PMD: For now, I'll just use my old Hardy LRH Lightweight reel with this rod, although the color of my old Orvis Battenkill reel might look better. Got any suggestions? There are some really expensive ones that would look great, but they are above my pay grade.
Dave: Estimating the time spent would be really difficult. I worked on it off and on during evenings and weekends since I received the blank in early September, but at the same time, I was stripping and refinishing an old bass-weight rod that I just finished also. It had to be several days worth of work overall. Now if I had also split the bamboo, planed the strips, and glued it up, that would be another long story, but I don't know how to do any of that yet. Some day maybe. Dennis Stone made the blank for me in less than two weeks after we settled on the taper he would use, and he was making others at the same time during his summer/fall blank sale.
BillB: No color preserver on this rod. I did for the orange/black jasper wraps on the old bass-wt rod I referred to above (I use Aerogloss clear lacquer for a color preserver), but for this 5-wt rod, I wanted semi-translucent brown wraps like old Dickerson rods. I have a couple of old Orvis Battenkill rods that also have translucent brown wraps that I really like, so I searched on the Classic Fly Rod Forum web site for how to achieve that. The guys on that forum live and breath bamboo rods 24/7, so anything you need to know is there. I found a recommendation to use Gudebrod medium brown #541 nylon thread and apply varnish directly to the thread without a color preserver. The tipping is black silk thread. I use Man-O-War spar varnish thinned about 50/50 with mineral spirits (and strained through pantyhose - don't ask where they came from). I like to apply one coat to the bamboo blank before wrapping the guides, then apply several coats to the guide wraps until the thread texture is almost obscured, and then follow with three or more coats of the same varnish to the whole rod (with some very light sanding with 1200-grit paper between coats). I'm still brushing on my varnish very carefully, but most guys use a dip tube.
Glad you all like the rod. I may get a chance to try it out in a couple of weeks and can post on how it casts (and catches fish, hopefully!).
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