I'm getting ready to start my next rod build: a 7-1/2' 4WT I'm outfitting with black guides and clear wraps. Anyone have any tips on restoring the color of the guide foot after dressing it? In other words, I expect my guide foot dressing to remove some of the black finish that'll be visible under clear wraps. Is it as simple as touching it up with an India marker or something else? My only co
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Wanted to ask a question to those of you using water slides and seeing UV degradation. Are you using any type of UV resistant top coat to seal the decal before cutting/applying it? Is the color shift and fading you see affected by that at all?
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You all have obviously thought about this and developed some really creative solutions to overcoming the problem. Your wraps are certainly better than mine. I grabbed a couple of tips provided here that worked well for me: I temp wrapped the top of the foot working backwards from the guide ring, leaving plenty of room at the ramp to work up the actual wrap. For the temp wrap, like suggested b
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Thank you all again.
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Some great suggestions here that I can try to improve the wraps. The more I think about it, it's not so much the flex of the blank - I'm accustomed to dealing with that - I think it's more that the guide foot is so small, I can't keep it from walking while I'm wrapping. Maybe more patience, a little less tension , and trying some of your tips will get me there. Thx again and I'll feed
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I'm building out a1 oz carbon 8' 3WT fly rod blank with single foot guides. My tip section has 4 x 1/0 single foot guides behind the tip top. I'm not new to rod building but the combination of the very thin/flexible tip section and the very small foot is giving me a run for my money. As I wrap up the foot, there's enough movement that causes the wraps to overlap/bunch up and just look sloppy
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I'm a fly rod guy so I usually don't deal with feet quite that long. That said, for stripping guides that have the longest feet on my builds, I (1) make sure the first coat of whatever (epoxy or spar) is sufficiently thin and (2) before starting the initial coat I snake a piece of mono into the tunnel from the open side of the wrap. The is udually a piece of 1X-ish mono bent like a "U&
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I wanted to add the following photo to help the OP illustrate his point: I took this photo when I was rebuilding a SA System 5 rod and trying to match thread color to the original. What this photo shows is 3 wraps of three different threads with a couple of scraped original thread laid in for comparison. The stickie on the thread carrage refs the thread number and whether the wrap was tr
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As a veteran myself first, thx for your commitment some of our wounded warriors. When it comes to an intro to rod building, you can do a lot with a couple of vees cut into some scrap wood and a couple of threaded eyes. There's plenty of homemade options out there that mimic some of the more refined "systems' you can buy off the shelf. Have you considered (and do you have the time) t
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This forum will be one of your best resources for info. Aside from that, I'd encourage you to spend a little bit of time watching Matt Proof's tutorials: . They're fly rod centric but many of the skill he demonstrates are transferrible to any rod you want to start with. There's tons of info on youtube and other sources once you know what you don't know but Proof is a great place to start.
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Thx Kendall. That's exactly what I was thinking. Considering the pattern on the spool if probably somewhat consistient, changes in blank diameter may make the graduations look different. Like anytihng else, I'll test wrap the heck out of it before deciding to continue.
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Don Morse Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Pour your left over epoxy on a piece of tin foil > that way you can test how well It is set up. I add > the date and time with a marker to the foil. What Don Morse said above. Put foil in your cup and use that as your guide to confirm it's set enough. I do the same thing when using epoxy wrap finish
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Hope I'm not asking a silly questions but I'm considering using a varigated thread for my next fly rod build. I've looked around the world wide internet :) and didn't see a lot that pertains to wrapping with it. Are there any unusual considerations when wrapping with varigated threads? Thx!
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Get Bit is on my short list of suppliers when I'm assembling components for a new build. I've never been disappointed.
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I use the human analogy myself. I think it's the most relatable and makes the most sense to me. Because people do carry different positions on which side of the curve is the spine, I try to stay away from it and relate everything back to an 'inside the curve / outside the curve" perspective. Regardless of which side of the curve is your spine/spline/perferred plane of bending/etc . . . I
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I ordered these once the ones for my particular thread carrage went out of stock everywhere: I havent received them quite yet or tried them out but the totalelement should have whatever size and ID you're looking for.
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I use the cheapest fingernail polish I can find in the color I want and coat it with a thin coat of whatever I'm finishing my wraps with - spar or epoxy. You can buy an alignment dot tool on several rod building sites that is exactly the same as a fingernail dotting pen. You can get a set of them containing different sizes on Amazon for ~$5. I usually opt for relatively small dots. If y
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My short answer is YES to wrapping both the male and female side of a spigot ferrule. My rule of thumb is 1.5x the diameter = the wrap length is the standard convention that I follow. Any negatives added to your build in way of weight or stiffness a couple of wraps of thread and finish add at a spigot joint, to me, has always been a laughable consideration but hey, UMMV. The perception of an a
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