has anyone added a rod extension to a rod ?

[leonardgid]

Hi there , bought a couple of rods  , a 10ft  and a 12ft ,  both of them have sand spikes   and  they have short but ends, im thinking about     adding an extension  (aloy tube ) over the blank  after removing the spike and the rear  grip that is below the reel  seat , any advice  would be helpful,  (also any tips  on how to remove  a rod grip that is glued to a rod) thank you all.

 

   

[Evets]

Hi  Leonardgig,

I built a beach rod to live bait off the beach for Jewies. My blank was too short so I built it with the same notion in mind. 

  But what I did was glue in an alloy tube that fit inside the rod blank.  The alloy tube was about  4 mm smaller in diameter and I then rolled some masking tape  around the tube  on top of it self to form a strip  until it was about 2 mm from the blank to ensure that the alloy was exactly in the center of the rod blank.  I made 4 or 5 of these strips. 

I then epoxied the tube in, slid a new grip on over the alloy and rod blank, made a new sand spike (on the lathe) and epoxied it into the alloy tube. 

Turned out perfectly. And is still going  strong almost 25 years later.

The alloy tube will need to be epoxied at least  as far into the rod as you  want your extension to be - otherwise you risk breaking the rod blank itself through the extra leverage  you are exerting on the rod. So if you want a 2 foot extension to the beach rod you'll need a 4 foot extension.

Maybe also need to consider how far up the blank your reel seat will be with an extension as well.  

To take the rod grip  off you can carefully slice down its length with a sharp blade and pull it off. Many foam grips are merely held in by friction as they usually smaller in diameter than the rod blank and slid into place using water (or  other things) as a lube  and they stretch around the bank so it may not even be glued into place. 

 

 

[leonardgid]

Hi Evets ,  I am really grateful  for all   the details, my biggest concern was stress on the blank,  i have had a rod spike on a rod   crack a blank because i was using that rod for long distance casting, with your advice i know that its going to be as good as it can be,      i cant thank you enough for the time and effort  you went through with all of this ,   stay well .