Hi All,

I'm a Noob, having built two Sage 2 piece RPL fly rods in my time, both about 25 years ago. I've broken one of the butt sections and bought a new sage blank butt section to rebuild. The issue is, I don't have the thread I used previously, and am worried about matching the color (a dark red, and if I remember I didn't use a color preserver).

So, I could do some practice wraps on the broken section and try to match the thread, but i'm actually leaning toward removing the guides from the tip section, and rebuilding both with the same color thread, and doing some more decorative work. Does anyone have any experience/comments with doing this?

thanks in advance!

Mike Steinzig
Los Alamos, NM

Mike,
The simple thing to do is to strip the rest of the rod and rewrap all of the guides with the color and thread of your choosing.

Good luck

the fish don't know the difference in the 2 colors on the rod, Mudhole has a color chart, look for the best, grab it an go, as I see it , your rod ,

William Sidney
AK

If you want to try and match the dark red, try wrapping a lighter red, like Scarlet.
Then darken it with alcohol see how close it gets.
After years of use, the tip section thread will probably have lightened up some from the sun UV.

Best wishes,
Ron Schneider
Schneider's Rod Shop
Mountain Home, Arkansas
[www.schneidersrods.com]
mtnron40@yahoo.com
870-424-3381

Roger, my preference would be to remove the guides from the top section and redo them all with the same color scheme, but I've never done that before. Is it difficult to remove guides that have been epoxied on? How much risk of damaging the rod by doing that?

thanks to Ron and Bill for their input; i agree, the fish can't see the colors, but by that reasoning you guys would all be out of business :)

Mike,
The secret is "Gentle heat" and a sharp single edged razor blade.

Use gentle heat to heat the finish on the thread wrap. Especially concentrate on the guide foot side of the wrap. After it has warmed a bit, use the straight edged razor to slice the wrap, starting about in the middle of the guide foot and slicing toward the guide ring. The idea of starting in the middle is to avoid the possibility of slicing into the fibers of the blank. The reason to do the initial slicing on the guide foot side of the blank, is that you are slicing against the guide foot (metal) and not slicing into or against the guide foot. When you get that part loosened up and removed with your thumb nail or a pick, carefully work down the guide foot a bit toward the blank. Be very careful here to not let the blade slip and cut into the blank.

From this point it is just a matter of a bit of heat to soften the wrap so that you will have enough cut away to peel out the guide. Then, with the guide off of the rod, continue to work on each wrap to remove the remaining thread and finish from the guide foot area. The final clean up is done with the razor blade held at right angles to the blank and then you are simply scraping the softened finish and remaining thread off of the blank.

The key word is gentle heat. Excess heat will in fact ruin the blank. When you get near the tip, be especially careful of the heat, because you have a very small part of the blank, and without care, is easy to overheat and ruin the blank.

After you have done the first couple of hundred guides it will get easier. Just take your time, and use common sense not to cut into the blank and to not to over heat the blank and cause damage.

Good luck

OK, thanks Roger. I'll let you know how it goes. i have a couple of heat guns, i assume one of those or a hair dryer? Is that what you use?

I use an industrial heat gun - that is commonly used for stripping paint.

I have also used an alcohol burner which is the same burner that I use to heat tip cement to put tips on the rod blank.

I have also used a butane torch style cigarette lighter.

The lighter is about the best item to use for this project. The lighter puts out enough heat into a very concentrated area that is ideal for removing guides, so that you only put in a very small area of the blank that needs to have the epoxy softened for guide removal.

For example:
[www.walmart.com]

[www.google.com]

[www.amazon.com]

As Roger mentioned, watch out using too much heat, I’ve had a blank bend over near the tip when I used too much heat. All it takes is just a second or two of rapidly moving the heat gun over the epoxy and then carefully scraping away the softened epoxy. Unless I am planning on removing all of the epoxy plus the paint finish, I do not use a sharp edge metal blade because I will undoubtedly remove the underlying paint no matter how careful I am. I use a split piece of hard wood or a piece of split bamboo, they have an edge that is hard enough to remove the softened epoxy but not hard enough to remove the underlying paint finish. Your finger nails will also do a very good job. If you are putting the guides back in the same place, just clean up the best you can, the residual flaws will be hidden by the guide wrap.
Norm

Norm, thanks for the additional input. I started last night so i'm committed. The guide on the first one came off fairly easily, and I didn't use any heat, just scraped the thread and epoxy off the top of the guide. next will be the remaining thread and epoxy, and I am almost as afraid of damaging the rod with heat as I am of damaging it with the blade. The wraps are covered with epoxy, but the carbon fiber of the rod is also built of epoxy. I assume that if I get the guide wrap epoxy hot enough to be soft, the epoxy on the carbon fibers will also be soft. So maybe doing it with no heat is the safest, but that seems like it will be difficult. I have the broken section of rod that I plan to practice on with heat and see what happens. thanks for the advice.

Carefully heat the wrap area and cut the thread on top of the guide and just peel the wrap off and unwind any additional thread. Cutting on top of the guide prevents cutting the blank. The gentle heats softens the epoxy making it easier to remove. If you are worried about using a heat gun use a hair dryer, a hair dryer is safe to use on your hair so its safe to use on your rod. The hair dry will still soften the epoxy enough to make it easier to remove.
Norm