Second hand store bamboo rods

On 26-Aug-2008, wrote:

So one day this past July I had tied my mule up a few miles back in
the Pecos Wilderness, along a beautiful meadow section of a stream up

Jon

I have horses and we are considering buying 2 small mules
I would like to ask you some questions about their teperament if it is OK by
you
Are they good pack animals as good or better than horses and do they have
any problems w horses?
We do have room for them in the barn and pastures

Fred

On Aug 27, 12:03*am, "Fred" wrote:

I have horses and we are considering buying 2 small mules
I would like to ask you some questions about their teperament if it is OK by
you
Are they good pack animals as good or better than horses and do they have
any problems w horses?
We do have room for them in the barn and pastures

Fred

They don´t have many problems with horses Fred, or they wouldn´t even
exist!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mule

Don´t bend it more than ninety degrees when you are trying it out!

wrote:
On Aug 26, 11:47 am, wrote:


Of course there are lots of people who love cane rods, and everything
associated with them. That too is just fine with me. Each to his own.


So one day this past July I had tied my mule up a few miles back in
the Pecos Wilderness, along a beautiful meadow section of a stream up
there. I had my 3forks 3wt with me but the skies were growing ominous
so it was going to just be a lunch break and then head out. A few
minutes later a couple of guys ride in on horses, tie up and start
stringing their rods. One of them had seen my rod on the back of my
saddle and politely came over and asked which way I'd be fishing. I
told him I wouldn't be, but noticed he was carrying a very fine bamboo
fly rod. To understand how out of place it looked, he was kinda
scruffy in cutoffs and holey canvas sneakers, and normally a person
who rides up on horseback is going to have a 10-year-old spinning rod
at best, with equally old 10lb line, and will either collect some
worms or use powerbait.

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

On Aug 27, 12:11*am, rw wrote:
wrote:
On Aug 26, 11:47 am, wrote:

Of course there are lots of people who love cane rods, and everything
associated with them. That too is just fine with me. Each to his own.

So one day this past July I had tied my mule up a few miles back in
the Pecos Wilderness, along a beautiful meadow section of a stream up
there. I had my 3forks 3wt with me but the skies were growing ominous
so it was going to just be a lunch break and then head out. A few
minutes later a couple of guys ride in on horses, tie up and start
stringing their rods. One of them had seen my rod on the back of my
saddle and politely came over and asked which way I'd be fishing. I
told him I wouldn't be, but noticed he was carrying a very fine bamboo
fly rod. To understand how out of place it looked, he was kinda
scruffy in cutoffs and holey canvas sneakers, and normally a person
who rides up on horseback is going to have a 10-year-old spinning rod
at best, with equally old 10lb line, and will either collect some
worms or use powerbait.

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

Not always;

http://www.kk.org/streetuse/archives...bookmobile.php

May also be of interest, ( or not?)

Thomas Young, an English Doctor and physicist, coined the term
"Modulus" in the early 1800´s. The term is used as a constant in
equations, as "Young's Modulus", to calculate specific properties of
certain materials.

In simple terms, it may be seen as a mathematical description of a
material's property of resistance to bending.

Calculations using this are essential for developing the fibres used
in many modern composite constructions. The fibres, such as carbon
fibre, boron, glass fibre etc, provide the stiffness, at the same time
reducing the weight which using other materials would involve
("standard" carbon fibre is about 30 % of the weight of aluminium, and
roughly 250% stiffer) and the epoxy resins used hold the whole thing
together.

So what does this have to do with fishing rods?, and why is the term
"Elastic Modulus" so often bandied about?

IM6

It has to do with them, insofar as the term may be applied to the
materials used in their construction. IM6 Graphite for instance. IM6
has a modulus of about 35 million, although many rod manufacturers use
fibres of much higher modulus. IM6 is actually only a trade name for
Hercules fibre in any case, Hercules being the largest producer of
carbon fibre.

