Guys,

Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I just started my subscription and haven't seen the issue that has started all the talk about the 'unified wheel'.

What, exactly, is it used for? Are you polishing the guides 'foot' that will be covered with the thread? Or, are you actually polishing the guide itself to increase line flow?

I've been 'tapering' the feet of my guides with a dremel and adjusting them so they make a 'seemless' transition from the blank, but have not bothered to do anything else to the area that will be under the wrap. Should I be? If so, why?

Also, if you are using comercially made double foot 'snake' guides on a fly rod, does the 'line passage' portion of this type of guide require, or benefit from, any polishing or such?

I actually made a set of guides for one of my 'early effort' fly rods from stainless steel wire, and I polished the heck out of them, but I just assumed that since the comercially available ones were plated, that polishing might harm the finish (that rod is still in fine shape, but WAY TOO MUCH work considering the price of snake guides. I just wanted to build one where I 'made everything' except the blank).

Thanks for enlightening a beginner.

After you have sanded, filed or ground your guide feet to the proper taper, you need to polish them to remove any sharp edges or burrs. There are many ways to do this, but far and away the fastest is with the use of a Unified wheel. With it, you are looking at a job that takes maybe 3 or 4 seconds per guide. Perfect polish and smoothing but it does not remove material to any real extent.

By the way, I just received a sample of the wheel Bingham Enterprises is selling. It is almost identical to the original wheels I have here. Just a tad larger in diameter so it will last longer. It's a great tool and every rod builder should try one. Don't know where they found it, but it is almost exactly what I was talking about in the article.

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Tom,

Thanks. I've been doing this, but obviously this tool will do the job much faster than the polishing bit for my Dremel. It takes me several minutes to 'deburr' the foot after grinding.

Glad to know I wasn't leaving out an important step....

Thanks again,

Buddy

By all means get this wheel. I used to polish mine with a Dremel tool, then tried hand polishing with crocus cloth. What a gigantic waste of time. The Unified wheel does the job on the entire foot in mere seconds, and does it well. You just press the bottom or top of the guide foot into the wheel for a second, then the edges for just a second and you're done. That's all there is to it.

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