Hi All,

I have been a lurker here for a long time and built a couple of great fly rods for myself based on advice I have gleaned. Thank you. But I recently purchased a rod from another builder over the internet and am a bit concerned about a couple things and wanted to run it by some experts before I made a decision. I understand, when I build a rod for myself I can take as long as I want to get it the way I want; a one man shop just can't afford to do that on every rod. Perhaps I am being overly critical of this new rod. Any advice is appreciated.

Some background on the rod: It's a fly rod, the guides I am referring to below are only the snake guides. It is a custom rod, but it is the low end of this builders line of rods.

My concerns:

Some of the guide feet are noticeably burned from the grinding process. This isn't particularly attractive; but would this have compromised the strength of the guide sufficiently to warrant concern?

One of the guide feet is exposed, meaning at the transition from blank to guide foot there is probably one wrap that didn't seat properly and thus the guide foot is exposed for that one wrap. Probably not a big deal, the foot wasn't ground flat enough or the wrap was carelessly placed; it does have finish coating it over it; again it isn't particularly attractive but probably not a concern.

One of the snake guides near the tip consistently clicks. It has been my understanding that this is usually caused by the finish that forms a bridge from the blank to where the guide is just beginning to turn away from the blank. Hopefully that makes sense. But perhaps there are other causes?

And again with the bridging of finish from the blank to the guide where it turns away from the blank. I understand that it is necessary to get finish around the foot of the guide so water is unable to penetrate that small hollow that is formed to each side of the guide foot. But in this instance the finish is carried away from the wraps causing a significant bridge of epoxy. It has been my experience this almost always begins to part from the blank and sometimes it causes that clicking sound as described above or sometimes it just deteriorates to some extent.

I was hoping to get others feedback on this. Most of the issues seem cosmetic to me and probably not really worth making a fuss about. The builder is fairly well regarded, so perhaps I am truly being too critical.

Thanks for any insights,
Justin

Guides that are held against a grinding wheel are easily "burned" which can remove the temper from the material. It's not a huge problem although the ends of the feet can break off. But again, this isn't going to have much of an adverse effect on anything. In fact, most commercial makers buy guides that are "pre-ground" from the guide manufacturers (your's may be as well) and they're generally ground and "burned." They work and hold up for a decent time period.

No, it's not as good as it could be and certainly not top notch work. But I have no idea what you paid nor what the expertise of your builder is. You're right, however, most of this is cosmetic and isn't going to likely make much difference in terms of function or longevity.

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

If the builder is fairly well regarded then the concerns you speak of are unacceptable. Otherwise you have nothing more than a production rod . Attention to detail and quality workmanship are what one is to expect when purchasing a custom fishing rod.

Freddwhy (Rapt-Ryte)

Most of what you describe is quality of workmanship issues, and should never happen on a custom rod. As for the clicking sound, I have trouble believing it is coming from a guide, could it be a ferrule instead?

Hi Phil,

It's definitely the guide. I isolated it by breaking the rod down, then flexed each section from guide to guide until I narrow it down to one of two guides. Not sure that really makes sense. Furthermore, one of the two suspect guides has a small crack in the finish. Bummer, this one is going back I'm afraid; didn't even get to cast it. I had a St Croix that exhibited a similar clicking behavior, I was on the river when it started and found that when I chipped out that small bridge of finish that I spoke of earlier the clicking ceased. As best as I was able to determine, the bridge of finish had come unattached from the blank and that was causing the clicking noise. But maybe I shifted or bent the guide slightly in the process and that healed the click, hard to determine.

Thank you for the replies guys, I appreciate it. There are just too many small things wrong with this build for me to overlook without talking to the builder.

Justin



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/29/2010 11:12PM by Justin A Sharpe.

If he is worth his salt he will make the repairs.

Bill - willierods.com

These symptoms are indicative of poorly done or inexperienced guide prep and finish applications. You can grind guide feet without burning them. If you do make a burn mark, it can be polished off simply. The end of the guide foot should never protrude through the wrap, even on an inexpensive rod. This will crack over time and allow moisture under the wrap. It may take years to fail, but it looks bad. The finish glob at the guide/blank interface is just poor finish application. This is caused by too much finish pooling there, and then cracks later when the rod is flexed.

