I am putting together a lightweight (graphite) , fast action rod for targeting yellowtail from a kayak. I will be using Fugi Nsg guides. The question I am pondering is whether or not to underwrap the guides. That whole weight, performance, aesthetic thing. Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Also, if I do underwrap, what product would you recommend for coating the underwrapping before wrapping the guides? All thinking on these important life decisions would be very appreciated.. Bill

NOT!

I like underwraps on this type of gear since the whole weigt performance thing is mute - Yellowtail arent what you call finesse biters. Some other species may be a different matter.

Bill,
There was an article in RodMaker about a year ago and one of the things that it showed as a result of a bunch of measurements was the affect of the added weight of under wrapping guides. It turns out that the total weight of the wraps and epoxy can be almost as much as the weight of the guides and can significantly reduce the performance of any rod that will be used to cast with.
If it is a light weight rod that you are building that you will be casting with then you definitely do not want to under wrap the guides. You want to use as light weight guides as practical and no more epoxy on the guides than is necessary.

Doc,
It is not just a question of the affect that under wrapping will have on sensitivity or feel. The added weight significantly lowers the rods resonant frequency. This means that with the added weight of under wraps the rod will also not cast as far or will require more effort to cast a given distance.
Adding weight has basically the same affect as lowering the modulus of elasticity. It makes no sense to me to pay for an intermediate modulus or even a high modulus blank and under wrap the guides and as a result get the performance of a less expensive standard modulus blank.

I don't underwrap anything but the heaviest saltwater trolling rods and only unerwrap those because the customers are trying to match the colors of their boat and reels and they seem to expect them to be underwrapped. I think it's done more for looks than function.

Emory

As always I stant corrected.

FOR Bill Lane's particular application, wouldn't it still be worth while to recommend a locking wrap on the guides?

RON>

An NSG is a casting guide Ron.

I guess I'm old school like Doc because I prefer underwraps on my 25lb+ graphite rods that are going to take a beating, and a Yak rod's going to take a beating, like it or not. I think the piece of mind in knowing that the blank is protected from the guide foot is worth the foot or two of casting distance that the added weight will add to a rod of that line class. I know, I know, guide foot prep is all the protection you need, so I guess I'll just call it insurance if nothing else. I don't think my underwraps have cost me any Yellowtail.

Bill, if you want to coat the underwraps, just use finish as you would on the overwraps.

Mark Griffin
[]
C&M Custom Tackle
San Dimas, California

Mark,
If you want the rod to be tough because it is going to take a beating then it makes more sense to make the rod out of standard modulus graphite or even fiberglass. The strain energy or toughness goes up as the modulus of elasticity goes down. Standard modulus graphite will have roughly 25% higher strain energy or toughness than intermediate modulus or almost 50% higher toughness than high modulus graphite. Fiberglass will be almost 400% tougher than standard modulus graphite.
On heavy duty boat rods it may be good insurance and the little extra weight is not going to have a significant affect on the performance of that type of rod but on lighter rods particularly ones that will be used to cast then in my judgment under wraps make no sense.
I do not think that fiberglass will cost you any Yellowtail either.

I always use the Forhan locing wrap on single footed guides. It takes no more effort, doesn't increase the weight, and gives so much more strength that I don't see any reason not to use it.
Steve Broadwell

My bad assuming he wasn't using a high modulus graphite. Not a good idea in that application. Something along the lines of a Grafighter or a Rainshadow RCBL is much lighter than their glass counterparts and are the most common in that application. High modulus on the open charters I fish is asking for trouble. I even underwrap my glass blanks in that line class as most factories do.

Emory, this something you probably know, and I've always been curious about. On a high modulus blank of say 8' with nine guides, how much of an effect WOULD underwrapping the guides have in casting 1 - 1-1/2oz. on 20-25lb line? Feet? Yards? The same has me curious as to guide weights. I know it's a difference that you can feel as far as sensitivity, but is it one that can be seen/measured in casting that class of rod as we're talking grams here rather than ounces?

BTW, I'm probably 10:1 on the YT with glass over graphite for what it's worth.

Mark Griffin
[]
C&M Custom Tackle
San Dimas, California

Mark Griffin Wrote:
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> On a high modulus blank of say 8' with nine guides, how much of an effect WOULD underwrapping the guides have in
> casting 1 - 1-1/2oz. on 20-25lb line? Feet? Yards? The same has me curious as to guide
> weights. I know it's a difference that you can feel as far as sensitivity, but is it one that can
> be seen/measured in casting that class of rod as we're talking grams here rather than ounces

WHy stop with a high modulus blank - how much of a difference would it make in ANY blank with those specs. This whole weight thing is a relative thing - if you're building a rod which completed will be 4oz, adding 1/4oz of weight will have much more of an effect than a rod which will end up weighing 8oz. In other words, in ACTUAL FISHING usage, teh addition of underwraps on the quoted rod will be negligible so if you like how they look use them, if not don't. Mark, all you would have to do is wrap 2 of the same model blank and fish them side by side to see that it doesn't make a difference whatsoever.

