I have just finished wrapping my 6th rod and it turned out OK. I wished that it looked better. Anyway my question is this. What is the procedure for wraping guides on. On the last one that I did I put and underwrap of silver metallic size a. Then attached guides with size a thread also. My problem is that the thread wants to fall off the guide feet and not go on straight. Do most start at the eye of guide and work down or start from the bottom and work up. I have had problems on all my rods about the tread doing this. The guides that I used last were preground. It there an easy way to get the thread to climb the feet of guides?



Thanks as always for your advise.

Brad,

I think you may have two problems.

I always wrap size A for underwraps and size C or D for the guide wraps. Metallic A is larger then nylon A which really adds to the problem. The guide wrap wants to fall in between the larger thread used for the under wrap. To wrap over size A metallic, I always used size D.

The other problem is the guide foot prep. A preground guide foot is not good enough. You must improve the prep of those guides as well as ones not done. A very gradual slope on the top of the foot and the sides will allow you to wrap up the foot toward the eye.

Do a search here or look at the lastest issue of Rodmaker to get the proper guide preparation information.

Larry Tysinger

Is this a heavy saltwater rod that needs an underwrap or did you do the underwrap just because you wanted to do it?

It is just a basic bass baitcaster rod. I thought that it would look better.

I think most people don't do underwraps on freshwater rods. I just did my first one under the hookkeeper. I used some Sulky metallic thread that's probably about size 00. I gave it two coats of CP prior to actually wrapping on the keeper with size A. The CP gave it a more even surface so the top thread was a lot easier to pack. I had done some test wraps and trying to get the size A thread packed tightly was a major problem. The CP helped a lot but I don't intend to do any more underwraps.

I would skip the underwraps, unless you do only a false underwrap, and just wrap the guides on with size A. The rod will be lighter and more sensitive.

You got some good info here. Guide foot prep is very important, a shallow ramp is what you want. Underwraps or not, most folk wrap up the guide foot, if the foot is properly prepped, the thread should just walk right up the foot without any problem. If you are using a doublefooted guide, you would wrap each side from the end of the guide foot up the foot towards the ring. It's a good idea to put a coat of finish or CP on an underwrap to prevent the guide wrap threads from digging into the underwrap, or do as suggested, use a larger diameter thread for the guide wrap. That make sense??

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