I’ve got some flexcoat that seems be pretty discolored. I’ve taken a pretty long hiatus in rod building and repair. I want to say like 5+ years.

I’m currently testing it out to see if it still hardens completely.

Do any of y’all have experience using old epoxy or finish?

It will work fine. Epoxy doesn't really have a shelf life. Get fresh if it makes you feel better, or even try what you have a test wrap just to calm any apprehension.

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I just used finished a rod today with finish that was at least 10 years old. It gets more of an amber color over time, but it mixed, and performed great. Cured perfectly.

DR

It should work perfectly fine

I have done the same thing. Got back into rod building over covid and working through a couple batches of old epoxy. I have not had any issues. If doing lighter wraps, could be more of an issue. But, the applied coat is so much thinner than what is in the bottle that the amber color is not noticeable at least with darker thread colors. If you are doing white blanks or wraps, test it first for sure.

Even new finish will turn amber after a bit of time, both in the bottle and on the wraps.

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We always say to never buy an amount of finish that you can't use in 1 year. Not because it will go bad, but because of best practices. The Part A can crystalize like honey and the Part B can amber in color. You can melt the crystals with heat but the amber color will remain. Just know that you will be thinning the amber Part B with the Part A and then brushing into a thin coat on your rod. When you see the amber Part B in the bottle, you are looking through 1 inch or more of it. On your rod it will be reduced by 50% and then less than 1/16". You will only notice the amber on white or other light colors.

If you find yourself with old finish that you don't want to use on wraps, use it as glue, it just takes longer to cure and it has very high adhesion.

Flex Coat Company
Professional Rod Building Supplies
www.flexcoat.com

And if you don't like the idea that the finish is slightly yellowed, you can add pigment to it and use it for marbling, or to color finish for thread wraps. I used some on an old G Loomis factory rod I refurbished. Using pigment to color the finsh to the silver color of the blank. Turned out great !!!