Neal, The grinder idea sounds ok, but what I did was to file down the coating with a file to the top of the guide foot, but it wouldn't peel, it just shattered and flew everywhere. All I could do is pick and chip at it until I got it all off the old windings leaving the windings intact to protect the blank. It chipped and shattered like plexiglass. This stuff was brittle compared to anything
Forum: rodboard

I had tried some heat, but was affraid of getting it too hot, but it didn't seem to make any difference. I had seen these before, but lately they're coming out of the wood work here. This was the first one like this in which the customer opted to repair it, and the customer was also sent here buy another very good customer. I couldn't tell what the blank was, it didn't look to be high end, but di
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I have been doing rod and reel repairs now along with the occasional custom rod for about 20 years now. Lately I have been seeing a rash of custom rods brought to me for repair that are coated with what looks like urethane or some sort of epoxy that apparently had no UV resistance what so ever. I had one here today, the entire blank and all guides were coated with this stuff. I had to replac
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All of those hacks out there just help to make the work done by those who are true artists look all the better.
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That rates right up there with the people you see using a spinning reel on an upside down trigger rod. I can't count the number of people that I've seen doing that. I've watched guys looking at rods and reels pick up a spinning reel and go trial fit it on a boat rod or baitcast rod. Usually theirs no explaining the difference to someone like that either, all they know is that if the reel fits
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I have to agree with Lou on Penn quality slipping long ago, but the biggest drop in quality was more recent. Penn continued to at least offer the better line of reels even after they began bringing foreign made products in under teh Penn name. This seemed to start in the early 80's. The 101-105 silver series was Japanese made, but at least a fair deal for the price, they then came out with the Po
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Lynn, You will have to repost some pics in a year or so, after it's really got that 'worked in' look. I had my shop all organized for a while, it lasted about a week, but that was years ago. I guess the heaviest rods you see there in Kentucky are for catfish? I'm near the shore here, so I get lots of surf rods, in fact, probably nearly half of what I do are surf rods, but mostly re
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How much different do you think it will be? The current owner has already taken nearly all production to China. None of the spinning reels are made here now, they closed the Lansdale, PA plant which made spinning reels well over a year ago and as far as I know only the International series, and a few of the remaining Senator reels are still made here. Some of the GTi series may also be still U
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It's too clean, it looks like a doctors office. One question; Those benches look pretty close to the wall on the righ side of the lathes. What's the longest blank you can wrap? One of the biggest problems I had when I layed out my wrapping area was to make sure I could handle at least a 12' 1 pc surf rod. I have a fold down section of bench that connects the benches here, it allows me t
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Last year I had a guy bring me a medium quality spinning rod that he sold a customer that was broke in 4 pieces, once at the handle, another at the middle, and two at the tip. The customer swore to him that it 'just broke' the first time he went to cast it. I didn't sell or build the rod but the rods owner was screaming that he wanted it fixed for free at my customers expense. I told him what t
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I still have lots of older Gudebrod thread on wood spools, I've had some of it for years, others are less than a few years old, but I can't say when they quit making wood spools. As far as having any problems with the older thread, all of mine is stored in drawers, away from heat, light, and dust. Some of the real old thread isn't as clean or fuzz free as the newer stuff, but I figured that wa
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I use a mono backing on each reel, the amount depends on how much braided line I want to have on the spool. I also run a short shock leader of either mono or fluorocarbon. The backing is simply to better fill the spool since braided lines are so much thinner. The leader is for several reasons, first, if I get a snag or a break off, I don't loose a spool full of expensive braid, second it to allow
Forum: rodboard