Got a rod back from a friend of mine that tourney fish's, missing 3 spiral wrapped micro guides. He stated: "I was in a hurry and was taking the rod from my rod locker and ripped off 3 guides".

In reality, he BROKE off 3 guides right at the bend of each guide frame. All three Forhan locked guide feet were left under the wraps and never moved the tiny-est bit.

No CP, metallic thread.

Seeing how well my wraps held up, I don't mind replacing the 3 guides one bit.

[www.rodbuilding.org]


DR



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/18/2010 12:58PM by Duane Richards (DR).

Yep, something has got to give. Which micro guides?

Raymond in your case they were strong enough!

The key words were " a friend of mine"!

If that rod was sold commercially to a stranger they were not strong enough!

Rod warrantys typically cover " defective materials and workmanship'!

Do you have the ablity to distinguish between a defective component or one that has been missused?

I sure wish I could!

Did you charge your friend for the time spent on removal, replacement and the cost of the failed guide.

Did you attempt to recover the cost of the "failed" guide from the manufacturer.

There are many attempting to put all of this in words.

Bill,

no no and no LOL!

Definitely misused, surely not the fault of the guide or maker and totally FREE, even the original complete rod was free.....hard to beat eh? :-)

DR

I guess I don't see the benefit. If the wraps are strong enough to break a guide it's strong enough to break a rod. I would rather have the guides come out.

I always wrapped using the Forhan method but after discussing it with a friend who knows quite a bit more than me about it I'm having second thoughts.

I have been wondering about the benefits of the Forhan wrap as well. I have built two complete rods and have two more that I am in the process of finishing. I have been using the Forhan method since I started building rods. However, I don't know that it really benefits me. I have never pulled a guide out on any rod I have ever owned, factory or custom. The fact that I fish from a jon boat instead of a bass boat with rod lockers and rod tubes might be one reason. Ever since I read this thread I have been considering the benefits of the standard wrap vs. the Forhan method. I think the Forhan method may be better suited for regular guides. With a standard guide wrapped with the Forhan method, you should be able to feel it jam against a rod tube and stop before it breaks. However, a micro guide is probably more fragile and is more likely to snap in this situation. Personally, I would rather pull a guide loose than break it off. A guide that pulls out can be fixed on the water with tape or glue, however, a broken guide can't. I guess the real solution to this problem is to be careful when extracting rods from their tubes and place all the rods you plan to use on the deck before you start fishing. This will provide less opportunity to carelessly jerk a rod out from a tube when you are in a hurry and the adrenaline is pumping.

Ben,
I have found that for virtually any conventional sized guide down to about a size 8 or so, the guide foot is long enough with flanges, that a conventional wrap normally is good assurance against guide pull out.

However, for any guides that have a shorter foot, or if the guide foot simply has a straight taper, with no hooks to help hold the wrap, then I think that the locking wrap really helps avoid guide removal.

Take care
Roger

To pull a single foot guide out from a standard wrap takes very little effort.

To break a guide, much less 3 of them, on wraps with Forhan Locking Wraps, takes considerable effort. Rest assured that this fellow really ripped that rod out of his rod locker. Guides don't break that easily.

I wouldn't stop using the Forhan Wrap due to this scenario. I think Duane was just pointing out that he feels he's doing a good job on his locking wraps.

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

Keep using the Forhan wrap - and if your guides come with the little flange on the foot - grind it off when you do your guide prep! You get a much claner looking wrap that way - and the Forhan wrap gives the strength you need.

I use the forhan locking wrap on all my guides regardless of the size. this gives me a place to add a trim wrap before and after the guide wrap and ensures that the guide is in as secure as I can make it.

Rolly Beenen
Rovic Custom Rods

There are several different micro guides on the market and more headed our way , Each has completely different pull out characteristics. Pull test data exists on all. Production builders are using this data to select designs that will minimize warranty claims. A single foot stainless steel guide guide frame will fail quite easily, like Raymond reports, if it has been cold worked by the user bending it back vertical a couple of times to get it straight. The Forhan wraps do not have a chance to help if this occurs. When you see a guide pull or frame separation failure & the Forhan locking wraps not broken there were other reasons for the failure.

Tom is exactly right, I was kinda "tooting my own horn" for the strength of my wraps. I never dreamed they'd hold well enough to sheer off 3 guides!

Now, on the Forhan wrap..... if you're not using it, you're missing out in my humble opinion. I've pulled out single foot guides on everything from a Bass rod to a Musky rod, and like stated: if you grind your feet properly and remove the "wings", any single foot guide can be pulled out rather easily. Ask me how I know..... I've done it several times.

Forhan locking wraps make single foot guide wrapping's a LOT stronger, they encircle the foot, grip it, and hold it.

Lets face it, most of us will never treat a rod like Tommy did this one. He'd never seen a spiral wrap or heard of a micro guide before, mix this with a little fishing excitement and a brand new boat with an unfamiliar rod locker and you have what my photo shows you. HIS fault! and he knows that as well as we all do.

My rods get more abuse than most, I spend a lot of time night fishing for Striped Bass with light weight Bass rods, and a lot of time river fishing, these two things are the HARDEST on all equipment.....and I wont make my own rod without the Forhan locking wrap, that should tell you something.

DR

I'm surprised that I have suffered very little guide damage over the years and have never pulled a guide out. I will keep using the Forhan wrap on all of my rods to help prevent future problems. I like the way the Forhan wrap looks and my guides feel a lot more secure when wrapped in this manner. It makes sense that smaller guides would be much easier to pull out. The feet of the size 6 Fuji Hardloy and Alconite guides I have been using are short and narrow, so I would assume that they would be fairly easy to pull out if I had not used the Forhan wrap. I would be interested to see how much force it would actually take to pull a guide out (I have a few broken rods I might experiment with). I have yet to try micro guides, though I might try a set on one or two of the Castaway HG40 blanks I got recently.

DR;
What brand of Epoxy did you use in this rod?

The finish protects the thread. The thread is what holds the guide on. Some here have said they CPed guides and they have stayed in place.

Bill - willierods.com

Bill;
That has been the general opinion for years, but there have been some "Pull Studies" done in the last few months that have proved that some epoxies hold better then others when it comes to Micro guides.

Not saying that all epoxies even when using CP won’t hold Micro guides.
Just that some hold better then others.

I am just stating what has been said HERE many times. I do not believe every thing but makes common sense to me. I can also think of the thread-less wraps that have been done ??? never done them and do know how strong they are, but also are they stronger then thread wrapped guides ???

Bill - willierods.com

The wraps on this rod had NO CP and the finish used was Flex Coat Lite.

I don't normally use FC lite, but tried it during the duration this rod was built.

DR

I think the real issue in this case is that it was a free rod. If said friend had spent his hard earned money buying the rod he would have been more careful handling it and had he broken one guide he would have really been careful afterwards. It makes a difference when its costing you money instead of knowing your friend will fix it free of charge.

Les,

There was never an "issue".

I was ONLY trying to point out that my wraps were a lot stronger than I thought they ever were, and to show everyone else that micro guide wraps can be very strong, stronger than most think.

DR