I’m working on my first casting rod and I’m readiy to start wrapping guides. How much wrap should I have in front of the foot? Is there a rule of thumb to determine the width of the leading wraps?

Thanks

I have 3 wraps of so in front of the guide foot tip, some make the length of the wraps the same as both feet are not the same length as built. It depends on what looks good to you.

I am pretty much in line with Spencer, I use four turns.

Mike,
3-6 wraps in front of the guide is certainly a good staring point.

But, this is called Custom rod building.

For a particular request, I have made wraps with as much as 1-2 inches of wrap in front of the guides. So, it is really up to you as the builder, and if building for someone else, up to the client's wishes as well.

Good luck

Thanks guys. I think on the striping guide I’ll make it about 10-12 wraps. The rest I’ll do around 5-6 wraps.

I use a standard for me of 1/8th of an inch for all wraps.

Ray Zarychta
Glastonbury, CT

The minimum is about 2 wraps prior to reaching the outer end of the guide foot. This ensures a good seal for the eventual epoxy on the wrap to seal out moisture and prevent lift-up of the thread at the end of the guide foot. Any additional is really personal preference but do keep in mind that each additional wrap and bit of additional epoxy, adds unnecessary weight. Of course, unless you really go overboard on that length, we'd be talking a minuscule difference.

As our blanks and guides have gotten lighter and there is more and more focus on increasing performance, builders have typically kept their wraps as short as possible. If you wish to add a bit more pizzaz to your wraps on any rod you wish to consider high-performance, consider going whole hog on the butt guide wrap, only, and then making the rest of the wraps more basic and short. This keeps the weight down on the upper 2/3rds of the rod where any increase comes at the highest cost.

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