I am thinking about taking a G loomis bcr803 jig and worm series rod and rebuilding it because I want to use the blank. My question is what is the best way to remove the green finish from the blank? I want a natural matte carbon look with no finish at all. Can I sand the finish off, or can I use alcohol to remove it?

This is what I do.
Remove guides Take and wrap blank with paper towels place in bag that blanks come in. take out side and pour acetone into bag. Enough to soak towels not to fill bag let sit out side for an hour. Then take green scotch bright pad and scrub finish off while running garden hose over it. Finish will come off clean and easy, with out sanding into the blank and maybe causing some problems by sanding off to much. If you run into a stubborn spot wrap and soak it again. It will come off. Also if you don’t have a rod bag, pour the acetone into towels and wrap with saran wrap. The only purposes for the bag or saran wrap it to keep acetone from drying out.

I am "re-wrapping" some well-used factory GL3 rods for a bass fisherman friend who doesn't like the cloudy appearance on both the guide wraps and Loomis logo and rod information decal at the butt sections of the rods. Apparently, these areas are "wicking" water underneath the epoxy finish. Could a color preserver be the culprit... or, maybe, the paint finish on the black itself. I've noticed that alcohol will remove the finish.

Loomis doesn't use color preserver on their rods, black stays black with no CP. The cloudy appearance sometimes disappears if you just leave them in a dry place. Mine only do that if left in a damp environment and it will happen with anyone's epoxy job. The thread epoxies are not impervious to water. I've taken the matt black off a few spinning GL3s that I have rewrapped for myself as I'm not a fan of their guide spacing and prefer the concept system over theirs.

These Loomis rods were factory wrapped in a color that I would describe as dark gray or blue (my color perception is not the greatest). They are definitely not black. I may be mistaken on the GL3 designation (the rods are not in front of me now). GL2 maybe? The blank is painted matte black.

Thanks for the info, so putting paper towel soaked with acetone on the blank for an hour won't damage the blank? Also, will this remove the first foot or so, what I think is permaglos, after the foregrip(The area where the gloomis name and model # is)?

I don't know - I'd be EXTREMELY leary of soaking a blank in acetone. Acetone is a very powerfull solvent and will likely damage the resin in the blank.....

Acetone will not damage the blank. Have done it this way several times. Also now of another builder on this site that has posted info about soaking blanks in accetone for long piriods of time just to test it andthe blanks were not effected.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/14/2007 05:27PM by Steve Gardner.

Thanks, I will give it a try.

Jonathan;
not being familure with the finish on the loomis blank you may want to soak it for 30 minutes and see how that does. It may soften up the finish enough to accomplish what you want. If not after you remove what you can. you can soak it some more

I've also used some of the citrus paint/finish strippers to remove rod blank finishes with good results.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/15/2007 01:28AM by Spencer Phipps.

Acetone will, in fact, damage a rod blank if it reaches deeply into it. A light surface touch or wipe with acetone isn't going to hurt anything, but as far as actually soaking the blank in acetone, well... you're up against at least some element of risk of damage to the blank.

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