I recently bought a diamondback classic western fly rod blank in a 4wt and I have a couple of questions.
I was wondering about the thread wraps on the male and female spigot ferrules, I thinking that both need to have a thread wrap, but how long should they be?
Also wondering about the guide placement, starting from the tip, I'm using the following measurments:
4.5, 9.5, 15.25 ,21.75, 29, 36.5, 44.75, 54, 64.5, and 76. I am planning on using 2 stripper guides (pacbay TiC) and the rest are single foot TiC guides. Does anyone have a better placement measurment? Its the most expensive blank I have purchased to date, so I don't want to mess this up.
Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.

Bill,

Yes, wrap the ends of the spigot ferrules. About 1/1/2 times the diameter of the blank at that location is about right.

The spacings you list don't look anything like any I'd ever use on a 4 wt. Looks like they came off a chart. I'd support the tip better on a light blank and the first guide would be closer to the tip. If it's a 9 foot blank, your last guide is 32 inches up from the butt. Can you reach close enough to it to pick up the line easily? I'm 6 foot tall and have reasonable length arms, that's too far for me to 'reach' comfortably (it's close, but I'm usually in the 28 to 30 range there). I like to be able to comfortably reach out and get the line if I lose control of it (happens a lot to me), without having to change the rod angle. Nice thing about buildign a 'custom' rod, you make it to fit YOU.

If you really want to do it 'right':

Read the static placement article in the library here. I know it's hard for anyone to actually read instructions, but if you want to 'do it right' then you have to actually 'do it' and not rely on some chart. It takes a few minutes to do, but is well worth it in the end.

Good Luck!

Buddy

Buddy, thanks for the info. I looked up the static placement method and it does not seem all that difficult to do. I'm going to give it a try and see just how far off the chart that I was going to use is. Thanks again.

You can start with the measurements off a chart and then do the test and adjust from there.