I'm with Mike. I don't know why you would want to go to all the trouble to turn down and bore out a peice of balsa when the you can have a FC arbor bored, sanded and glued in place in 3 or 4 minutes. And they're cheap. As far as vendors are concerned, I recommend Fishsticks. They're never given me anything but great service. But as Mike said, it would be pretty hard to go wrong with anyone o
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Tony, You're lucky that you got the CA-BLO finish correct right off. I've read dozens of posts from people who've worked at it for hours and haven't been able to get it right. And even people who how to do it will sometimes have it go "bad" and then they spend a lot of time trying to fix it. On wood, I use friction polish, spray lacquer or Tru Oil, depending on the wood and how I
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Some things to consider about CA as a finish. First of all, it is any amazingly expensive finish and second, the CA-BLO finish has a fairly steep learning curve. It has a beautiful gloss if done correctly but has some drawbacks down the road. Since it's a plastic, it can easily break on impact and it feels like plastic, not wood. Thin CA is a very good wood stabilizer. I just finished work
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Sorry, but I have to differ about the finish being slippery. The first time my son used his 3 weight with the marbled grip, he caught and released several trout, 12-15". I asked him specifically if he thought the grip was slippery after handling fish and he said it wasn't. That was also my experience with the other grip that I marbled, and a marbled grip does not have a thin coat of finis
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Ken, To actually answer your question, yes, it's prefectly OK to put epoxy finish on a cork grip. I've made three marbelized cigar grips, two of which actually ended up on rods. The only caution would be to make sure that the entire grip is coated so no moisture can get between the cork and the finish. If you don't want the glossy surface, buff it lightly with 0000 steel wool after it's compl
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Rio.
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Also, if you receive spam, NEVER, NEVER, EVER respond that you want to be removed from the mailing list. Doing that verifies that your email address is correct. If you want to report spam, go to www.spamcop.net.
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Lowe's sells individual steel balls in a variety of sizes, fairly cheap as I recall.
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I think you'd need an awful long tube to be sure you got the stuff distributed along the entire length. My guess, and it's only that, would be that it would make the rod a lot stiffer. My limited experience with the expanding foam is that after it cures, it's really pretty hard stuff.
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Do a search on champagne and wine corks. This has been discussed many times.
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I personally think single foot guides, whether wire or ceramic, look cleaner than snake guides. I've fly fished for more than 35 years and have rods with snake guides, single foot wire guides and single foot ceramic guides and cannot tell any difference in castability among the guides. When it comes to fighting heavy fish, ceramics win hands down.
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If you are at least 100% sure that you will never want to turn your own wood inserts, these things will do the job. But, if you think you want to eventually turn your own wood inserts, just buy a mini lathe in the first place. Once you get a mini lathe, you'll discover how much fun they are and all the things you can do with them, like building a peppermill to replace the one that doesn't work.
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I don't know where you live, but if you live where there are Juniper trees, the big ones, get some. It has a very dense grain, it turns extremely well, is pretty light and it's really very interesting wood. I've found shades of green and shades of red and dark violet along with the normal lighter color. Look on the photo page for some of Stan Grace's work. He uses Juniper all the time.
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Technically, isn't it impossible to have the thread the same color all around, unless there's nothing but blank underneath? Every guide I've ever seen, the thread on either side of the foot (the tunnel) is a slightly different shade than the rest because at that point there isn't any base color.
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I normally thin Gudebrod 811 with DNA because the viscosity of the stuff approaches cold honey. If it's that thick, it will dry before it can penetrate the threads.
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Artist's Workable Fixatif is the answer. Krylon and Grumbacher both make it. Sign the rod as usual, then spray a very light dusting of the Workable Fixatif over it, let it dry and you can then apply your finish. I've never ink smear when using this stuff. Gudebrod 811 is extremely inconsistent in viscosity. You can thin it with DNA to the consistency you want.
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That is a truly spectacular piece of work. You should all pat yourselves on the back for about a week.
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I guess I must be suffering from a "senior moment". I didn't mean to imply I slide it on from the butt because I don't.
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It used to be that Veniard's was the dye material of choice by the big time fly tyers. I know it's still made because I saw some on a website several months back. I've used Veniard's and also Rit. The Veniard's was better, but the Rit did work but took longer to get the colors I wanted. The big advantage of Rit was that it was cheap and readily available.
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I would never glue the whole assembly together first, because if you do, you must then slide it onto the blank from the butt end, which means the front end of the insert will be bigger than it should be. This is what I do, it isn't the only way to do it, but it work well for me. I ream the insert out until it just barely slides to the butt of the blank. Then I take it off, use scotchbrite
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Here's a link to a site that sells stabalized wood for reel seats. Not a large selection but reasonable prices. There are also some relatively safe products on the market that will get you close to true stabilized wood. I'm currently experimenting with a completely non-toxic home brew solution on a peice of spalted maple, but won't know the results for about 10 days. You can approximate
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Oh boy, don't start another of these. There'll be 10 pages before you know it. To prevent that in the future, you might try zapping both parts in the microwave for 8-10 seconds. They should both flow pretty easy after that. I've had trouble getting the resin to flow when it's been too cold, but I've never had trouble with the hardener.
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Actually you did ream the cork, you just did individual rings rather than the entire grip. I do it all with a 1/4" mandrel, then drill it out with a Flex Coat arbor bit and ream the last bit. From the time I start at the lathe until it fits the rod is about 20-25 minutes. That works for me. Some people do it all on the rod. I've never tried it and probably never will. If this works for
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Stan, You need to quit using that Jack Daniels shot glass for what it was intended for and then mixing finish. LOL
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Are you planning to marble the entire space between all the guides? If so, you will be adding a considerable amount of weight to the rod, especially in the tip area. Or do you mean just the aread between the guide feet? This would certainly be a better option. If you want to know which looks better, try both on a scrap blank and see what they look like.
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What do you mean by "setting up?" Is it just getting really stiff? If that's the case, just zap it in the microwave for about 6 seconds. I often need to do this during the winter because there aren't any heat outlets in my workroom. Just be sure to let it cool down a bit after you do this or the epoxy, after being mixed, will set up really fast.
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When you've finished wrapping around the guide just begin the next wrap like you are going to do another wrap around the guide but instead wrap around the blank. Check the instructions in the library.
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Where can you buy these molds?
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The biggest problem you'll have in trying to "test" rods is to find a fly shop that will let you test it under actual fishing conditions. You can't test a fly rod in a parking lot. Realistically, what can you tell from casting in parking lot? You can't tell how it will work for mending line which is a lot more important than how far you can cast with it. You also can't tell how you
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I think you can order directly.
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