Rod Blank Building

Laminated Rod Profiles

Shown Below are profiles of rods made today and in the early 1930's

My personal experience when discussing rod building with other fishermen is that many are not familiar with rod profiles other than the traditional hex rod.

Looking back at vintage rods I found many rod profiles. Among the shapes I found were heart shaped, 5 sided pentagon shapes, 4 sided quads as well as other variations. Among the profile's were various types of laminations.

So while I would like to claim originally in my quad laminated rods the idea has been around for over 100 years. What I do claim as original is the use of integrating carbon fiber and Arimids in my laminations.

While were on the subject of laminated materials I also found that before bamboo was used there were several hardwoods used in rod making. Included in the list are, Greenheart, Lancewood, Mahogany, Hickory and Elm,

It is my sincere hope that you will branch out from the basis of the instruction I am providing in laminated bamboo and carbon fiber rods and try other hardwoods and materials.

So many rod building enthusiasts are limited by the cost of building rods from commercially available rod blanks and hardware. That they are only able to justify building so many rods. The cost for all in your family to build rods may become cost prohibitive as an ongoing hobby. This is NOT the case in building vintage rods from scratch. The materials cost little, can often be obtained free as scrap from wood shops and bamboo flooring installers. The materials used in making your own hardware are also minimal.

My point is and as I will often repeat throughout this blog is that rod building is a easily sustainable ongoing art form for the whole family. I cannot over emphasize the joy of building rods experimenting with various designs and materials and then taking YOUR OWN creations to the water to test.

There are no limitations to the types of rods you may make in fact the early laminated bamboo rods were strong rods popular with deep sea fishermen.

Please note, The information provided on this page is only a basic representation of the subject. My plan for this blog is to expand on each topic by presenting new rods being built, trial and error experiments with bamboo, composite materials, tools and techniques.