Hello all, I am a first timer here. Some of you may know Joe Preast and he has been helping me build my first custom. I am done now except for the guides.

Have any of you had experience with the American Tackle BCUE series of guides? I just ordered a set because the rings are blue and the rod I am bulding has a bunch of blue thread.

By the way Tom Kirkmans book on rod building was a very helpful start!!!

If I can figure out how to post pictures on here I will add some of the rod I am building.

Dave Digirolamo: "If I can figure out how to post pictures on here I will add some of the rod I am building."

GOTO: [www.rodbuilding.org]
REGISTER THERE ALSO, THEN LOG-IN
Then CLICK-ON the "UPLOAD PHOTOS" Button
on the RED BAR near the TOP of any given Page.
Unless you are Logged-In, you will not be able to UpLoad.

Dave,
First of all welcome. Second, I used the guides your referring to and they work fine. They are a little heavier (probably because of the ring) then some other similar type guides but if weight isn't a big factor you'll do fine with them. And, they do look pretty cool. What type of rod are you putting them on? Randy.

I have used them as well and they seem to be a very sound guide. You will like the color as it adds another dimension to the rod. Mark

Thanks all for the input.

I am putting these guides on a Rainshadow SWS1027 blank. The blank is 8'6" and medium fast rated at 3/4-4 ounces of lure. Seems to me to bend more like a medium action than a fast but I am new to this.

The blank is rate for 3/4- 4 oz lures and it will throw 3 ounces a very far distance. I temporarily taped up some fuji guides and threw some weight but but I did not have a full set of matching guides so I bought the American Tackle BCUE set. I am using a 16mm 1st guide then a 12 then (2) 10mm and (4) 8mm and an 8mm tip top. Now that I type it out it looks like a lot of guides for that rod. Maybe I can skip one of the 8mm. I will have to load test it and see what I can get away with.

I talked to American Tackle today (I already ordered the guides) and they told me they match up very well with Fuji SiC guides but are slightly heavier.

I am looking forward to getting them and testing the rod out.

They are fine guides, I've had a set on my favorite crankbait rod for quite some time and they have really gotten a WORKOUT without fail. I'd buy another set.

DR

Dave,
I tried to e-mail you a tutorial on posting pix but your e-mail address is hidden. If you click on MY CONTROL CENTER at the top of the message list and click on EDIT E-mail and enter your e-mail address and check VERIFY, people will be able to click on your name on a post and e-mail you direct.



Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

Mike,

I updated my email settings. Also tried to upload a few photos of my rod but I guess I better read the post on how to do it!!

Dave

Yeeehaw I figured it out. I have posted 3 pictures of my first project in Misc pictures.

Dave,

Try to size your photos a bit smaller and they'll load a lot more quickly. 800 pixels square is about all you need. You can do this in your image editing program under the "resize" frame in the "edit" menu.

If you're just bringing them right in from your camera, choose the lowest quality setting. In digital, "quality" is really just another word for "size." It has to do with how many pixels you need in order to display at a certain size. The internet is a low resolution medium and cannot display high quality images. They'll still show at 72dpi no matter what.


.................

I used several sets and love them.Only one had a corrosion problem from not being cleaned after salt water use.

Freddwhy (Rapt-Ryte)

Those are sweet guides! Nice job on the rod!!. Life as you now know it is over. I hope your wife is very understanding!

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

Dave - Really nice Diamond Wrap. ... If and when you wish to create a Cross-Wrap pattern whose diamond intersection has more of a perfectly SQUARE shape, and some more OPEN-space between the bands:
For a standard, two-axis (000 & 180 degrees) Cross-Wrap Diamond:
SPACING INTERVAL = PI * OD = Rod Blank CIRCUMFERENCE

For an OPEN-wrap Cross-Wrap, that is about all you need to know at this time. Eventually, if you continue to do many LONG Cross-Wraps, with more than ~ 5-6 Diamonds, you wil notice the innate Pattern Distortion of the Angles of Intersection and the accordion-like compression or expansion of the Open Space between the Band of Thread.

That is because of rod blank's TAPER. There are several convenient ways to reduce or minimize these distortion effects. But that is a subject for later discussion. Fewer centers; narrower bands; open-wraps (rather than "closed-wraps"); and something called the "Taper Offset Layout" will help. ...

Some great tutorials are available in videos, DVDs, booklets, (personal) websites & computer software to help with Butt Wrap patterns, and VisualWRAP is among them.

Have fun, ... B)- ... Cliff Hall

WARNING: Rod-building, and day-dreaming about it,
can become habit-forming, and may be hazardous to
other relationships. Participant discretion is advised.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/22/2006 02:26AM by Cliff Hall.

Keep it up Dave and welcome!

Raymond Adams
Eventually, all things merge, and a river runs through it..

Mike, that was pretty funny. My wife used to think she would see more of me in the winter time because I was not fishing and hunting but now she will not see me unless she visits the basement workshop lol.

Tom, thanks for the info about picture sizing. Your rod-building guide book has excellent pictures that helped me tremendously. The butt wrap that I did was based on the wrap you show in the book.

Thanks for all the feed back about the guides I cant wait to get them on the rod. I will post pictures of that as soon as I get them on the rod.

Dave

Dave :

I've used them on the last 5 rods that I have built. I liked them so well that I had to keep 3 and build the other 2 twice... Like they say you can't have too many???? WE ALL NEED HELP !!! By the way Cliff Hall has seen them. Well 2 of them.


Tight Lines
Bill Rice

P.S. I fished them yesterday and I'm going out the door now to try them again. It's a great sickness......

Beautiful guides, and beautiful rods, Bill.
I got an e-mail going your way later this weekend
about the MudHole Open House, Sat. Oct. 7th. -Cliff Hall.

Very nice Dave! Welcome aboard.

I'm thinking those guide rings would look great on my SCIV. I wish they came on a tall titanium frame for spinning rods.

Chuck

Very good guides and they really compliment certaincolor patterns for wraps and butt wraps.

Uncle Russ