Purpose-built Rods Part 2 b) Guides

[wazatherfisherman]

Following on from part a)- building the butt end, our rod had been left to dry with the butt cap, grips and winch glued on, now for the guides.

Guides or 'runners' serve several purposes on fishing rods. They keep the line attached to the rod- yet off the blank, provide a contained area during casting- which aids with accuracy by keeping line-travel uniform and they determine that the blank's action is utilised to it's full potential by following the curve of the taper, as well as providing a contact point for fishing line that is greatly friction-reduced.

When I build a rod, after finishing the butt-cap, grips and winch-fitting (reel seat), the next thing I do is put the tip on. Today's rod tips are pretty much all just glue-on types, so are simply glued on. I still use 5 minute Araldite for this purpose as it provides both a great bond quickly and also enables easy removal of the tip whenever it needs replacing. Others may use glues like the hot-melt type, but I've seen some of these fail over the years, so I stick with the Araldite which has never let me down. It bonds quickly and securely and when the tip needs replacing due to either damage or wear (ALL tips wear and 'groove' with constant use) it can be heated with a cigarette lighter or similar and the glue softens, enabling easy replacement by just pulling the tip off with pliers (because it's hot!) The hot-melt type is very handy for instant repairs while out fishing, as the stick form is easily carried, heated and applied, but for initial build I stay with the Araldite.

When selecting a tip, obvious choices are simply the exact same type/style as the rest of your guide-train, however, most guides these days have an insert of some type to reduce friction and there can be advantages in selecting a plain type of tip with no insert at all. When building for side-cast reels for example, the insert-less tip can be a good idea due to the fact that for 75%+ of fishing scenarios, there will be a swivel as the closest rigging point between the rod tip and the rest of the rig. I doubt there's any fishers that at some point haven't wound their line a bit close and some part of their rig/lure has come into contact with the tip. Worst case scenario of this can result in the insert being either damaged or popped out and swivels are usually the greatest culprit of causing this.

While night-time bait fishing for Bream on the darkened low platforms of the ocean rocks or break-walls, torch light was 'banned' near the water, so if you got snagged or lost a hook, when retrieving your remaining rig (which was basically just the swivel as the hook and free-running sinker were gone) it was common to have the swivel wound into the tip, occasionally resulting in 'tip-pop' where the insert is forced out of the tip frame. This of course can ruin a fishing trip unless you carry a spare tip or two and glue- ("lipstick-type" glue sticks are tiny and invaluable for temporary yet instant repairs). It can't happen with an insert-less tip- just something to keep in mind if building primarily for bait fishing or night-time use.

A neat fit is required and most guide/tip manufacturers have a large range of tip sizes with both different sized rings and also different sized pipes (the tubular section that goes on the blank) The general 'rule of thumb' is to select a tip that has a ring size suitable for what you're doing with it, for example: large enough to accommodate winding a wind-on leader, joining-type knot (such as braid-to-leader knot) or even 'stopper knots'/beads easily through it if that is the purpose.

In years past it was common practice to do a small 'under-bind' of thread on the blank to create a protective barrier between blank and metal tip, but isn't necessary if you buy a pipe size that fits on snuggly. Measure the size of the pipe length and make sure it's entire length will fit on the blank before applying the glue and then tip, check alignment with the hoods on the reel seat while affixing the tip so they match up. Leave to dry, the 5 minute Araldite has usually well and truly set within about 20 minutes, with no problem of the tip moving while the 'set' glue continues to harden. 

Now for the guides. In general terms, guides should be placed on a blank in a position so as that your fishing line running through them will follow the curve of the taper without any extreme deviances. Try to imagine your line curving around in as smooth a curve as possible when the rod is under load eg: when fighting a fish. Of course it's not possible to exactly match this curve (or you'd have guides on everywhere!) but the general positioning idea is to have your fishing line curve as to match the rod's curve. This enables a nice even 'shock absorption' effect and utilises the blank's taper to it's maximum- therefore maximising both the rods power and the strength of the fishing line being used.