However this may be, the fibres used in rod construction are only a
part of the story. The taper, wall thickness, and of extreme
importance, the weaves and resins used, and the actual manufacturing
process are at least as important. In actual fact, of even greater
importance than the modulus of the fibres used.

Rod designs vary considerably, and this may be controlled by any and
all of the factors above. Using a suitable design, resins etc.,
practically any rod action may be obtained, anything from a floppy
noodle, to as stiff as a poker. This really has little to do with the
modulus of the fibres used, and is mainly the result of other design
factors.

Although higher modulus fibres may be used to produce stiffer lighter
rods, they may also be used to produce noodles if desired.

Light, heavy, stiff, soft

Although light rods are generally desirable, they do have some
disadvantages. Some light rods will not load very well at close
range, as they lack the mass to "pre-load" themselves, which a cane
rod for instance has, and will not "cut the wind" very well, and will
often not be very robust. Differences of half an ounce or so, or even
quite a bit more, between various otherwise similar rods, will not
really make much difference in terms of practical fishing either. Rod
length is more of a factor here than rod weight. Rods of about nine
feet are usually more or less optimal for most people. With much
shorter rods the weight is not even a major factor.

Whether you choose a stiff rod or a soft rod depends, (or should)
mainly on what you want to use it for. Nowadays, this is not
considered as important as it once was, as other technological
advances in lines, leaders, floatants, sinkants, etc. have made it
less of a problem. Casting techniques have also improved greatly, and
a good caster can produce wide loops or tight loops, indeed, some can
even produce "sexy" loops at will. Once upon a time, all this was
simply not the case, and specific rod actions were deemed essential
for specific applications. It is still a good idea to choose a
suitable tool for your particular application though, and not just
rely on "feel", or advertising hype.

From cloth to blank

Back to modulus.The modulus given by the fibre manufacturers only
applies to the fibre used, which comes to the rod maker in the form of
special "matting", or ""graphite cloth" and once this has been built
into a composite (sometimes also rather inaccurately referred to as
"laminates"), it no longer applies, as the actual "modulus" of a
finished rod (to which the term is not really sensibly applicable in
any case, although it could theoretically be applied), is not
dependent on the fibre used, but more on how it is used in the
construction, wrapping, resin bonding, etc.

Hollow blanks are made by wrapping very carefully measured pieces of
the matting around a steel mandrel. This is then coated with special
resin, and "baked" in an oven. Manufacturers keep their exact
processes secret.

When finished, the mandrel is withdrawn, and used again for the next
batch of rods. Usually fairly large batches of rods are made at a
time. How good the finished rods are, depends on how good the design
is, and on the quality control of the resulting blanks. There are
often a number of rejects in each batch, due to cloth imperfections,
and various other problems.

Many marketing departments have swooped on the term "modulus", and use
it quite indiscriminately for all sorts of things, basically none of
which have to do with the properties of finished fishing rods. It is
basically hype.

So, does modulus mean anything?

It is not possible to compare fishing rods in any meaningful way by
calculating their elastic modulus, and using the elastic modulus of
the fibre used in their construction as a basis for such
"calculations" is just nonsense, and will really tell you nothing
useful at all about the rods in question.

The quality of modern composite fishing rods is dictated primarily by
the manufacturing process used, the quality control, and the hardware
and cosmetics. Practically any modern blank, even Far East
"cheapies", will make decent fishing rods if good procedures and
materials are used.

Rods produced in America and Western Europe are more expensive than
those produced in Korea and similar places, simply because the cost of
producing them is much higher. Labour, materials, marketing, etc etc
etc are all more expensive.

Do you really get what you pay for?

There is indeed considerable controversy about cheap rods vs.
expensive rods. Some people maintaining that a cheap rod can not
possibly be as good as an expensive one, merely because of its very
cheapness. This is factually incorrect of course, certainly as far as
composite rods are concerned, any composite rod built anywhere to the
same specifications, under the same conditions, will be more or less
identical to one built anywhere else. The price of course may vary
very considerably, even though the rods are identical. The same
applies to any manufactured goods.

