Number 9 is Finished

Finished up number 9 just in time for the southern rod makers gathering. This is a 7ft 4pc 4wt pack rod. It's a slightly modified version of Wayne Cattanach's Sir D. Beefed it up a little to carry the weight of the extra nickel silver truncated ferrules.












I plan to fish this rod on North Arkansas creeks for small mouth bass. I needed a rod that would turn over a Dave's Near Nuff crayfish and throw a short line into heavy cover. The tip also needed to be stout enough for a quick hook set. I've been fishing number 8 on the creeks this summer and the tip of the rod just didn't have enough horsepower to turn the fly smoothly and set the hook on a smallmouth. Number 8 is also a 7ft 4wt 4pc pack rod. It's a very smooth casting rod that's probably better suited to midge and dry fly fishing. Look for the post on number 8 for more details. Both tapers are included in this slide. For what it's worth, several folks at the SRG commented on how smooth number 8 is. Very few commented on the Sir D one way or the other. Number 8 is my clear favorite for small trout stream fishing and number 9 will probably be a good small mouth rod.

Cosmetically, number 9 is by far my best effort. I'm not saying it's anything special, just that it's better than the last one. One of the cool things about being an amateur rod maker is that every rod is a little better than the last one.

I learned some new things this round. I used zip ties to hold the rod centered in the drain tube. I wrapped the ferrules on each end of the section with scotch tape, put three small zip ties on each end, and cut the tag ends of the zips to hold the section centered in the tube. I also taped a piece of fly line onto the end of the section to lower it into the tube. The combination of those two changes eliminated the masking tape residue problem I had with number 8 and made it easy to pull the section out of the tube to pop the varnish on a guide and lower it back into place to finish draining. I'll update the photos in the rod making album in a few days.

I'm disappointed with the finish on the wraps. Visited at length with Alan Kube about that last weekend. He showed me how to properly sand the wraps between coats. I hope that will solve the problem. My wraps still have a build up of varnish at the edges. Looks sloppy to me. I want a smooth transition from the blank to each wrap and a nice flat finish on the wrap. Maybe I'll nail it on number 10. Then again, maybe not. I don't suppose I ever want to make a perfect rod. I really don't want to graduate to the next level of rod making. I want the freedom to be an amateur maker so I can keep experimenting with stuff and changing things up from one rod to the next. That's part of what makes this a cool hobby.

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