The Traditional Fisherman's Forum

SeanM wrote:
Wizards are heavy old things as can be seen from the following weights courtesy of Mrs M's kitchen scales:

Wizard 14oz
Lucky Strike 10oz
Chapmans 500 12oz


and for comparison:

13ft Shimano Triple X 6oz Would I buy a Super Wizard? Well yes if one came up at the right price. I suppose the real problem would be sourcing rings if it needed new ones and I would be tempted to use unlined rings.

Just weighed the wizard i,m restoring.
Green label Super Wizard 12.8oz.
All the ring,s are lined.
The handle measures 19 1/2in from the cane to the end of the rubber button but the cork it self is 16 1/4in.

Lucky Strike 10.4oz.

Chapmans 500 De-Luxe 11.4oz.
Lined butt and tip ring.

Seem,s to be a bit of difference in weight in all rod,s.

All this technical detail.....its a Wizard, it has magical powers, ignore it at your peril !!

And with that post I am now a Dace, proof positive

Thanks Nobby!

Remember that Wizards had a solid wood handle which probably accounted for some of the weight. Mine also had a hardwood button which might have weighed a bit more than the rubber one fitted to later rods. I also wonder if the ferrules were lighter on later rods. Mine had the spigotted male ferrules which probably added a bit of weight.

I wouldn't argue about fractions of an ounce LJM as kitchen scales are probably plus or minus an ounce and ours have small divisions. Having said that my Wizard certainly weighed a fraction more than the Octofloat which surprised me.

I have to say that my Allcocks Wizard is one of my favourite rods to fish with.

It has a new longer handle [28"] & was fully re-furbished [Wizardman on eBay] but has a lovely through action [see "A Day Out in the Spring" thread p.16] & I'd trust it to give me a chance to land a big fish on a low hook link.

It has quite a thick butt section [whole cane] & that seems to be a plus when waggling one.

I've a LS & an Adonis which both rank as ok & a Lancer which is a bit of a one off [as in I've never seen another for sale]. The Wizard is definately the nicest to actually fish with.

Plenty of "variance" over 30 odd years though.......

My black label and green stained are both very nice :Ok
Sorry couldn't resist
Bumble

I bow to the superior, to the awesomely superior, knowledge of the members of this forum when all things rod are discussed. However, I do own both a Wizard and a Super Wizard, both decent gold-label versions. While I do use the Wizard when float-fishing for bream and tench, I would not fancy hooking many even middling carp on it. This has happened to me a few years ago when one turned up and took some sweetcorn intended for tench on a small, peaceful fen drain. It was not very peaceful for the next quarter of an hour and I can in all honesty that the fish was in charge for fourteen of those fifteen minutes. It was a 12 pound common.

If I had been using the Super Wizard, I doubt that I would have landed the fish. My S W has a much lighter and much more through action than that my Wizard. I use it for roach, bottom fishing and placed in a couple of rests. I've had a small tench of a couple of pounds on it, and would not want to ask more of it than that.

Might it be that the SW has a 'lighter and through action' because it bends more when you waggle it due to the weight of those lined rings, do you think?

Either that or this just goes to show that no two rods are quite the same, which bearing in mind the organic nature of cane isn't so surprising really.

A very popular rod was the Wizard, copied by everyone, even today, as the Walker Mark IV was later to be, but I never got on with that short handle personally and hence it was always a puzzle to me that it should be so popular when nobody ever fishes it in the Nottingham style it was intended for.

At least you got your carp in and were able to release it....FWK Wallis wrote of taking an hour to 'kill' his 30lb salmon with one, but then I imagine that fish was taken for eating.

FWK Wallis wrote of taking an hour to 'kill' his 30lb salmon with one, but then I imagine that fish was taken for eating.

I'll admit to being a fish-eater, one not averse to eating his catch. If I could have only one sort on my plate from now on, it would be sea-trout, but perch and zander are delicious - and pike isn't bad if the cook knows his or her business. I am intrigued by what carp might be like, and tench, but could not bring myself to knock either on the head. I'm not sure why...

The Super Wizard was my first purchase after that Damascus moment when you realise you will never buy a carbon rod again, and so it has a special place in the wardrobe where they all hang up. Each time I take it out, I pray that I won't hook one of the pesky carp that have spread throughout the river and drain systems in the fens. How times change. Once, I dreamed of nothing else but carp.

I have restored a Super Wizard and managed to get the handle length to 24 inches overall without losing the transfer (or cutting it down at the ferrule and adding to the butt) I did have to sacrifice the hook keeper but I rarely use these anyway, preferring to hang the hook in the butt ring.

I also removed the lined rings and fitted high Bells including an extra one on the tip section and I also took the opportunity to fit a threaded tip ring to use the rod for swing tipping.

It is a nice all rounder and feels so much better with the longer handle.
A few pics of the rod below, you can see the handle is a big improvement on the standard one.

By the way, one thing I did find when altering the handle was that the whole cane only went into the wooden dowel about 12 inches so not right through as I would have imagined. I used cane to rebuild it back to length and sleeved it to the existing cane with aluminium tube and cork shives over the whole lot.

Wal.