Having said that, if he REALLY wasnts to make a rod and feel a difference in weight, he should use TNSG's instead of regular NSG's, as the weight differenc between these 2 guides is signifiant enough to feel a difference while actually fishing.

Last time I checked NSG's were a pretty heavy guide...I wouldn't think a couple grains of underwrap would make much of a difference in resonance frequency or dampening or whatever. Do what you feel is right and make it the way you want it to look...is my "what its worth".

MJ

NERB that types with a bar of Ivory soap in his mouth.

Mark,
The testing that I did for the article in RodMaker (Volume 8, Issue3) was mainly on 9' Steelhead rods (Rainshadow IST1084) that were rated at 8lb-12lb and had relatively fast actions and intermediate modulus. I used light weight V framed guides and used 8, 9, 10 and 11 guide configurations. I also measured the difference using small U framed guides. In each case I started with size 10 and dropped down to size 6 guides.
I measured the weight of the guide, the thread and the epoxy separately but found that with size A thread the weight of the total wrap for short wraps was about 65% of the guide weight. With under wraps, using Size A under wrap and size D over wrap the weight of the wrap was actually more than the weight of the guide. Most of this weight comes from the epoxy. I found the epoxy to be surprisingly dense. Where additional weight is added makes a great deal of difference. A weight of a single additional guide near the tip has a large affect but the weight of the same guide farther back on the rod has much less affect. With each guide configuration I spaced the guides using a modified static method.
I found that for each additional light weight V framed guide plus A wrap that I added the resonant frequency of the rod dropped about 7%. For each additional guide and wrap that was under wrapped the drop in resonant frequency for this particular blank was almost 15%.
A drop in the resonant frequency of 15% is significant. This means that the maximum tip velocity, which will determine casting distance, will also drop 15% for an unloaded rod or in other words for a rod casting terminal tackle that weighs nothing. But as the terminal tackle, the weight that is being cast, gets heavier and heavier the added weight of the guides has less and less affect and the weight of the terminal tackle starts to be the main factor determining the overall resonant frequency and casting distance.
For your example of an 8' high modulus rod, with 25# line casting 1 to 1 1/2 oz. I could only make a wild guess, the power of the rod is going to make a great deal of difference, but I think I can say that the difference in the maximum casting distance between under wrapping the guides and not under wrapping them is going to be yards not feet.

Thread doesn't really protect the blank. Underwaps don't serve that purpose. A sharp guide underfoot will cut the thread even more easily than it will cut into the rod blank's surface.

Rods that have guides positioned on top, sometimes benefit from underwraps as the thread makes a less slipperly surface (particularly when CP or finish has been applied to the underwrap and the guide tends to sink into it just a bit). So the torque on the guides isn't as likely to cause the guide to twist or slip under the wrap. That's the real purpose that underwraps were designed for. Go back many years and you find that most guides had very narrow feet - against a slick blank they were sometimes prone to slip under the wraps. But the advent of stamped guides with wider feet and better thread coatings have relagated underwraps to the cosmetic arena for the most part.

But, everything Emory says about underwraps and weight should certainly be considered if you're really after the lightest, most efficient rod. If not, or if the rod itself is heavy enough that the weight of the underwraps only increases the overall weight by a very tiny percentage, then throw that out the window and underwrap it to your heart's content.


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Billy,
I have read a number of your posts about the rods you build and I guess for the rods that you build I would agree with you that a little extra weight is not going to make much difference. However, for the lightweight rod that Bill is considering I would not be quite so dogmatic if I were you about the weight of under wraps being negligible in actual use.

You can always split the difference and use false underwraps. Get the same look with a lot less thread.

Emory, I would think that since he's using NSG's, that the rod is a bit on the heavier side. I think if he is worried abotu adding too much weight, the most effective way to cut down weight would be to use lighter guides instead of skipping an underwrap. I wish I had data saved in grains, and I wish I weighed NSG's vs. TNSG's, all I can provide is that when I weighed BLNAG's size 8 on my crappy scale, each guide weighed .015oz, adn the Titnaium version weighed .010. Stick 8 of them on the rod, and you'll have a total weight savings of .04oz, which really isn't much - but I'm sure with the NSG guides it will be more significant. I also weighed 12" closed butt wraps which I cut off, complete with a coat of CP and 3 coats of epoxy, and it barely weighed more than a guide. Again, my cale was crap so I cannot verify how much it actually wieghed.

Where the weight is located has a great deal to do with how it will affect the rod. I doubt a butt wrap has ever upset any rod very much, but even slight extra weight on the upper 1/3rd of the rod can have a noticeable effect on rod performance.

But again, you have to use some common sense when deciding on these things.

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