Making a bamboo (split cane) fly rod

this video will show you the steps to make a six strips but cane fly rod rod makers employ a variety of methods to make bamboo rods but the following steps will be ones used by me there are many different types of the Ambu throughout the world the one preferred by rod makers is a variety from China named arunda narium a ballast it is frequently called Tonkin cane by enthusiasts this variety of bamboo has sufficient thickness and power fibers for rod making technically bamboo is not wood but rather a member of the grass family in nature it is green but will cure to a straw color when talking about bamboo rods I find some folks think that the rod is one solid piece shaved to a taper dimension I'll then explain that it is really a number of tapered strips glued together to form a rod bamboo culms often come in twelve foot lengths some makers prefer uncut combs but I usually order columns cut into two sections you should have both a butt and tip section the butt section will have a wider diameter and the nodes the area where the plant leaves out will be closer together I usually mark the bottom of both butt and tip sections with red marker so I don't confuse the direction I'm working on when creating a bamboo rod you want to inspect the columns for water damage growers marks or insect holes these imperfections can bar the finish and even strength of the rod you'll also want to decide whether you want to build a blonde lighter flamed or darkly flamed rod here you'll see a couple of flame columns versus a none flame column I'll use a torch attached to a propane tank to do the actual burning for this particular rod I'm going to leave the columns blonde I'm not going to flame them and you notice that I've also put Czech splits in the columns and this keeps something from splitting further there's a comb cut in half food here's the internodal dance I'll cut the buff session into thirds and each strip will be about a quarter-inch they'll be a little bit wider than the tips tricks will be here I've got six strips for the butt section of the rod I've got a lot of extra strips left still but I'm not going to bother to cut them unless I might happen to need some for this rod and I'll save them for another ride so from half a call I now have sixteen strips to use for the tip each tip takes six strips so I'll have twelve to make the two tips and I'll have four extra in case I come into any problem what I'm doing here is just knocking off a little bit of the latter part of mode and also taking a slight interpretation out of the pit and a literal I'll explain why I do that the rod I'm making is seven foot long half of that will be 42 inches the total length will be 84 inches this these are but strips and what I'm going to do is stagger them at a spacing it's called three by three spacing because you don't want the nodes directly together because that's a weak point of the rod so what there will be will be a node here a node here a node here a node here so they'll be alternating every four inches for both the butt and tip strips what I'm going to do here is about two inches up from this node I'm making a mark and then at 47 inches and the reason I'm using 47 inches is because I went two and a half inches play on either side I'm going to make another couple of marks and that'll make my total it like 47 inches but again half of the rod will be 42 inches then I'm going to cut these sections and that will give me the length that I want to work with now I'm ready to begin cutting there's sections that I measured so at this point I've cut the strips to the length I need to begin planing and the next step is actually going to be no straightening and straightening the strip's because before I do that I'm actually going to soak the strip's in water overnight and what that will do is make the strip's a little softer and more pliable and the process of node straightening actually involves heat and so that I don't burn the bamboo I'm going to actually heat it wet so thus I put it in a container of a tube of water I'm about to show you now is what I consider probably one of the more difficult parts of making a bamboo rod and that's strip and node straightening particularly the nodes this is an area where rod makers really utilize different methods to get the same result some rod makers will simply sand the nodes down they could use the 1 inch belt sander I use or regular sandpaper some will use a small alcohol lamp and actually burn the nodes to heat them to bend them some folks just simply take a plane and just take the nodes off that way so use a scraper to take the nodes off I employ a method that actually uses heat through a heat gun to soften the strip and once I've got it softer I'll often take it to this little jig called a Warren node press to further bend it and I have this great device here that uh I got in trade with a neighbor it's a machinist vise and I can then take the strip's once they're eat it and put them in this and basically after setting for a matter of seconds that heat will help to bend the strip into shape see a hump on this node and it also needs some straight I'll do this with all of the strips until I get relatively straight and flat strips here you have the first six tip strips straightened without - tongue twister I put weight on top of them because the strips are still a bit wet and as they dry though sometimes take a concave shape I mentioned to that I put a little cut underneath the nodes and the reason I did that is that when I press them in the vise the the bulge on the outer part of the node will tend to push in it will have a place to put in if I have a cut underneath and that's a reason for that but as I'm cutting the strip's into a triangular shape and they get smaller all that will disappear once I finish straightening the nodes and strips and begin a process called rough beveling and what I'm using is a simple maple form in an old low angle stanley number 60 and a half hand plane