Is it possible to alter the color of a fiberglass blank that maintains the blanks translucence?

I have never seen a "translucent" fiberglass blank. How do they cast? My first fiberglass rod was built on an opaque, square, solid, white fiberglass blank marketed by Wright an MacGill in the early 1950's.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/15/2020 04:29PM by Phil Ewanicki.

Short answer yes, depending on what type of blank you are dealing with. I have seen some dyed with Rite Dye and then covered with a top coat of U-40 Perma Gloss.

If you have a Glass blank that was rolled with "clear" or "off white" prepeg and not top coated with something, a blank in the raw, its possible. To me, it did not look all that great. Its like staining certain species of wood, it just does not penetrate equally, but it did have a Translucent look to it.

You might want to look at the color offerings from CTS, many of their colors on Glass are somewhat Translucent. Their raw Prepeg is an off white color to start with. Some companies, take Lamiglas, their Yellow Glass, that Prepeg is colored by the manufacturer. Steffen Brothers does the same with their Woven S Glass, a "brick red/brown color".

Thanks, Bill. I've seen the CTS blanks, and they are what I'm thinking. However, I'm looking for a conventional, preferably 1pc, blank. Their website page for their CrystalGlass conventional blanks is gone. Appears they've stopped making them.

Probably not, contact Herb, HNL Rod Blanks, he'll be able to find out if the blank you want is still able to be rolled. CTS streamlined their site back a while ago, typically, if the blank was made, they will still roll it with a few exceptions. Example: I and a couple of other glass geeks were getting unsanded painted glass fly rod blanks from them, they won't sell an unsanded blank, the "spiral" has to be sanded off and then painted or left raw.

Reach out to Herb, he should be able to help you out.

[www.rodbuilding.org]

I contacted CTS. Megan replied and gave me the web page address, which still does not work. Only that page. I've responded. I suppose they have a glitch. Will check with Herb too.

Ah! Thank you, Lynn. That makes sense.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/15/2020 08:55PM by Paul Roberts.

Ooooo-Kay... The CTS S-Glass spin rod page is working! What comes up is a graphic that looks like a 'missing page' graphic. Just have to scroll down. I think they might want to change that. Anyway, in conversation about rod colors.

Contacted Herb. A couple blanks ordered. Their Crystal S-Glass blanks are translucent, and can be painted with translucent paints. So, I ordered one painted and one raw (a milky off-white is how it looks online). Oh, they are going to be pretty!