Once, it was generally accepted that only in game fishing were there rods built to match line classes exactly, this gradually changed over the last 40 or 50 years to the point that now pretty much every build has been refined to cater for a 'smaller-range specific' of line class. This information when choosing a blank/rod is used to match up rods to exacting line classes and to utilise the maximum strength of your line. In turn, the relationship between line-curve and rod-curve becomes relative, so guide placement along the length of the rod is important.

For building a rod on blanks up to 7ft (2.1m) -for reels other than overhead/baitcaster- you will find that somewhere between 6 and 8 guides will help you achieve the 'line-curve' you're looking for. Guide sizing for general purpose rods should be something like: a) 2 x size 8 and 1 each of 10, 12, 16, 20 with the largest (or 'stripping guide') either a size 25 or 30 -or b) 2 x size 6, then 8, 10 12, 16, 20, 25 The numerical sizing refers to ring diameter and I rarely use guides any smaller than size 6 or 7 which are for light to ultralight use. Size 6 may even be a bit small for winding joining knots through the rod towards the reel. Using 2 of your smallest choice guides instead of just one is useful to keep the line close to the blank as you work from the tip down.

General guide sizes are as follows from small to large: 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 12, 16, 20, 25, 30, 40, 50. Smaller and larger sizes are available, but normal range is between 6 and 30- the larger 40's and 50's are for rods over 10ft (3.05 meters) and smaller than 5 for ultralight rods.

Without knowing exactly which blanks are being used, a couple of spacing ideas are as follows:

1) For a 'Medium-fast' 7ft spin rod -1 each of sizes 7, 8, 10, 12, 16, 20 and 25 with spacings measured down from the tip ring in mm: 90, 100, 105, 140, 155, 200, 280

2) For a 'Medium' 6ft spin rod- 1 each of sizes 6, 8, 10, 12, 16, 25 with spacings: 105, 125, 145, 170, 225 and 250

3) For a 'Fast' 7ft double handed spin rod- 2 x size 8, then 1 each of sizes 10, 12, 16, 20 and 25- the 25 can be substituted with a 30 for reels size 4000 or 5000

4) For a 'Fast-Multi-taper' 8ft built with low-mount for side-cast reel i each of sizes 8, 10, 12, 16, 20, 25 and 40 spacings: 85, 110, 125, 160, 195, 250 and 350mm

After tip has been glued on, the best general advice on guide spacing is to put your reel on the rod and tape the guides on with a couple of wraps of masking tape, put line through and put a working curve in the rod. Get someone to hold the rod and view the line-curve from side-on. It's easier to see if any guides need to be moved a little while viewing from side-on.

Once you're happy with guide placement, you're ready to bind (or 'wrap' as it's known) the guides on and do the finishing coatings, which we'll cover in the final chapter coming soon.

 

 

 

[Little_Flatty]

Thanks Waza for another great article.

I've always been slightly mystified as to guide sizing, so that clears it up slightly. Is the sizing referring to the diameter of the inner ring in mm or is it an arbitrary size?

I just stripped off a couple of 'ring-popped' runners off my travel rod last night. I have spares from a previously broken rod and also some A grade thread + epoxy. Will do a bit more cleanup of the blank tonight...taking it very easy. Just need to build up a binding bench ready to do the repairs. It's not a hugely expensive rod, so doesn't need to be a stellar job.

Edited April 12, 2022 by Little_Flatty

[Green Hornet]

Another good and well written article Waza.

I used to like the stainless guides without an insert on my blackfish rods as the larger diameter ring allowed the stopper knot for the float travel through them easily when fishing deeper than a rod length.

I originally used the old Varmac guides and the last couple of builds I used Recoils. The recoils are excellent as they're made from a type of spring steel and stand up well to the knocks when fishing around breakwalls and ocean rocks. They also come in a single foot version which is great for a long, light rod.

G Loomis went through a stage where they built a lot of rods using the Recoils. 

[Little_Flatty]

2 minutes ago, Green Hornet said:

Another good and well written article Waza.

I used to like the stainless guides without an insert on my blackfish rods as the larger diameter ring allowed the stopper knot for the float travel through them easily when fishing deeper than a rod length.

