G'day Guys,

I'm building a 10-15kg standup rod at the moment. I'm using a slick butt and decided to arbor it with graphite arbors. My largest reamer (the largest of the Batson reamers) falls a fair way short of being big enough to ream the arbors to fit. Does anyone make a reamer that is about 0.75" (19mm) at the rear and about 18mm at a point 300mm forward of this?

If not, do you reckon I could ream on the rod i.e. attach some of the abrasive strip directly to the rod blank temporarily and use this to ream the grip? I'm starting to think I was being too clever here and should have just used drywall mesh.

Cheers

Jason

Jason .......... you could try turning a hardwood dowel to slightly smaller then the taper and then epoxy grit to the dowel with a lot of grit pushed into the epoxy. Let it fully cure for a couple of days and then ream out some practice cork or wood to take off any loose grit. This should give you a good reamed fit. I know some say that they have had problems of grit coming off and scratching a blank but by letting it fully cure and reaming some practice pieces I've never had the problem.

YOu can't hand ream a 1" long arbor? you should be able to hand ream that arbor with the smallest sized reamer, you are overthinking.

Billy,

I'm not sure what you mean. I'm guessing that you are talking about reaming the arbors before gluing them in the slick butt. I glued them in the butt first and now have to ream them. It probably would have been better to do it the other way around.

Jason

OHHHHH!!!! MY bad. I was talking about reaming them prior to installing on teh blank. I have no idea what the OD of teh blan kis or ID ofthe Slick butt, if the arbors are going ot be paper thin then you really won't be able to ream before installing on the blank (try wrapping masking tape around them before you do, if it splits it doesn't matter, instal it on teh blank with epoxy and glue the split where it broke, then wrap thread around the arbor).

Since they are alrady glued up, try wrapping teh sandpaper around the blank like you suggested. I had a friend who would make a mess out of everythign he did, he's put double stick tape on teh blank, attach a sheet of sandpaper, then ream his grips onteh actual blank. IT atually worked as long as he dind't ream overly aggrasive. Was a mess taking D stick tape off.

Jason I agree with Billy. Caution if you use grit, grit well come off and can score the blank. How about using a large dia. round file ? Where are you located?On the East or the West side of the land down under. My folks use to live in Perth on Safety Bay. My Mum was an OZZY LOL

Good Wraps Bob



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/09/2010 03:16AM by Bob Balcombe.

Guys, thanks for all the input. I will try doing it the other way next time i.e. ream first and then glue to blank, then slip butt over and glue. The arbors won't be paper thin so this will probably work OK. For this rod I will either ream by using a strip of sandpaper on the blank or try Richards idea. I also rang my local tackle store and they may have a broken blank for me to turn into a reamer.

Bob, I'm in the South East, in Tasmania, the island state. So 4 or 5 thousand kilometres from where your Mum was.

Cheers

Jason

Jason What type of fish do you search for. and do you do any Black Marlin and giant Grouper fishing? I live in Western Washington (USA) near the coast

Good Wraps Bob

Wait a sec....if you have the arbors already glued in the slick butt wouldn't you have to over ream the arbor closer to the reel seat so it can pass over the gimbal end of the blank???

Jason,
It is really quite simple.
Just use one of the reverse boring bits to ream out the arbor and grip.
Go to the local hardware store, purchase the blade bit that you need with a long handle on it.
Take it to your grinder and sharpen the back side of the bit. Pull the handle through the grip, insert it into your drill and pull it back through your grip- drilling and reaming as you come back.
Come about 3/4s of the way through.
Then, take the bit out of the drill, remove the bit from the handle, reverse the handle and repeat the process for the balance of the handle.

The entire process will take you less than a minute.

Take care
Roger

Russel,

The slick butt is going on the rod first, so it will be glued in place before the reel seat therefore no need to install it from the back end.

Roger, Unfortunatley the blank has a bit of taper so reaming as you suggest would not give a very good fit.

Anyway, I decided to try ream on the rod last night. Luckily I have 2 of these blanks so I can ream on one and try on the other. I wrapped some grit paper I got with my reamers around the blank in the area that would give me the correct reamed diameter. I used electrical tape to hold down the bottom end of the grit and a small spot of superglue to hold the top (will be under the grip anyway) and used the rod blank as a reamer. This worked out just fine and has given me a good fit.

Thanks all of you for your input.

Jason

If you plan on making a lot of these rods, get a piece of scrap tapered blank and glue the reamer tape on for the next one. A lot easier.

Bill - willierods.com