I was talking with Tom McNamara at Mud Hole this afternoon. He was explaining the difficulty they were having taking the CCS measurements on their heavier blanks. The problem isn’t the CCCS - it’s the difficulty of securely holding a blank in a fixture while you apply that much weight (anyone that does static guide distribution on heavy rods knows what I’m talking about).

At any rate, a thought came into my head after I hung up the phone with him. The CCS operates the same way a tape measure does. But the CCS doesn’t yet have a tool with a built in scale, like a tape measure. It should.

So, suppose you had a sturdy fixture and were able to affix a rod in it, and then between the rod tip and a track on the base of the fixture, you connected a combination hand winch and scale. The scale would be pre-marked in either penny or ERN increments (this wouldn’t be hard to concoct). The track on the bottom of the fixture would allow the winch/scale to slide in order to keep the load straight down on the tip.

I’m going to take a look at building something along these lines for the 2010 Expo. It might be beyond the needs of the casual rod builder, but for anyone taking many measurements (manufacturers, high volume rod builders, etc.) this sort of thing could be a real boon, particularly on heavier blanks that require hundreds of pennies to deflect the blank the required distance. The winch/scale instrument itself won’t be hard to construct and would make taking the ERN measurements as easy as measuring length with a tape measure.

Anyone that wants to take their own stab at this, please do. One of us should have thought about this much sooner. It won't be that hard to do.


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The biggest issue I've had, regardless of blank "strength" or measuring system is attaching the retaining line to the tip.

Sure I can glue on a tip top, but what if I want to secure the weight 2 inches back to see the impact of a tip cut?

Haven't figured out that one, so I'd love to hear suggestions.

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Alex,

I'd Forhan-lock wrap a single foot snake fly guide at the cut-off point, no cp or finish.
It should be secure enough for fresh-water-powered rods, maybe not for the heavy stuff.

Tom, you may want to contact Jason at St. Croix. I know that he has something like you are talking about that they use for testing their blanks. I know it has a scale built into it and they mount the blank horizontaly and then use a t-track to slide the scale back until they get the bend in the rod that they want. It's kind of a neet set up.

That's exactly along the lines of what I'm thinking. In effect, they're doing the exact same thing but the particular scale they use is their own power scale (1-power, 2-power, 3-power, etc.) The only problem is that the CCS has so much more resolution it will take a much longer scale. But there's always a means to do it.

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A small take up rachet and spring scale should be all you need. If blank manufacturers are already using these type devices and they are available commercially, I would just obtain one of those and peel the scale off and attach one that had the CCS penny and-or ERN scale on it. Should not take long to plot the CCS scale on a specific scale. If this is for more powerful rods you really do not need increments of one penny each. You could go ten each.

I am sure you have already thought of this, but just in case, remember to allow for the weight of the tool when you make the scale.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/29/2009 09:19AM by Richard Kuhne.

Thanks, I had already taken that into consideration.

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There is a means to remove the physical weight of the device from the rod but it would entail doubling the physical size of the printed scale. I have to do a bit more thinking about all of this.

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Rod mounted horizontally approx 4-1/2 to 5 feet from floor.
Nylon pulley mounted to track on floor. Track allows pulley movement to align with rod tip.
Hanging weight scale mounted to ceiling joist.
Multiple pulleys may be mounted and utilized as block and tackle for more sensitivity and or load.

Eugene

For accurate weight measurements it seems the weight scale should move in conjunction with the pully.

Alex,
A month or so ago, I sent you what I thought would solve your problem. I never received any response. Did you get it?

It needs to be a simple rachet/scale without a lot of muss and fuss. I know how to do it. It's really just a matter of setting the scale to read increments of weight/pull equivalent to 10 pennies.


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At that point wouldn’t it be easier to abandon the whole penny as a unit of measure all together? I have always had a problem using the number of pennies as a unit of measure, I know you preach that it is purely relative and shouldn’t matter. The thing is we already have perfectly good units of measure for the weight required to load a rod blank to 1/3 of its working length, you could pick grams, ounces, pounds, or whatever you wanted and people would instantly know what you were talking about. The only reasonable explanation I have heard to use the number of pennies was to allow measurement without having to have a scale. To try to figure out how to calibrate a scale to simulate a unit of measure designed to eliminate the use of a scale seems like circular logic.

I have never used a penny to measure a blank, I use lead shot and measure the weight in grams. Then I measure the weight of the blank in grams and can calculate the power to weight ratio, which at least to me seems like a very important piece of information.

Tom,
just thinking out loud, but what about pulling up instead of down on the rod? Would this still work for some of the measurements? Then you start off with a scale you can set to zero;its hanging from the ceiling not the rod.

MIke,

The use of a penny was to provide a simple means for taking the measurements. It didn't require any the user to come up with something to load the rod with and then have to measure that amount of weight. Dropping pennies into a bag and just counting them dispensed with having to weigh anything, not to mention having to acquire a scale with that type of resolution. It didn't preclude anyone from using another weight source if they wanted to do so, it just dispensed with that trouble for those that didn't want to deal with it. Over all, I think it's still a pretty darn clever unit of measurement.

My thinking on such a tool would be provide the scale in both pennies and ERN - on opposite sides of the readout. Although I suppose the penny reading could be omitted altogether as the scale would be doing that part of the job for you.

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Lou,

If you were to pull up instead of down, then the weight of the blank itself, which the CCS takes into full account, would be lost. And that weight does matter. There is a way around this but it would add an extra step to the process.

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I am preparing a lecture for the High Point rod show in February and need some information about fishing rods other than fly rods. Therefore I am asking for assistance from members of this forum. Specifically, I want to relate the frequency of a fishing rod to the application for which an angler uses it.
To accomplish this, I would like to ask as many of you as possible to perform a simple test for me and report your results.
This test is to be performed on as many different kinds of rods you use in you fishing as possible—excluding fly rods, as I have enough data on them.
The test involves:
1. Set the butt of the rod at the edge of a table or shelf (as for determining CCS data). You can have a friend simply hold it down FIRMLY.
2. Attach (tape) a lead sinker of known weight (e.g. 1, 2, 5, or more ounces) to the tip (x in table below) and start it oscillating up and down. The weight should be sufficient to slow the oscillations to the point they can be easily counted.
3. Using your wrist watch or equivalent, determine how many seconds (y in table below) it takes for the rod to make 20 oscillations,
4. Report the following:
Type of rod:...................... Weight attached to tip...............Time, seconds
heavy bass, ..................................x............................................y
ultra light spinning,......................x............................................ y
surf,
live bait,
spey,
trolling,
popping,
tuna,
etc.

Please note if your data is for a rod blank as opposed to a finished rod.

Thank you for any assistance.

Dr Bill - I received it. Thank you very much. It works fine on lighter rods, but my higher power rods it still slips off.

My apologies for not responding sooner. I missed your post on here.

Thank you for being a help!

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