Hey Guys-

Ever break a rod while finding the spine? I spined 6 blanks last night and one of them broke. I have been building for 5 years and never have had this happen. Just wondering about any of your similiar experiences.

Thanks,
Dan Colville

It can certainly happen. I have no idea what method you use for determining spine. I've seen some methods that were very hard on rod blanks. In other cases a guy just gets a bad blank, or a blank that was damaged in shipping and it pops the first time it's flexed.

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I went years before breaking a rod by spining. Then I broke a few of them within a 2 month period. Problem was me, I used to grab teh tip with one hand, and the middle of teh blank with teh other, and put the rod into a 90 degree bend by pulling the tip. Problem was with heavier graphite rods it took a lot of pressure to flex the rod like this, and with my hand beingin the middle of teh blank, it caused the evil "high sticking" scenario which is responsible for so many rods breaking.

I wan tto make it clear I'm not blaming you for doing this, I'm jus relaying my past experiance.

Dan

When rod companies are pushing product out as fast as they can an occasional bad one gets through. I have been outwrapping for about twenty years and have done thousands of rods per year. Over the years I have had blanks break while wrapping guides on and even while taping guides on, it just happens. I've had maybe twenty five rods break out of over a hundred thousand . It is more common to find flaws in finish or in the blank itself than breaking one.


Thomas F. Thornhill

You should make a habit of giving every blank a really good workout flex before starting on it whether you spine them or not.
There's a hundred opportunities for a blank to be damaged before you get it and only one opportunity for you to check.
Imagine how heart broken you'd be if it had happened the first time the customer used it AFTER you spent 50 hours building the rod of his/her dreams.

This is why I always do a bit of test casting before I wrap and finish a blank. I even do it when I know a blank very well, or when the rod will not be cast (like a trolling rod) -- tape on a plate reel seat and fling a few casts, just to make sure the blank is not defective. Getting a dud is rare, but it can happen.

I could be wrong, but my guess is that you had a defect. I say this because A) you only broke one rod, not all six; B) I'm assuming that you did the same thing to each of these blanks; and C) that the rod broke as soon as you did something with it -- in my experience, defective blanks break as soon as you put any kind of stress on them. If the problem was you, I would think you'd have broken more than one of them.

I agree 100% with owen.
Even though you might think you are abusing the blank, be sure to give a new blank at least as deep a flex as it would ever encounter in routine fishing. Then, it makes sense to bend it about 20% further, just to give you a good feeling of assurance with the quality of the blank.

It is much better to find that you have a defective blank, immediately upon recipt of the rod "before" you either store it away, or start to build on the blank.

If the rod breaks during this test flex, it was defective, and all that you are out is the hassle of returning the blank for replacement.
Better to find it before you have hours in a build or right after a customer starts fishing with it.

You seldom find a defective blank, but if you do - better now than later.

Take care
Roger

Something came to mind and that regards one method of spine finding that involves holding the rod by the tip and laying the blank across the edge of a table while allowing the weight of the blank to create the flex. While this won't hurt most blanks, it's suicide on others. If you're doing it this way I advise that you change your method.

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