A glorious, good day to all you happy wrappers and a previous thank you to those replying to offer assistance.
I have become very fond and respectful of the old FG rods from the 50’s and 60’s, restoring those with names / markings such as Conolon, Garcia, South Bend to their original condition. Others found without names, which were probably custom or home wrapped, I have removed the guides, ferrules, wraps, handles and reel seats (most but not all), stripped the varnish before refinishing the blank and installing modern components. The result is a reliable and lighter rod while preserving the beauty and fantastic feel of a vintage FG rod. It is inline with my composite business motto, “Old school craftsmanship utilizing advanced technologies”.
All but one of the stripped blanks have turned out beautifully, a light to medium brown with the fine FG weave proudly popping through after refinishing. But that one blank must have been made using a green colored resin rather than the typical, of that circa / industry, brown. The guide and trim wraps were installed, and then a brown stain and / or varnish were applied over the entire blank. The result is a brown blank except under the wraps which remains the green color. Since I will be changing the guide positioning, those green bands will be unsightly.
Hence my question(s) to those reading this: Have any of you experienced this scenario and how did you resolve it? Will a typical brown stain / varnish color the green bands presently on the FG blank? Although in the composite industry, I have never had the need to stain any of my products or pieces.
I will attempt to post a photo on the photo page and link it here, but I have never done so before and I am admittedly not very computer savvy. If I cannot link the photo here, Please find it under “Photos, Miscellaneous, Staining a blank”.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and hopefully assist in solving my issue.
Mark Talmo

Mark Talmo
FISHING IS NOT AN ESCAPE FROM LIFE BUT RATHER A DEEPER IMMERSION INTO IT!!! BUILDING YOUR OWN SIMPLY ENHANCES THE EXPERIENCE.

Hi Mark,
I date from that era. I started building rods in1959. My first rod was a light action spinning rod built on a Conolon (before becoming Garcia-Conolon) blank. The blank was a medium Brown that allowed you to see the fibergLass weave. I also built on Harnell blanks which were a Glossy Black. I also used Sila Flex blanks which were a rich Honey Yellow. At that time I lived in Santa Monica, CA where Harnell was located and down the road a bit I could reach a Sila Flex dealer. My first fly rod was built from a Harnell blank and a I also built an 11.5 foot spinning surf rod from a Harnell blank. I built an 8 foot steelhead rod from a Sila Flex blank. None of these rods blanks had any kind of varnish or stain that I could detect. The Harnell blanks indicated they had a phenolic coating.

At that time we only had varnish as our rod finish. The varnish did have an amber color, which was not noticeable when it was applied to the wraps. The color preserver appeared to be a model airplane lacquer. This CP tended to dry very rapidly and you often had a major bubble problem. However, once you learned to fill the tunnels along the feet of the guide, the bubble problem disappeared.

I'm not sure any kind of "stain" will tint the green areas on the rod blank you have. I would hazard a guess, that you might be able to hide it by painting the entire rod with a high quality epoxy paint similar to what they use for concrete floors. My other guess is that you might want to try the dipping method. Good luck with your project.

Mike Blomme

It almost looks like the dye from the old wraps may have leached out and stained the fiberglass, rather than the original blank being green. Never saw an unpainted green FG blank from that era. The non painted blanks from that time were yellow, brown or black. Try a little cleanser with bleach on the end of the rod to see if the green color will bleach out. Can also try to wet sand with a 1000 - 2000 wet/dry paper. Again do this at the end of the rod to see if it that removes the stain. This wet dry paper will not harm the blank it almost like buffing it. Not sure how a brown wood stain would work to even out the color, might be fine if over coated with some thing like permagloss. Good luck, hope something works.

Norm

Mark, You may not be the first to rewrap that blank. It looks like those green bands were leftover from another time where it might of had green thread or had been overpainted green as many rods from the Orient were.
Sorry thats all I have but, I would like to see more photos of your lathe and the story behind it. It looks well made.

