Working on a "government" project for my brother. He found this old blank; who knows where. Feels like fiberglass, light power, maybe ultra light. It has a graphic of an eagle holding a rod in it's claws with the words Fenwick Woodstream just above the rod. To the right of that it has the word BLANK in a box, with SP 812 under the box. I'm red/green color blind, but it looks to be a medium brown, is suprisingly straight, and except for having some kind of very hard glue all over the butt end, is in very good condition.

Did some Google work and did not find that exact blank. I found a few comments here and there. The SP might mean spinning. For the 812, I found multiple decodings, one of which was 8 foot, 1 power, 2 piece. Another suggested 81 inches, 2 piece. Another suggested 81 inches 2 power. The blank is a two piece, but is only a bit over six feet long, with the tip section being about 9" longer than the butt section. The butt section looks to have been trimmed. It doesn't really matter what it is. I'm going to build him a spinning rod on it, because that's what he wants. I'm just curious about what this thing is, never having seen such a thing.

It came to me with a grip and spinning reel seat assembly, about twenty inches long, installed, with no guides, and no evidence that guides had ever been wrapped on it. I had the devil's own time getting the grips off. The rear grip and reel seat were built on a piece of soft aluminum tubing, too big to fit the blank. The blank was inserted into the tubing about 8". It was glued to blank crooked. Glued to the tubing was a cardboard tube, and the rear cork was glued to that. Under the reel seat was an ugly mass of tape and glue. It was crooked as well. In front of the reel seat was more cardboard tube but no aluminum tubing. The front cork grip was glued to that.

I found four different kinds of adhesive used to put this abomination together. One was probably standard rod building epoxy. It softened under a heat lamp, and I could fingernail it off. One was some soft yellow goop that came off easier than the epoxy. There was a partial layer of some blue stuff that was very brittle. Heat did not affect that, but I was able to chip most of it off. Underneath it all was something very clear and very hard. If I had to guess, I'd say superglue. It did not come off. I also found epoxy splattered all up and down the blank, on both sections. At this point, I have about twenty hours in this project just getting things cleaned up.

With all the old glue on the butt section, I didn't think i could get a normal seat/grip assembly straight enough, so I've glued up a Tennessee cork handle and was planning to use Fuji slip rings. The handle is long enough, ten inches, to cover up all the old glue. I sent little brother a picture, and he did not like the idea of slip rings, and said put a clamp on it like my Airrus rod. I have an Airuss Tradition spinning rod, with a plate type seat, so I bought a Fuji plate seat.

Can a plate seat be wrapped on a cork handle? I've never seen one wrapped on cork. Should the seat be epoxied on before wrapping?I told him I could get some graphite, kevlar or texalium tubing to wrap the seat on, and then arbor that to the blank. He didn't like that idea either, so cork it is. I'd like to know if anybody thinks this is not such a good idea.

Thanks for reading this long-winded dissertation.

The SP 821F is listed as a 6 3/4 foot 2pc blank Moderate action, light power rated for 1/8 to 1/2 oz lures tip size 5. from the 1985 catalog

You can wrap a plate seat on a cork cylinder. It can be tough wrapping, as the thread won't easily slide into position. Expect some minor gaps here and there. You can minimize these in several ways - wrap two layers of the same color thread, as one will tend to fill in the other. After finish is applied, you can't really tell what's been done. Or, apply a band of epoxy onto the cork cylinder where the thread is going to be wrapped. This gives you a smoother base upon which to wrap.

You an also secure the plate seat to the cork cylinder with some heat shrink tubing, although the sizing will need to be just right for such narrow bands to really hold the seat securely over the long haul.

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Thanks gents. The cork is glued up and turned down just enough to get rid of the irregularities. I'm thinking of trying to turn a very shallow channel in the cork, at the wrapping points, and filling it in with Permagloss to give me a base for the wraps.

That's not a bad idea, although Permagloss is so very thin that you don't want to turn too deep of a channel or it will take a good many coats to get it back to level.

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Tom, you've convinced me to use epoxy. I'm not so sure I can turn a very thin channel in cork. Hardwood, no problem. Soft cork, may be difficult.

An emery board can be used to do it.

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A very fine file will work, go lightly.
Curt