I originally used the old Varmac guides and the last couple of builds I used Recoils. The recoils are excellent as they're made from a type of spring steel and stand up well to the knocks when fishing around breakwalls and ocean rocks. They also come in a single foot version which is great for a long, light rod.

G Loomis went through a stage where they built a lot of rods using the Recoils. 

I have a rod with recoils on it and would have to agree that they are amazing, for the amount of rough treatment my rods get. Mine are the single foot version.

[noelm]

Just on guide placement, I used to set them out as described, but then try to move them slightly to be "mathematically" spaced, as in, the distance is the same decreasing measurement, I found rods looked much better if the guides were spaced this way. I know it's a bit hard to grasp what I am saying, but I think with a bit of thought, most will work it out! By the way, great write up....again.

Edited April 12, 2022 by noelm

[noelm]

Not too sure if you are going to do a write up on initial blank selection, but it needs to be remembered that guide selection can alter how a rod "feels" dramatically. Also if the rod needs to be a bit of a compromise (as some things are) then the most important points need to be considered, like overall length, or casting light weights accurately as compared to outright distance, that's where doing/building yourself comes into it.

[Green Hornet]

1 hour ago, Little_Flatty said:

I have a rod with recoils on it and would have to agree that they are amazing, for the amount of rough treatment my rods get. Mine are the single foot version.

I have the single foot Recoils as "infill" guides on a couple of my custom bream rods. The stripper and tip guides are regular Fijis. I love the "sing' of the braid running through them when you have a good fish on.

[wazatherfisherman]

1 hour ago, Little_Flatty said:

Thanks Waza for another great article.

I've always been slightly mystified as to guide sizing, so that clears it up slightly. Is the sizing referring to the diameter of the inner ring in mm or is it an arbitrary size?

I just stripped off a couple of 'ring-popped' runners off my travel rod last night. I have spares from a previously broken rod and also some A grade thread + epoxy. Will do a bit more cleanup of the blank tonight...taking it very easy. Just need to build up a binding bench ready to do the repairs. It's not a hugely expensive rod, so doesn't need to be a stellar job.

Hi Mike glad you enjoyed it, the sizing is a bit of a mystery to me because they measure the guides by the outside of the guide ring- not the inside and not including the metal frame! This gives a possible small variation in actual ring sizes, but is used universally by manufacturers.

"A" thread being the thinnest grade, provides the neatest bind by far, but can be tricky to run over guide feet on the transition when moving from blank to guide because many guide feet have 'squared-off' ends. When buying guides from some of the large USA companies they come with 'pre-ground feet', where they have ground an angle on the 'toe' of the foot (the leading edge each side that are first contact point for the binding thread) 

A neat trick to remedy this without filing/grinding the feet yourself is to use clear sellotape to both lock the thread and travel over the foot. It provides a flawless transition to bind over and negates any height differential between guide foot and blank. It's totally invisible also and in a way provides another level of attachment that keeps the foot in place. I'm going to put a photo on in tonight's next chapter showing exactly what I mean.

A simple 'binding bench' can be made by taping two long-neck beer bottles together- use two sets of two and rest the rod in the gap! -Works fine and you can drink your 'lathe' once finished!

[wazatherfisherman]

2 hours ago, Green Hornet said:

Another good and well written article Waza.

I used to like the stainless guides without an insert on my blackfish rods as the larger diameter ring allowed the stopper knot for the float travel through them easily when fishing deeper than a rod length.

I originally used the old Varmac guides and the last couple of builds I used Recoils. The recoils are excellent as they're made from a type of spring steel and stand up well to the knocks when fishing around breakwalls and ocean rocks. They also come in a single foot version which is great for a long, light rod.

G Loomis went through a stage where they built a lot of rods using the Recoils. 

Thanks Pete glad you enjoyed it. I still have a small handful of Varmac's and also re-built one of my Blackfish rods with them for the same reason re stoppers- especially since using those small rubber stoppers -I always put two on so you have a visible indicator for previous depth changes- but they could get stuck on small inserts, hence the Varmac's

[Rebel]

Great read.

