going to be just the ticket! You might also look at Bogart's tapers. I seem to remember casting a thunder stick he built a couple of years ago at Grayrock. (Brian Creek)

A friend asked me to build him an 8'6" 3-piece rod to fill out his collection. Does anyone have a suggestion for a such a taper? I really like Paynes and had settled on a 204, but it's listed as a 5 wt in some places and a 6 wt in others. My friend mentioned that he might try to hunt largemouth bass with it, but specifically said he wanted a six wt. Around here he's more likely to encounter Smallmouth. My feeling is that the Payne is too light for largemouth, and if it's a five, might be borderline for smallies. Is it a six or a five weight?  (Bill Hoy)

Go with the Granger, some of the 8 1/2 ft rods would take an 11/17 ferrule and some of them would take an 12/18 ferrule. The 12/18 is a true 6 wt (DT). Paynes are a pain! As there are no indications on the rod as to what model the rod is (204L, 204, 204H, 205....) they are OFTEN misidentified. A 204L is a light 5, a 204 is a great 5 wt with almost identical numbers to a Granger 11/17 and a 204H is also a 205 and a good wt. Remember to think ferrule size when you are looking at classic tapers, that is how the guys built them. (AJ Thramer)

I’m looking to build my friend a bass rod I looked at Garrison’s 221 8’9”, Gillum’s 8672, Nunley 9’ 9 wt, PHY Para 17 8’5” 7 wt, FE Streamer Special 9’ 7 wt, AJ’s 8’ 7 wt and Gould’s 9’ 6 wt. I’m lost, does anyone have a favorite Bass taper (Big River smallmouth bass rod). I’ve built a lot of trout rods but bass rods I have not or cast that many.  (Joe Eichenlaub)

I use Garrison's 221 for king salmon in Michigan. It is one powerful rod. Take a look at Garrison's 212E. A little more comfortable size. I use mine for Steelhead so I am sure you can do the bass with it. (Jerry Drake)

I am looking for a good 8' 7 wt rod to build for bass fishing. I have an 8' 6 wt Dickerson 8014 which is in my opinion a great rod for streamer fishing for trout in the larger tailwaters. I was thinking about building a Dickerson 8015 "guide special" or possibly a Chris Bogart Shenandoah Special "Hexrod"ed to an 8 ft rod. My casting stroke really suits the "Sir D" or Cattanach tapers at least in the smaller line weights or in graphite - the Sage SLT rods. Based on the stress curves I thought that the Bogart rod might be a little softer on the tip and easier to cast shorter even with the bigger flies than the Dickerson with a little more punch than the earlier mentioned rods. I don't see many 7 weight tapers that aren't parabolic listed around on the web. I am concerned about the weight to some degree, but I will also be fishing (sitting) out of a canoe, kayak, or john boat most of the time for bass, so I need a long enough rod to help keep the backcast in the air. Your opinions and suggestions are most welcome. (Doug Peters)

Try the 8015. It'll handle small to medium salmon, possibly large ones too in the right place. (Tony Young)

I'd suggest either the 8014 Guide Special, or the 8015 (NON GS) as really great 7 weight rods. (Harry Boyd)

I would recommend the PHY Boat Rod that is posted in the Hexrod archives. Since I posted the taper ages ago, I've sold the rod, and was actually using a 7 wt on it rather than a #6. It's got good line speed and a strong butt with good line lifting power. (Rob Hoffhines)

I would second the PHY boat rod taper as listed in the archives.

I too use a WF 7 on it. It's light in hand, pretty fast action, and has a whole lot of power in the butt. I use it for summer steelhead and bass. (Chris Obuchowski)

I would like some input for a Smallmouth taper. It will be going to a graphite fisher. (Tony Spezio)

I would be interested in this as well. There are many good smallmouth streams around me and the trout fishing around here dies during the dog days of summer. I am a few minutes up the road from the Rappahannock river, which is supposed to be a blue ribbon smallmouth stream. A buddy of mine retired from the Marines recently and landed the freshly minted job of River Steward of the Rappahannock and me and him always talked about fly fishing and never got together. I would like to show him what I have been up to since we last saw each other. I know he would get a kick out of it. (Scott Bearden)

The 4 piece Sir D I had at SRG was made for smallmouth fishing North Arkansas creeks. I beefed up the original Sir D taper a little to carry the weight of the extra ferrules (nickel silver truncated ferrules). The finished rod is noticeably heavier than the 2 piece SDs that were at the gathering. It would be a relatively fast rod for typical nymph fishing for trout but I think it's going to be perfect for throwing a Dave's Near Nuff crawfish under cover on a small Arkansas stream. Hopefully the "hinge" will help roll cast those flies, but that's yet to be seen. Haven't taken it to the creek yet. (David Bolin)