On most of my rods I've just not seen the need...the guide feet weren't long enough to bother......Single foots, snakes, and ceramics included.

Current set is forecast ceramics...Seem to fit nice without the grinding.

Am I messing up?

Keith

Keith,

The grinding is done to make the guide foot THINNER not shorter. Being thin does several things:

allows flex in the guide foot to bend with the rod
allows for nice thread wrappings
ease of getting wrappings up onto the guide foot
and maybe some more I cant think of

DR

It also reduces the amount of epoxy cracking around the guide feet. I've never seen any guide satifactorily ground from the factory. Many claim to be pre-ground, but not enough for my taste.

THEre is a guy who doesn't grind guides on his large surf rods, claims it doesn't make a difference since the epoxy will crack regardless. HEavier guides like BHNLG, BNLGH, and Hi Frame BSVLG's. THe ramp up the guide foot = wrap on top back and forth until the thread can sit on teh guide foot without slipping off. Gottta love Black on Black.

Forecast Guides already come Pre ground for easy wrapping.May need a touch up from time to time but helps save time $.

Pre-ground guides are the WORST. They're usually rough, have burrs, broken tips or worse. They look like somebody just takes them and sticks them up against a commerical grinding machine and then holds them there until the metal is glowing red. I worry the blue discoloration means that the temper has been taken out of the metal. I've sworn off pre-ground guides but that only leaves me with fuji. So I pay more but have good guide feet to at least start with.

In my opinion, Guide Prep is about the most important part of building a rod. I've yet to see a "pre-ground" guide that didn't need to be done over again (actually, I wish they would leave them alone so we could do them right). By making the guide foot thinner, with a gradual taper, you are enabling the guide foot to flex with the blank and prevent problems down the road.

Just my opinion!!

Mike

So you guys regrind the REC foot also? Haven't seen these but are they not supposedly flexible?

Thanks,
Mo