Super info.

Thank you.

[Little_Flatty]

22 minutes ago, wazatherfisherman said:

Hi Mike glad you enjoyed it, the sizing is a bit of a mystery to me because they measure the guides by the outside of the guide ring- not the inside and not including the metal frame! This gives a possible small variation in actual ring sizes, but is used universally by manufacturers.

"A" thread being the thinnest grade, provides the neatest bind by far, but can be tricky to run over guide feet on the transition when moving from blank to guide because many guide feet have 'squared-off' ends. When buying guides from some of the large USA companies they come with 'pre-ground feet', where they have ground an angle on the 'toe' of the foot (the leading edge each side that are first contact point for the binding thread) 

A neat trick to remedy this without filing/grinding the feet yourself is to use clear sellotape to both lock the thread and travel over the foot. It provides a flawless transition to bind over and negates any height differential between guide foot and blank. It's totally invisible also and in a way provides another level of attachment that keeps the foot in place. I'm going to put a photo on in tonight's next chapter showing exactly what I mean.

A simple 'binding bench' can be made by taping two long-neck beer bottles together- use two sets of two and rest the rod in the gap! -Works fine and you can drink your 'lathe' once finished!

Waza, I just love the long neck beer bottle idea. Except I can't agree with the idea of using FULL longnecks to make my lathe!

Trouble is, after drinking four longnecks, I don't think I could stomach the idea of rod building. Or fishing for that matter...I'd probably fall into the water! 🤣

Thankfully I'm a home-brewer, so I have plenty of bottles to play with  

Thanks for the sellotape idea. I did use sellotape in my first build, but removed it as my binding reached. Seems like I could keep it on.

 

[wazatherfisherman]

1 minute ago, Little_Flatty said:

Waza, I just love the long neck beer bottle idea. Except I can't agree with the idea of using FULL longnecks to make my lathe!

Trouble is, after drinking four longnecks, I don't think I could stomach the idea of rod building. Or fishing for that matter...I'd probably fall into the water! 🤣

Thankfully I'm a home-brewer, so I have plenty of bottles to play with  

Thanks for the sellotape idea. I did use sellotape in my first build, but removed it as my binding reached. Seems like I could keep it on.

 

Mike you need to use FULL one's for the weight necessary to keep them in place, the joy of using them is you can use them anywhere to do a repair. "Holiday lathes" they're known as! I have a mate that has had a bottle lathe in his garage for many years!

Yes leave the tape on- just over 1 revolution is all you need of the real thin stuff. Makes doing a bind really easy and nobody knows except you and I!

[Green Hornet]

1 hour ago, wazatherfisherman said:

 

A neat trick to remedy this without filing/grinding the feet yourself is to use clear sellotape to both lock the thread and travel over the foot. It provides a flawless transition to bind over and negates any height differential between guide foot and blank. It's totally invisible also and in a way provides another level of attachment that keeps the foot in place. I'm going to put a photo on in tonight's next chapter showing exactly what I mean.

 

Hey Waza, I've never heard of using sellotape before. Sounds like a neat trick.

Even on the pre-ground guides I always still take to them with a file and fine wet and dry sandpaper. I reckon they have too much "hill" on them, making them difficult to bind using A thread. Doesn't take long and looks far nicer in the end.

[wazatherfisherman]

43 minutes ago, Green Hornet said:

Hey Waza, I've never heard of using sellotape before. Sounds like a neat trick.

Even on the pre-ground guides I always still take to them with a file and fine wet and dry sandpaper. I reckon they have too much "hill" on them, making them difficult to bind using A thread. Doesn't take long and looks far nicer in the end.

Hi Pete the sellotape is probably one of the best discoveries I've learned in building because of the 'nil' transition in height. It's great for using on the lathe also because there's no need to slow the speed down when you're about to go up the foot. I'm going to put a couple of photo's on in tonight's instalment showing how it works.

Most of the new-age American guides have far better angled toes coming off the guide foot, which negate the need for us having to file/ground/sand them.