i'm trying to achieve is the initial angle of the 60 degree strips at this point I finished roughing the strips to an initial 60 degree taper and I'm ready to begin the process of heat treating heat treating does two things it tempers the strips and it also dries out any excess moisture to accomplish this I'll first take the strips and then I'll run them through the string binder I'll do this in both directions by both directions I actually insert the button first both times but reverse the direction to the string lines before I started building I really had concern about heat treating the bamboo and what was I going to do for an oven I didn't want to spend a lot of money for one buy something like a pizza oven fortunately this man named Frank Newman had a great idea for simple yet effective on a vertical heat treating of it all it is is stove pipe and insulation and the way it works is you have a heat gun on the top through a hole it comes down one baffle and comes up through the other and it works like a convection oven I simply put a thermostat in and I gave the temperature generally I put the bamboo for maybe 20 minutes at 350 degrees for blonde the sections CIA the section team after I'm done heat treating all on by the strips and begin the process of removing the enamel to do that I use a scraper to take off the enamel and then I'll use various grits of sandpaper on small blocks to sand the strip's until all of the enamel is removed I'm not the heart of split cane rod making final planing the planing form is probably the most important tool in making a bamboo rod along with a hand plane the plating form has both a butt and a tip side I'll use a dial gauge it measures in thousandths of an inch to set five-inch stations on the form marked with red ink at this time the rod taper will be formed for this task I'll be using an old Stanley 9 and a half inch block plane fitted with a hot blade actually I'll be using two planes one to get close to the form and a fresh plane to get down to the form I've already done the butt strips and I'm now setting the form for the tip strips a well-sharpened plane blade helps tremendously it helps to minimize chips tear outs and open seams I've completed planing the strips and a now ready for a process called hollow building or hollow scalloping this provides an additional reduction in weight I do leave small dams particularly round the areas of the nodes and this helps to maintain the wall strength I'm now ready for the process of glue up I'm not going to film all this section because it's a bit time-sensitive in my hands will be messy but basically what you want to do is to lay out all the materials that you're going to need to do the process I'll apply the glue to the strip's save all of your old toothbrushes from your dentist when you go there they definitely come in handy and what I'll do is I'll roll the strip's up after the glue is applied I'll then take them over to the binder and bind them again after they're bound I'll take them over to this plexiglass that I have laying on the workbench and I'll roll the strip's flat and I'll also flatten them with this actually it's a pizza burger once I get the strip's flat and straight as I can I'll take them over to a drying closet and I have some cup holders on the top here and as hooks I'll hang them on the cup holders they'll dry overnight because this type of glue has to gel it's a two-part glue it's first that I believe similar to epon and it has a resident hardener once the glue gels in the morning I'll then take the strips out and I'll take them over to the heat treating oven again this type of glue has to cure so it will be in the heat treating oven at a low heat of about 150 degrees for three and a half to four hours and then the strip's will be set at this point the sections are out of the oven the strings have been taken off and the sections have been cleaned one point of note if you use verson it Reap on epoxy you'll want to take the strings off clean and rebind the sections after allowing them to gel overnight before heat treating if you do not the glue will set to the string in the oven and you'll have to sand them off not an easy task at this point the sections are ready to be cut to length and fair nickel silver Farrell's usually come slightly oversized and need to be lapped to get a good fit I'll app the Farrell's with light wet sandpaper going down to 2,000 grit until I get a smooth but secure fit Shen's have been cleaned and are ready to be dip varnished to do this I put thin spar varnish into a PVC tube the area where I do the dipping is our basement stairwell as the height is sufficient for both the dip tube and rod sections I purchased a small motor from Grainger that withdrawals the sections at approximately four inches per minute and fashioned this on off switch setup there is a pulley at the ceiling and the string is 20 pounds backing each section will be dipped three times between coats of varnish the sections will be hung in the drying closet with a light on to quicken neurons stairwell there's a hot plate with a vase filled with hot water prior to dipping I will put the dip tube in the drying closet with the light on these processes aid in keeping the varnish warm so it flows more smoothly I lightly sand between coats and this will help take out any dust nibs or small runs that might occur and need the following coats of varnish to adhere Mars is dry the rod has been polished and is now finished one of the goals when building a split cane rod is to do what they call marrying the tips meaning that the length is the same the note spacing is in the same position and the guides are as well my wife Sally made me this terrific rod sock you you

Channel: Keith C

Views: 149,583

Rating: 4.7765365 out of 5

Keywords: Bamboo Fly Rod (Sports Equipment), Fishing Rod (Sports Equipment), Bamboo (Fiber), Making, split cane

Id: j8yiCm9YCCw

Length: 24min 24sec (1464 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 13 2015