Spar varnish (long oil type) has a light amber color, so probably not the finish for a white blank. Same story for some of the poly and urethane "spars", but I've not tried an exhaustive number of the urethanes or poly varnishes. No experience with the one part finishes. Keep in mind we live in a world awash with UV. If a finish does not yellow over time the wrap colors are od
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Got hand it to the marketing types at Orvis who never are at a loss to describe a new fly rod's advantages, and for 2024 the newest model Helios is 4X more accurate than its predecessor. Golly. Guess I'm lucky to keep a cast in the stream using my old Superfine.
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Have not purchased feathers in a long time. The last I purchased were from moonlightfeather.com
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Do it outside if your weather and situation permits. I mount a make shift lathe on saw horses outside the garage and have at it 10 months a year. Wear a mask for fine particles and use a leaf blower to disburse the mess afterwards. Tom's suggestion above works well - I've used it in the past when carving cork duck decoys - provided the fan and motor can move a large volume of air and the fi
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Treat male ferrules as if they were Remington 11-87 magazine tubes - keep them clean and dry.
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Herb 100% Ritz? How about for lighter weight rods, 1 or 2 weights? I too favor the Ritz but my hands shake just thinking about the aesthetics of a Ritz on a very skinny rod.
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Be careful with excessive thread tension and packing else you're at risk of creating the "shimmers" which is a fog like appearance caused by tiny, tiny trapped air bubbles. It's a counter-intuitive thing where you would think more tension and packing than your usual would be just the right thing - but it is not.
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Mark One of the "secrets" to using TruOil is to allow each application to throughly dry before applying another, else you make a mess. I made birch bark grips long ago and abandoned them in favor of faux birch bark grips made from 1/8" cork, which is much easier to glue up and turn to shape, and with a bit of wood stain and colored glue is (to my eye) just as attractive as th
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If all you really need to do is add weight, wrap lead tape to the reel spindle then wrap on backing and line. Super simple. Used this technique to balance an 8 weight bamboo rod long ago.
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Mike The YLI 100 weight color 212 is all I have used for years. Do not over pack nor too tightly wrap. Practice is a good idea to get the feel of things. The only time I use acetone is when making clear wraps. I use 1 part hardener, one part resin, and one part acetone. DO NOT get this witch's brew on your skin and be certain your work area is well ventilated.
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If it's not too late, put another layer of finish on before sanding. It will give you a bit of sanding safety margin to prevent sanding into the decal.
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A final thought for you. Next time try a very light pastel silk - maybe light yellow or green - finished without color preserver ought to make attractive translucent wraps on a white blank.
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Clean hands are a must but gloves are really not needed. Just wash your hands well and repeat every half hour or so and it will be fine. If you are using water to help the first two or three turns of silk "grip" the smooth painted blank be sure to use distilled water which will dry leaving no residue or stain.
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What are you going for? Clear wraps? If so, clear wraps on a white blank is very difficult. Did you use white color or natural color silk? What finish did you use? If you are going for clear wraps how and how much did you thin the finish? If you are going for white wraps you need to use a color preserver such as Al's Color Rite before applying finish.
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Al I build mostly fly rods and turn the grips on a 1/4" mandrel. Then, BEFORE boring the inside grip diameter to fit the blank, use one of these - - to bore the inlet for the hood. It's hard for the hood inlet to not be concentric with the grip's bore.
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Daryl There is maybe a finish epoxy I've not used but I sort of doubt it. Gen4 is more like ProKote than FlexCoat. At 72 degrees I'm finding it take 5.5 to 6 hours to be sag free. I turn it 8 to be safe. 10 hours gets you close to tack free. a 3 minute mix in a CRB mixer is all that is needed and there will be no bubbles. No need for heat, just let Gen4 do its thing. I tend to apply j
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Michael A serious word of caution for you from hands on (literally) experience with clear wraps and acetone. Acetone is seriously bad for you - it can find its way through your skin bringing with it whatever chemicals Gen 4 contains. And while you might not react badly to those chemicals today, tomorrow could be different. So, protect yourself with appropriate PPE and work in a well ventila
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The problem with apply, wait for drips, wick the drips, flip, wait and repeat is that while you flip and wait the epoxy is curing and the wait time therefore gets longer and longer to detect the excess epoxy. The good news is you can speed things along by using a bit of heat to loosen the applied epoxy causing it to drip or sag more quickly. Mind you heat is a hard task master - too much he
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Last 10 wt I built I used a MW-18 for the stripper and a #4 snake for the transition. Worked well. it just looked a bit odd at first\.
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I'm with Mark. ProKote is relatively slow to cure but it does not take days. If it is metaphysical certainties the mix was equal parts and the temperature was 72 or above, then the combining of the resin and hardener is the remaining variable. How did you mix the 2 parts and for how long? Are all the wraps tacky or have some cured and some not so cured?
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This world is awash in UV. If a finish absorbs / stops the UV then the substrate (windings) are protected at the expense of the finish, else the finish permits the UV to pass and remains clear at the eventual expense of the substrate. It's a pick your poison thing.and an argument in favor of rod bags and tubes.
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Ronald Think on this. Imagine you are panting a vertical wall with a flat brush. If you overload the brush and apply excess paint the paint will drip or sag. Now imagine the wall with paint sags is rolled into a cylinder. What you would then see would be "subtle undulations" that are worse on larger diameter butt sections and less so on the smaller diameter section wraps but none
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Johnathon 1. For me, the dead lift capacity or other performance loss is offset by the aesthetics of the finished rod. I cannot see dead lift capacity but I can easily see guides located in spot-on alignment. 2. I primarily build fly rods for which it is frequently very difficult to locate the spine of the butt or mid-butt section while the straightest axis is easily located. 3. F
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You are correct to be concerned about PPE and allergic reactions to epoxy. It can be bad - very bad - if you are allergic. it's something known to chemists as BISPHENOL A which is in the epoxy resin and which is the usual offender. And if you thin the finish epoxy using acetone to about the viscosity of whole milk to make clear wraps you are at even greater serious risk as acetone readily
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FYI, if you want transparent / clear / ghost wraps use natural color silk, which appears to be a rather dull white and which is the natural color of silk that has not been dyed. Silk labeled white is often dyed white and is not what you want for transparent / clear / ghost wraps.
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Fisheries: (1) Elkhorn Creek, Kentucky (2) Multiple creeks within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park Species: (1) Smallmouth & Spotted Bass (2) Brook Trout Rods: (1) 5 weight, 7 1/2' tri-hex (2) 2 weight, 7' 3", TFO Finesse For most other freshwater venues, a 6 weight, 9', Epic 690G For the salt, a 9'
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It's the finish that works for you. Seriously. If your technique is slow you might be better served by a finish with an extended open time. If, like yours truly, you put on way more than is needed then wick off the excess with the aid of some heat, you can maybe use a higher viscosity epoxy with a bit faster cure time. If you're building on a bamboo blank you ought at least consider a long oi
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Top two mess ups: 1. Needed to shorten the butt section of a 4 sections rod for a permanently affixed fighting butt so that all sections would be the same length when the rod was disassembled. Cut exactly the correct length off the mid-butt section. 2. Epoxied a pricey, nickel silver reel seat to an extremely pricey bamboo blank - backwards. Most fortunately I was able to remove the ree
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