Recently, through my own stupidity, I damaged the lower section of a Rainshadow 10/11 rod. I had finished building the rod and was reshaping the cork grips while they were on the blank. From now on, I will use a mandrel when shaping grips before they are installed. Anyway, I contacted Baston Ent., told them about my mishap and they said that they would replace the butt section of the rod. As asked, I sent the upper section of the rod and a portion of the broken butt section. I retained the grips, reel seat, and about 5 inches of rod above the grips. I figured that I would salvage what I could from this section at a later date. The Batson folks sent me a new butt section matched to the upper section of the rod at a very reasonable price. I received the new butt section a couple of days ago. However, now that I have all of these parts, I was hoping that I wouldn’t have to strip off the reel seat and grips from the lower section of the rod that I retained. I got to thinking about connecting the original reel seat and grips to the new butt section from Batson with some sort of ferrule, then, putting my upper section on top of that. Could I turn my 9’ two-piece rod into an 11’ three-piece rod using some sort of ferrule to connect the original lower section to the new butt section? That way, I wouldn’t have to ruin all the cork work that got me into this trouble in the first place. If I can make a three-piece out of these parts, do you have any suggestions about how I use to build a ferrule to connect the lower with the seat & cork to the new butt section? Your advice is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Nils Pearson

How to do this was covered in a past issue of RodMaker. You'd need to construct an oversleeve of fiberglass and it would work exactly as you envision it.

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with a new section being added that close to the handle, you may experience a loss of sensitivity in the overall feel of the rod. This fix, only 2 feet long "may" cause you to break the bottom section off while fighting the trophy fish of your dreams. (this will be due to the first four feet being the same size which would in turn mean strength) You will put more torque on the rod at that connection point when fighting a fish. Besides, with the cost of parts on the lower half of the rod (seat and cork which may or may not be reclaimed), why modify your rod to be two 4.5 ft sections and one 2 foot section? The real question is do you want to sacrifice the function of the blank which was designed to be 9 foot? Good luck in your decision!

Tom and James,
Thanks for your advice. In pursuing this dilemma, I contacted Dan Craft about purchasing a fiberglass sleeve to build an over-ferrule. We spoke about my intentions and I came away from our conversation convinced that the stress at the joint between the old handle and new butt section would probably split open when put under stress. Just the same warning that James had given to me in his posting. I have already made one stupid mistake and I don't need to make another. So, I plan to build out the new butt section in the way it was designed and salvage what I can from the broken section.

Nils Pearson

Nils, You can easily recover 99% of you cork, reel seat, and whatever else was on the broken butt section. You'll need a pot full of water deep enough to immerse all the components you plan to remove. Heat the water to boiling. As the water temperture comes up, it'll start to soften the expoxy bond. You can check on the softening process by gently twist the cork and reel seat every 5 or 10 minutes. If immersed long enough, the bond will soften enough to remove everything from the blank well before the water reaches the boiling point.
I used workman gloves to safely handle and work the bond until the components lift off.
PS The bond between each cork ring on my handles held without separation.
Patrick vernacchio

Hey R. Patrick,

Sounds like a plan. I'll give it a try.

Thanks,
Nils Pearson

yeah, thanks for the tip, i have a handle section from a broken rod and was wondering if there was a better way to remove the components without using a drill and rat-tail file. I will try that.

Thanks


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