While I was visiting home this winter I stumbled a fiberglass fly rod in my dads office. I proceeded to ask dad about it and he told me he built it from a cheap blank kit. The past few months I had been on the look out for a short fiberglass rods, such as the reddington butterstick, for use on the small mountain streams I love to fish. Right after he told me he built it a lightbulb went off and I thought, bingo, I can build a rod for small streams! I did some research and there are tons of places online that sell the blanks, kits, and supplies. Dad also gave me a rod wrapping stand my grandfather built for wrapping his spinning rods.
I decided on a TL Johnson retro glass blank, 7'6" 4wt. It was on sale because of a blemish from www.flyfishingcrazy.com and also had a deal for buying a building kit at the same time. I bought epoxy, thread preserve, and application tools from www.mudhole.com , they have tons of rod building supplies. The thread I bought at micheals haha.
The handle building was fairly straightforward and easy. The wrapping was the challenging part. I practiced a bit on a spinning rod I had lying around. In about two days I had completed all the guide wraps. They were pretty much all lined up perfectly.
It was now time for epoxy... I was dreading this part. I'm not a super fancy person by any means. Most of the time I prefer functionality over aesthetics, but I had spent a lot of time on this rod and I wanted it to look stellar.
Most rod builders have fancy rod rotisseries that spin the rod while applying the epoxy and keep it spinning during the drying process to ensure an even coat. Well I didn't have one of those. But I did have a cordless drill, some para cord, and a plastic retaining clip. Did the job!
The epoxy went great! I did two coats and most likely should have done a third but I was to excited to use it. I purchased an Orvis Access mid-arbor reel for the rod through backcountry. Once it was strung up, I was itching to try it out. My buddy Lisa and I went to the middle Provo last Saturday to see ifwe could hook into some trout. It was the warmest day we have had in a while and the river was packed. I didn't care though, I was obsessed with my new rod. Having the only fiberglass rod I have casted be a 10' 8w, I was blown away by the action on this small rod. It put a whole new spin on my hobbie.
I did manage to land one fish one the new rod! Not only was this the only fish we caught all day, it was the only strike. On a micro sz22 dry. I was a happy camper...
A few days later I landed my first ever tiger trout on it as well
I am super excited to use this rod on my trip and to be honest I don't see my self using my other rods at all haha. My next project is to build a rod/reel tube to mount on my truck so both my rods will be together and strung up ready to go for when I find a creek and just want to toss a line in real quick on the road.
No comments:
Post a Comment