I have to ask a question, not intending to open a can of "thread worms."

I have been crafting rods sinse the 80s. I experiment lots, and have made a number of changes over time, thanks to TK, Scott B, Dick French and others who offered sage (no advert intended) advice. I like to fool around, but am not over picky, as the advice and experience has me knowing there is lots of room for variation.

My question: I began rodbuilding with the "bend on the table" method of spining sections. A few years back I switched to placing the rod section straight up and down on a carpet and pushing down on the blank - several times to assure correct alignment. The rod takes a natural bend.

Always works, easy.

I also understand factory rods are not spined, mostly, and checked for straightness. (I have made a few that way myself, to see if it really mattered. Under load, perhaps not, but I have never overstressed a rod myself, at least knowingly.)

I do spine rods, however, just to be sure, but use the above method only. Obviously, this precludes tricky machines and does provide immediate load characteristics, etc.

So, what are your thoughts on this?

Hive

There's nothing wrong with what you're doing, as long as you understand that the act of loading a blank by hand flexing/pressuring it is not at all the same as what happens when the rod is loaded by a fish via a line running through rod guides. Any spine effect is quite easily overcome by the effect of the line trying to make it's way to the underside of the rod whenever it's loaded.

If you're simply asking about finding the spine, then any of the various methods are all going to work pretty well and give similar results. Some just find one method better than another for the type blanks they're working with. Setting the butt on a marble and pressing straight down on the tip is hard to beat, but maybe not entirely practical with short, stiff multi-piece rod sections or extremely heavy duty trolling rod blanks.

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TK, Thanks. I agree.

And, those thick sticks require an alternative - which in my case, I simply ignore, believing that the heavier, and I mean heavy sections or complete blanks are less spine "conscious," particularly glass.

I guess I would state that I am spine-picky with the ligher fly rods and get less so as the rods get up in weight. As to the float rods, I treat most of them as lighter fly rods and spine them, even though the 10 to 14 footers do not seem to need it. Once a fish is on, they appear to all react similarly, and the heavy spinners and, now that I think of it, maybe even light spinners all cast well, spined, unspined or spine up or down, if you get my drift :]

I have made a few simply for straightness - 9' 8 wgts - they cast super and no failures after a number of years.

BTW, your suggestions relative to guide placement (Concept) are wonderful, though I began suing a similar method, modified to reduce the guide numbers by one, some years back. I began by simply measuring off 1/3 of the blank length from the middle of the grip and then set guides with a slight gradual lengthening of spacing after the pinch-point. Fast, simple and functional. That is how it should be. I still use it today, but often use graduated guide size for esthetics or weight reduction.

I guess my drift was to find out how many believe that in the end, most rods do what they are supposed to do, regardless of craft methods.

Appreciate the response.

Hive

Hive

I put weight on the butt of a section, then press down on the tip with support under about a foot and a half from that turn the section till I find the way it wants too stay. mark the top place guides where ever. This way it seems to act the same as if a fish is on

That seems very practical. How do you set up the weight and anchor it to the section?


Hive

I use sections of scrap blanks that fit into the ends of the blank, making sure they are smoth so as not to scratch the inside of the femail of a tip section. Then after one if I need I will add more over . Seems to be a little bett then the push up the tip and push down on the middle
On light stuff watch that tip you don't break any !