I stopped using "A" thread when the eyesight got a little worse and I bought a 1/4lb spool of black in "C" due to "B" being difficult to find in the same large variety of colours. The A definitely looks the best of all though.

[wazatherfisherman]

As I couldn't finish the article tonight I thought I'd just put a couple of pics up to show what I meant- the guide has just been bound on for demonstration purposes and isn't a neat bind, however it's only to show the tape, pull through loop (blue) and pulled through cotton. Excuse the untidy bind it hasn't been tightened up but I didn't realise while taking the photo's until viewing on here!

The thread is held down by the tape and transitions smoothly over the guide foot and the tape isn't visible when bound over. The 'pull-through' loop is blue for visual. Hope it's clear enough. I overdid the locked-off end on purpose to demonstrate also

[Green Hornet]

Thanks Waza. How wide is the strip of sellotape? Looks to be about 1cm, judging by your pic, but hard to know for sure as some of it is bound over.

[wazatherfisherman]

Hi Pete the sellotape was 1cm originally and I trimmed it to about 8mm before putting on to suit the guide size (12)- it starts from the left hand edge of the orange, locking the thread down. My eyesight isn't exactly that good and I did the whole thing sitting in my computer chair without any burnishing ('evening'/straightening) of the thread. This is the missing pic!

[Green Hornet]

Thanks for explaining that Waza.

My eyes are "shot" as well and I can no longer bind to the standard I once could. You'd think reading glasses would help, but they don't in my case.

[wazatherfisherman]

35 minutes ago, Green Hornet said:

Thanks for explaining that Waza.

My eyes are "shot" as well and I can no longer bind to the standard I once could. You'd think reading glasses would help, but they don't in my case.

Hi Pete yes mine are definitely no good for any fine detail work any more (and tying knots in fluorocarbon leader after dark!)- I had glasses on doing the bind and photo's and it wasn't until looking at the crappy looking bind in the photo's did I realise, however it was only for demonstration purposes of the tape and pull-through (that's my excuse anyway!) 

Will turn out better when on the lathe properly I'd like to think!

[frankS]

+-

My eyes are not what they used to be and the older I get I find my fingers are following the pattern and I am becoming quiet clumsy when it comes to  thread binding and such.

I have a magnifying glass set up on a type of tripod  but this is sometimes awkward as well as I need to keep moving it as I progress, but better than trying to do the job without it.

I have used the sellotape trick but I only use the tape half way around the rod, just enough to create the bridge needed as I thought with the tape all the way round the rod would mean that the top of the bind where the tape is would get no sealer or resin and although it probably wouldn't matter,  a minute air bubble could form under the tape, probably wrong but that was my thought. 

I don't do much rod building these days but do have 1/2 dozen unfinished projects laying around.

Frank

[wazatherfisherman]

1 minute ago, frankS said:

+-

My eyes are not what they used to be and the older I get I find my fingers are following the pattern and I am becoming quiet clumsy when it comes to  thread binding and such.

I have a magnifying glass set up on a type of tripod  but this is sometimes awkward as well as I need to keep moving it as I progress, but better than trying to do the job without it.

I have used the sellotape trick but I only use the tape half way around the rod, just enough to create the bridge needed as I thought with the tape all the way round the rod would mean that the top of the bind where the tape is would get no sealer or resin and although it probably wouldn't matter,  a minute air bubble could form under the tape, probably wrong but that was my thought. 

I don't do much rod building these days but do have 1/2 dozen unfinished projects laying around.

Frank

Hi Frank- touch wood I haven't had any bubbles because I always use filler before epoxying- usually about 3 coats of filler, then hit the epoxy with a hairdryer to melt/blow bubbles out. Another good reason for using filler is it's a lot easier to get a guide off if you need to replace one. I recently stripped one of Derek's rods and with only a 'glass-like' coat of epoxy over the entire blank -it was really difficult to do- took about 3+hrs which was almost unbelievable.

I've also got about 15-20 either half finished or yet to be started rods/blanks and all the bits and pieces still to do. After looking at my own photo's I'll certainly be doing the magnifying glass thing!