There are now quite a number of very good cheap rods available. If
you put good quality hardware and cosmetics on a "cheap" blank, then
you no longer have a "cheap" rod. Also, the word "cheap" here is used
in the sense of the final retail price. It may have nothing whatsoever
to do with the actual quality of a blank.

Composite blanks are by their nature "cheap" products, as they may be
mass produced easily and consistently at will, once the specifications
are known. Pricing policies of various firms have little to do with
the quality of their blanks, although of course may reflect good
quality to some degree.

Comparing blanks

There is no generally accepted way at present of mathematically
comparing various rod blanks to one another in any meaningful or
useful way. Most anglers choose their rods absolutely subjectively,
based on how it "feels", how it "looks", price, manufacturers name,
"modulus", etc etc. Quantifying such things is an impossibility. Some
good casters, and quite a few anglers know pretty well what they want
and expect from a rod, but this is the result of long practice, quite
a bit of skill and knowledge, and is subjective in any case, although
some may pretty well agree on some things.

Some manufacturers, and a number of other interested parties have been
working on various systems of definition and comparison for some time,
but as far as I am aware, nothing of general application has yet
emerged. If you have never cast a rod, and have no other knowledge of
the subject, then it will not help you anyway, as there is no way as
yet to translate such system results into useful information. They all
require some prior knowledge.

For some new information on this and related mattes;

See “Common Cents” By Dr. Bill Hanneman



Money doesn't talk

If you think that a very expensive rod is better than some other less
expensive tool, then you must perforce buy the expensive one. One
thing is certain, it will not normally catch you any more fish than a
cheapie.

Quite excellent rods which cost ten dollars ex-factory in Korea, or
Taiwan, are regularly sold in Europe and America under various brand
names, for well in excess of two hundred dollars, and sometimes a very
great deal more. The final price has little to do with the cost of
actually producing the rods, and certainly not with the raw material
cost or the inherent "quality". Transport, advertising, several
middle-men taking their profits, etc etc, all jack the price up.

This is also why comparing rods based on their retail prices is
absolutely senseless, as you have no way of knowing how this price was
set. It may have absolutely nothing whatever to do with the quality of
the rod.

Tools like rods, must not only be suitable for the application itself,
fishing of course, but have a whole range of other properties which
makes them more or less desirable for the purpose, and may be used to
determine their "quality" more accurately than any mathematical
equations relating to the stiffness or otherwise of materials used in
their construction.

"Useful life"

As far as I am aware, there are no absolutely conclusive studies about
the useful working life of various composite rod-blanks, but modern
resins, coupled with the manufacturing techniques now available should
produce rods which will certainly last a very long time. There is some
literature on the useful life of composites in aircraft manufacture,
but this is highly technical, and not a great deal of use, as any
conclusions drawn would have to be based on the use to which a
material is put, and theoretical projections of such behaviour, with
regard to composites built and used for other purposes, would be
suspect at least.

Apparently, bamboo is susceptible to "going floppy" after a while,
presumably as the "springiness" of the power fibres lessens in use, to
put it simply. Similar effects in other materials are often referred
to as "fatigue". This will also occur with other fibres (like carbon
fibre), but will take much longer (in normal use), and be less
apparent. In fact it is unlikely that a difference may be found at all
in normal use, although it may be possible to measure one after a
certain time in use. I am not aware of anyone having done this
however.

Although I have heard that this is often the case with bamboo, I have
never actually attempted to measure or quantify it. Bamboo is
interesting for a variety of reasons, and although I no longer have
any bamboo rods (at least not in use), and the only ones I ever built
were really quite awful, I still read a lot about it, and listen with
interest to any comments from experts.

I would have no qualms about using even the cheapest composite blanks
to build on, as all I would have to lose would be the time involved
and a few materials. Hardware etc may be used again, should the rod
turn out to be useless, or not up to expectations in some way.

