Hi guys,

Got me a 9wt striper rod all built up and took her out for a test run this morning. Loved everything about her, except for one thing,... I messed up wrapping and finish the the TSG running guides!

Having never used these guides in the past, I fear that I may not have wrapped a little short of what was needed, and applied finish a little too far forward. Seems the part that kicked me was that little angled run that sits between the guide's foot and the guide's ring housing.

Appears that the epoxy that wicked up into that little gap (which, based off of my previous experience finishing standard wire style single footers, was believed desirable) is now seperating away from the blank once the rod or the guide is flexed.

Looks like I'm gonna have to cut them all off and rewrap and refinish... But I'm not sure how to not repeat the same result.

Would much appreciate it if someone could talk me through how far forward to wrap and finish this specific style of guide... A picture would be the cats the meow! But I'll take whatever help I can get!!! Caught my first striper ever today, and I'm dyin to get back out a do 'er again!!!

Thanks a million gang,

Nate H.

Nate,

I'm just about to sit down to wrap a similar rod tonite.

Did you use locking wraps ahead of the guide foot? Check out the library link above.

Hope this helps,
RW

Rick,

I have always used locking wraps on single foot wire guides in the past, but the angled portion of these ceramics makes it kinda awkward so I didn't use them this time... seems like using a locking wrap in front of this style frame would almost certainly neccessitate finish the wrap forward of the guide itself, resulting in the same problem I'm currently trying to aviod.

Of course, the extra thread forward of the guide might anchor the epoxy to the blank and help keep the angled portion of the guide from lifting away, but then again, maybe not.... sure would like to aviod a second strip down and re-refinish. lol

Looking at it, it would almost seem as though I need to end my wrap well back from the where the frame juts outward away from the blank, and make sure I keep my finished a few thread widths short it as well... dunno really,... just wanna get her done and done right and get on to them blitzin fishies!

Nate

Nate,
If I understand the problem you are describing I don't think that you want to shorten your wrap and you also want to be sure that you have epoxy a little past the wrap, about 1/8", and epoxy in the tunnel so I think that I would suggest that you wait until the epoxy just starts to set up and then use something like a tooth pick to carefully remove the excess epoxy ahead of the guide foot.

Nate,

Emory is pretty much bang on here. I have recently built about five fly rods using the T-SG guides. I used the Forhan lock and my first two effoerts were not salable. I got scalping on the first where the tunnel sucked away too much high build meaning I had to revisit the rod the next day and the result was a bit ugly. Completealy functional but ugly as you could see the line where I had filled in. The second attempt I had your problem with too big a gob of high build. I hate to see this on any guide. So Like Emory I found my solution was to wait a while and then with a darning needle remove the wicked up high build. I also use a piece of D thread like Dental floss to get right in underneath. If you get the timing right the epoxy does not flow down from above and cause a repeat of the problem. Leave it too long and you can get a mess. Better to go too soon than too late for this trimming operation. You can always add more epoxy from the point of the needle and it will get absorbed. Sometimes you will have to remopve the gob of epoxy two or three time until it settles down to where you want it. It is almost impossible in my experince to not get a bit of wicking but it can be reduced to acceptable levels

These TSG rings can be tricky because of the shape. Now I only wrap the part of the foot that is actually in contact with the blank. Look at the underside of the guide and you can se exactaly where it ends. As a general rule I only wrap this way for any ring. I never start wrapping up the curve . It does you no good at all and you get the epoxy problem you describded. Better one turn of thread too short than one too long.

Because of the shape of this guide you will never acheive the almost no gap finish that you see on the Forhan lock in the Library. You have to accept that you will see a fair bit of metal, and some blank near the tunnel area even with a three turn lock, so what it's honest and it does not look bad at all.

On another front I have had these rings om my saltwater fly rods for 8 years and no rust. My rods are well used and get very wet as I swim out to rocks to cast on occasions.

They are worth every cent you paid for them. I don't even consider them expensive anymore when I look at the total cost. LIke not having to rebuild because of corroded guides.

Hope this helps

Regards

Mike Oliver