The Traditional Fisherman's Forum

The butt section won't have a set will it. Therefore, if you are rewhipping the rod you can reorientate the middle and top joint to get the line of least droop whilst leaving the butt section as it is.

Weyfarer wrote:The butt section won't have a set will it. Therefore, if you are rewhipping the rod you can reorientate the middle and top joint to get the line of least droop whilst leaving the butt section as it is.

Indoody

Fear not fellas, the 'leave it beneath' decision has already been made. The restoration is coming along very well, and as it is my first, I am taking things very slowly. I am also taking photos as I go. One thing that has surprised me was discovering that the original whipping was indeed the early blue and not yellow :hide: ..The bright yellow being the degraded varnish, quite incredible really. The rod will now, of course, be whipped blue.

As well as photos, I find it most useful to lay the rod sections on a length of pristine planed pine and mark on the wood each rod ring position, inters, node whippings etc. It makes for an easy life when you come to put the guides back on.

Sound advice Weyfarer, I found that an the unused end of an old till-roll from the shop is equally up to the job!

I do something similar, though more compact, and record a 'menu' for rods I refurbish. Till roll is a stroke of genius...no grabbing for the ruler every two seconds and a small 'recipe' to store away for posterity.

How lucky we are to be doing this is the days of digital photography and simple uploading.


I did idly once wonder if I should be saving the old silk that comes off a rod and whipping some onto a bit of twig to save as a record. Not really needed in this digital age, I suppose.

A photo won't indicate the gauge as well as a sample.

I'm working on a Hardy Knockabout at the moment, trying something a bit different. The rod is in fairly good shape and all the original whippings are still in place, but the varnish over them (mainly on the rings and ferrules) is flaky. I could strip it and re-whip it entirely, or just re-do the rings and ferrules, but I've decided to try and salvage the whippings. If it goes wrong I've not lost anything; I'll strip and re-whip the whole rod.

I carefully pared away any loose varnish and ran some pale shellac into the exposed whippings, which I found tended to soak in beneath the varnish, restoring the original darker olive tone of the whippings (they had become quite pale where the varnish had lifted). This was repeated after a decent interval. Once fully dried out I gently removed the softened varnish around the edges of the treated parts and rubbed down the remaining varnish around the exposed parts with 1000 grade abrasive paper. The rod is now ready for varnishing. I haven't progressed further owing to the discovery that my remaining varnish had sealed itself irretrievably into the bottom of its tin, and I have so far been unable to source some decent oil-based stuff locally.

If the stunt comes off I'll post photos of the finished article. I should have taken some before I started, but it never occurred to me to do so.

This will be interesting GOS..

How many rods have ended up having a full refurbishment, including new shiny whippings, possibly of the wrong colour, when all that was actually wrong was a bit of flaky varnish?

You can varnish over old stuff that's flaked, but you can't trust it and it looks pretty naff.


Or you can do a full strip and refurb.

Nice to think there might be a middle path..........

Hopefully it'll work. Quite often where the varnish has flaked the original whippings are damaged and there is no option but to replace, but just occasionally (as with this one) they are intact, so I figured it was worth a shot. Like you I have in the past simply put some fresh varnish over crazed and flaky whippings; the result is functional, if not particularly pretty. Crazing of varnish seems more common on colour-preserved whippings; fresh varnish just bleeds into the whipping leaving darker patches, and one never seems able to get things nice and smooth either. This time I thought I'd try sealing the whipping first.

My initial concern was that the sealer would react with the varnish and cause it to peel away, but I decided to risk it. In practice it only softened the edges, which actually helped matters as it enabled me to feather them back to the full thickness, which hopefully will result in a more level finish once varnished.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-Allco ... 256a835c47

OMG, what a mess