One may also save a lot of time and trouble, take some casting lessons
in order to obtain the necessary knowledge and "feel", and simply walk
into a shop and buy the best rod one can afford, that one feels is
suitable, after trying it out. It is then most unlikely to be a
"lemon". What "modulus" fibres it may contain, is more or less
irrelevant, especially if it has a lifetime guarantee!

Tight lines! ~ Mike Connor

On 26-Aug-2008, rw wrote:

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

Zoom right over my head, man
I googled and tried Wikipedia
No comprendo KPOS???

Thanks
Fred

On Aug 26, 4:03 pm, "Fred" wrote:

I have horses and we are considering buying 2 small mules
I would like to ask you some questions about their teperament if it is OK by
you
Are they good pack animals as good or better than horses and do they have
any problems w horses?
We do have room for them in the barn and pastures

Fred, it'd take a novel to answer all that and besides I'm not expert
enough to do so anyways.

But, there are horse people and there are mule people and they are
different! You probably won't know until you try but if you find
you're a horse person then you won't like mules (though you may learn
to tolerate them).

Mule people are friendlier and smarter ;-)

Mules are better at everything than horses are, except perhaps
unquestioningly doing everything you demand them to do, no matter how
dangerous or stupid. They are always thinking and always have their
own opinion as to what should be done. This makes them safer, more
sure-footed, and less likely to cause a complete wreck; but it also
makes them "stubborn", though that's only the word that horse people
use to describe them ;-)

Mules typically respect horses (they were raised by one, after all),
but there are horses that can seriously dislike mules (and donkeys). I
know because I have one, though she's starting to come around.

Of course, there are bad mules just like there are bad horses (and bad
people). Unfortunately people rarely sell their good mules, so you've
got to really stumble into the right situation to buy some prime-aged
good mules, or buy young and raise your own, or spend alot of money.

Jon.

On Aug 26, 4:11 pm, rw wrote:

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

Yeah yeah. So do we get an AK report?

Jon.

On Aug 27, 12:24*am, "Fred" wrote:
On 26-Aug-2008, rw wrote:

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

Zoom right over my head, man
I googled and tried Wikipedia
No comprendo KPOS???

Thanks
Fred

At one time, a lot of people on here advised newbies to try the Cabela
´s "Three forks" ( Or was it two forks?) rods. These came to be known
a Korean Piece Of **** ( KPOS).

In point of fact, they are probably excellent for the money, like many
other Korean and other Asian rods. Indeed, a large percentage of all
rods now availabel are merely re-labeled Asian imports.

On Tue, 26 Aug 2008 15:11:44 -0700, rw
wrote:

wrote:
On Aug 26, 11:47 am, wrote:


Of course there are lots of people who love cane rods, and everything
associated with them. That too is just fine with me. Each to his own.


So one day this past July I had tied my mule up a few miles back in
the Pecos Wilderness, along a beautiful meadow section of a stream up
there. I had my 3forks 3wt with me but the skies were growing ominous
so it was going to just be a lunch break and then head out. A few
minutes later a couple of guys ride in on horses, tie up and start
stringing their rods. One of them had seen my rod on the back of my
saddle and politely came over and asked which way I'd be fishing. I
told him I wouldn't be, but noticed he was carrying a very fine bamboo
fly rod. To understand how out of place it looked, he was kinda
scruffy in cutoffs and holey canvas sneakers, and normally a person
who rides up on horseback is going to have a 10-year-old spinning rod
at best, with equally old 10lb line, and will either collect some
worms or use powerbait.

While we're dealing in stereotypes, someone with a mule is typically
carrying a KPOS. :-)

And apparently, 'roundabout Ketchum, Jr. way, a horse is typically
carrying TWO horse's asses...but only one innertube model...

HTH,
R
....and isn't about time you moved to North Platte and convinced yourself
it was just as good as Omaha, there, Wanna Buff-it...?