Good evening gents,
I have yet another question for you all. I have been looking at many of the factory ul's that I have here at the house and got to thinking... I know, I know it can lead to disasterous results at times... ie 2 piece 4'6" ul from a one piece blank equals BIG pop and broken rod!! LOL I noticed that most of the butt guides are placed at about 15" from the face of the reel as it sits on the rod from the factory. I have built on similar blanks and from what I can find most suggestions are from 18-22 inches... My personal rods are at about 16.75 or so inches. The blank that I am playing with is the 2s46ulm.. Am I setting them up short? I typically set them up with a BYAG20

thanks for the help and have a good one gents

Tom Kaufmann
GySgt USMC

Those super short UL's are usually used with really tiny spin reels (like Shakespeare/Pflueger 25's), and aren't doing a lot of distance casting, hence they can get away with closer locations.
Now, even a short UL built on a 1 piece section can be just as strong, provided the ferrule is fitted well and flexes with the blank. Don't be afraid to use a slightly thicker walled fibreglass sleeve, and if the weight is an issue, build it as a staggered 2 piece, with the ferrule right in front of the handle.

That's a really good tip that Ted just gave you - you don't have to put the ferrule in the exact middle of the rod. In fact, they're easier to build affect the rod balance less if you put them closer to the butt than the tip. On such a short rod, you might get away with Ted's advice and put one right in front of the handle, or even within the handle itself.

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

thanks Ted and Tom. I will certainly try that the next time I get a wild hair to make a pack rod out of a small UL.. I built it as a test as I had a request to build a small pack rod for fishing the Sierra's while I lived out in Cali. I ended up going with a travel blank that I dropped sections from and it worked out quite well.

thanks and I will definately file the placement of the ferrules in the ole memory banks for future reference.

Tom