Robert, You might want to contact the manufacturer of your particular epoxy and ask if they recommend thinning or not, and if so, what to use as thinner and in what quantity. Lynn

I have used Medium temperature lacquer thinner Worked well Now i use Urethane Mid temp reducer
In my High build Flex Coak UV finish Tried other finishes Some I did not like the way they worked

Bill - willierods.com

I just attempted transparent wraps on a translucent glass fly rod, very similar to the Epic. I used YLI natural silk 100wt, color was 212 and finished with ProKote. The thread will go clear but unless you really thin the first coat with denatured alcohol, I mean really thin it, you'll still see a shimmer from the silk. The shimmer is from micro bubbles of air that are trapped in the thread. You have to thin the epoxy to almost the consistency of water in order to completely saturate the thread and drive out the air. Just apply enough the soak the thread and then brush off any excess. The second coat just apply unthinned and the epoxy holds up as normal. I did several tests and it wasn't until I thinned the epoxy that it went totally transparent. Hope that help.

Yes, I was reading through a post on another forum where a guy was documenting his glass rod build. His first coat of epoxy was 1 part resin, 1 part hardener and 1 part acetone. He ended doing multiple coats (a total of 6) and would step down the amount of acetone in each subsequent coat. The finished product of that was absolutely amazing. I picked up some denatured alcohol and it was clear so that answered my original question. I'll probably get some acetone as well. Thanks for all the help and information.

Andrew,
You can exactly duplicate the perfect finish by using unthinned epoxy finish by just applying it to the rod. Then use gentle heat from a heat source to gently heat the finish to the consistency of water. The bubbles will be gone, the very thin finish will really soak into the threads and you will have no need to thin the finish and upset the chemistry of the cured epoxy resin.

When you cut the epoxy finish by a third - with epoxy, you have really turned that product into a very rubbery finish. Not exactly the perfect thing to have on the bottom layer of finish on your rod.

Be safe

p.s.

As a test, just take an old blank and mix up a small batch of finish with equal parts of A and B and apply a few inches of finish to the test blank.

Then mix up a batch of finish with equal parts of A, B, and C - where A is the resin, B is the hardener, and C is denatured alcohol.

Let both set of finish cure over night.

Then, just use your fingernail to scrape into each cured sample of finish. You will find that the finish that contains the Alcohol will be very soft - compared to the finish that contains 0 denatured Alcohol.

Just don't use Alcohol to thin epoxy. It is not the right solvent, and if you use more than about 10% thinner- you have really sacrificed many of the excellent properties of the rod finish.

Be safe