These are all signs of an inexperienced builder with marginal attention to detail. You can use inexpensive materials for a low end rod, but the workmanship shouldn't suffer as a result. It's a bad thought process to assume your workmanship can vary with the cost of the materials. I teach students in a 1-1 basis in my shop occasionally and always point out these areas as differentiators between a good builder and a marginal one.

He should take it back and improve on these things you pointed out.

Terry

Agree with Terry 100%

Paul@soonercustomrod.com

Justin,
You say that you are going to send the rod back and it is a bummer.
From reading your post, about the only thing that really bothers the fishability of the rod is the clicking of one guide.
Why don't you simply cut off that guide, retie it and recoat that guide.
Use a bit of "GENTLE" heat to slightly soften the epoxy, and a razor blade to cut off the thread and finish. Scrape the blank perpendicualr to the blank where the guide foot was placed to clean up the balnk. Take on the guide, rewrap it, recoat it and you wil be good to go.
Also, as long as you are recoating that guide, if there are issues with one or two other guide feet, add a coat of epoxy on those guide feet as well.

It should take about 20 minutes to fix the rod, and you will save the cost of shipping the rod back.

Good luck
Roger

Justin -

You said you've made a few fly rods. Why did you want to buy a custom rod? I agree with all the above comments. I would add some encouragement to do it yourself. That's what this board is all about. I feel confident in my finished rod now after 2-1/2 years. My first few rods sure could use some asthetics, but they still fish great and I'm still proud to catch fish on my own rods.
Take what you see as deficient in the rod you have and fix it. You learn a lot by repairs (which I hate, by the way) that make you a better builder. I think once you know what to look for in a finished rod, it's much easier to not make the same mistakes. I'm an engineer and not creative at all. If I can make a decent rod I'm very confident you can too.

I wish the people that bought new cars would repair the flaws themselves and not bother me with small detail items that scream quality. Senr it back and make him pay the freight. Probably not a legit builder anyway as far as taxes go. Gives the real builders out there a bad name.

Freddwhy (Rapt-Ryte)

Justin,

Just want to add my two cents. If you built the rod would you sell it? If the answer is no then why would you pay for sub-quality work? Would you reccomend this builder judging from the quality of work you have received? Plain and simple, if I build a rod for a customer I make sure it is the best work I can do period.

Tight lines,

John H

Wow, this topic garnered a lot more attention than I had anticipated. I really appreciate everybody taking time to write on the subject; I'm a bit blown away by it. Very cool. Thank you much!

Todd, I just don't have the time to build a rod right now. The free time I do have I really need to be relaxing on the river trying to figure out if my waders are leaking or if my toes are just going numb. It is a measured trade-off, there is a lot to be said for building a rod and putting a fish on it; no doubt about it.

I think this is a matter of form vs. function. I don't know that it's a fruitful debate; everybody has their point of view and they're all legitimate. The only constant is we have a passion for fishing, that's all there needs to be.

OK, philosophical ramblings aside, I talked to the builder today. He said I could send it back, but it was his lowest price point rod and it kind of is what it is. He hardly makes money on them so he has to crank them out to make it profitable. So, it's pretty much a production rod. If I was in a shop looking at other production models I would put this rod back on the rack and keep shopping. I can respect his point of view; it just isn't for me. To answer John's question. No, I wouldn't sell it; I don't think I would be proud of it. I don't think I would not recommend him, I don't think the things I felt were deficient would necessarily both others. It's kind of like Nascar. I know that Carl Edwards is going to take it all next year, but I'll bet there's a few posters on this thread that believe it might be a guy driving a Chevy that's a few rough years or, lord forbid, a guy from Sin City that drives a Camry. I can't deny, that those two guys -whose names I cannot say- are dang good drivers; but the 99 is going to win again in a mere 82 days ;))

Still

If he is not making any money - don't build it. All he is doing is ruining his reputation.

Bill - willierods.com