Dennis J. Danku
(Sayreville,NJ)

Michael, Norman and Dennis,
Thank you for taking the time to assist my dilemma. After posting my request for help, I inspected the rod more closely and gave it additional thought. Norman and Dennis, I think you are correct. The underwraps were yellow with green and blue overwraps and they were transparent enough to see the guide feet underneath. All three colors were separate wraps so I can only assume no painting was involved as Norman suggested might be the case. I will give the cleanser idea a shot and if that does not work, I will see what a little Clorox will do after testing on disposable rod first. I have no idea how either method will react with Phenolic (aka fiberglass) resin. Thanks again for confirming my suspicion after studying the situation farther.
Dennis, an additional thank you is deserved for your compliment of my wrapper. When deciding to start building rods, I could not find a commercially available wrapper with enough precision to enable me to fabricate an additional fixture to precisely align and mount the guides, so I made my own. The 1 X 3 tee slot aluminum, two six foot lengths, are rigid enough and straight within 0.007in and the ends were machined square. The aluminum bar and angle used for the uprights were machined on a numeric control (but not CNC) mill so they are virtually identical which is critical to allow the guide alignment / mounting fixture to quickly, easily, precisely and repeatedly secure the guides to the blank. The fixture enables me to position guides on a blank within 0.005in. It works flawlessly. No guessing, sighting, adjusting or lasers needed. While the small, 150 RPM, reversible, variable speed motor is more than adequate for wrapping, I plan on fabricating a dual bearing unit for more precision to enable turning cork, wood, bushings and such as well.
I have included photos under Equiptment & Tools, Mark’s Wrapper. I have not included photos of the guide mounting fixture as I am seeking commercial interest. Sorry, I cannot figure out how to link photos from there to here on the forum.

Mark Talmo
FISHING IS NOT AN ESCAPE FROM LIFE BUT RATHER A DEEPER IMMERSION INTO IT!!! BUILDING YOUR OWN SIMPLY ENHANCES THE EXPERIENCE.

Mark, It looks bullet proof, all you now is a right height bench for a perma- mount. Nice job.
It was My suggestion that the wraps might of been overpainted. I think we've all seen rods that were wrapped and then someone goes and paints them matching colors and adds accent trim bands. Sort of like an Ugly-Stik. That's what I meant ! I've tanken apart old rods from the 50's and 60's that might have had airplane dope applied to the wraps, they would crumble like onion skin paper but left the dye behind. Try making a paste with baking soda and rub that into the stained area. It can't hurt, and if that don't work go on to the more aggressive chemicals.

Dennis J. Danku
(Sayreville,NJ)

Dennis,
Thanks again.
As you can see from the photos, I am rather cramped for space and need to be able to store the wrapper away (hangs from the joists) although it is left down most of the time. My bench is used for all my projects and needs to be clear. I haven’t developed the nerve to ask the wife if I could put it in her sewing room, and doubt I ever will for obvious reasons.
Using a scotchbrite and Clorox hasn’t proved to be very effective so far. Since I see no reaction with the blank, I am going to soak a stained end of the blank overnight. I think the bleach may be my best bet. I hope something works, at least improves the stains as this is one of the nicer FG blanks I have, quite certain it is a Garcia as the butt cap has the lower case “g” embossed. It would be a shame to have to paint the poor thing.
I haven’t tried Norman’s suggestion of cleanser as I am afraid of jamming the grit down into the weave, plus the straight bleach is not looking too promising anyway. Even sanding the end a bit proved fruitless as well. I am leery to use a heavy duty stripper but may have to try, briefly, as a last resort.
But thank you for your concern and taking the time to share your experiences while attempting to resolve my issue. It is very much appreciated.
I will post the results of my bleach soaking sometime tomorrow.

Mark Talmo
FISHING IS NOT AN ESCAPE FROM LIFE BUT RATHER A DEEPER IMMERSION INTO IT!!! BUILDING YOUR OWN SIMPLY ENHANCES THE EXPERIENCE.

The green stain probably has penetrated the blank enough that it won't come out. Maybe try wetting the blank to see what the colors look like with finish on them. You may like what it looks like and can use thread for your wraps that works well with the blank's colors. Good luck!

Dennis, and anyone else who may be interested,
The overnight, actually 48 hours, bleach soaking only improved the stains 10% but also lightened the blank about 5%, so is not worth the effort. I cannot bring myself to paint it and hide the beautiful old-school FG weave, especially this Garcia one which I am quite certain is a Conolon blank prior to the two joining forces.
After static testing, the guide spacing will be within .375in of the stains, although more than twice as many bait casting guides will be used as the original surf spinning guides. That is close enough to fudge a little from the optimal spacing. I will attempt to employ the stains in the overall look. It is somewhat inline to one of my sayings, “A true craftsman will utilize a mistake beneficially”, at the risk of sounding boastful of my abilities. I see Dan, in the next post, suggested the same.
Thank you, Dennis and Dan.

Mark Talmo
FISHING IS NOT AN ESCAPE FROM LIFE BUT RATHER A DEEPER IMMERSION INTO IT!!! BUILDING YOUR OWN SIMPLY ENHANCES THE EXPERIENCE.