Rod breaking on a cast

[Dave Westburg]

Took my Wright and McGill Granger 9660 to the Cowlitz today. First time fishing the 9660. It's a powerful 9'6" 7 weight single handed bamboo rod. Was throwing lovely long casts into a tailout and this happened.



A break in the tip section about two inches above the ferrule.

Anyone else had a bamboo rod break during casting? The 9660 is not a dainty tiny tip bamboo rod - it was marketed for bass, large trout and steelhead. I was fishing a 7 weight 406 weight forward line and so the rod was not over-lined. Wondering if it simply had a weakspot which I wasn't aware of when I bought it. The rod wasn't in great shape when I bought it and was a project.

 

[Greg Armstrong]

Oh no. That’s a shame.

I had a similar break happen on an FE Thomas 7wt I own. It was more of a longitudinal break though and Dennis Stone was able to do a serviceable repair on it for me.

 

[Greg Armstrong]

Mine broke on a cast too I forgot to mention.

 

[Bambooflyguy]

Ouch! Bummer.....I’ve had bamboo breaks with the cast too. I call them died in vain....not breaking with a fish on.

 

[Tim Cottage]

Yikes! Must have been a weak spot but what caused it to be weak is anybody's quess.

 

[Mike Monsos]

Ouch that's a bummer Dave! Like Tim stated pretty hard to identify the exact cause, could have been a number of things, delamination, worm hole in a strip, glue failure or just bad luck.

 

[Brute]

Can the cause be similar to me breaking the tip on my 7wt Sage Instigator?…pretty sure I hit it on the back cast with a streamer with dumbbell eyes…

 

[Tim Cottage]

Can the cause be similar to me breaking the tip on my 7wt Sage Instigator?…pretty sure I hit it on the back cast with a streamer with dumbbell eyes…

Yes that is a possibility.

 

[Westelyea]

Yikes! I agree hard to determine exact cause.

It can be repaired with a composite ferrule.

 

[Bambooflyguy]

Scarf joint....

 

[@Dryflyphotography]

Dave, I am so sorry to see that!! Ugh.

 

[Dave Westburg]

Have been trying to understand how a perfectly fine granger would break on a cast. I think I know now. This was a project rod when I purchased it. Here's a picture of it just after I purchased it. You can clearly see a repair wrap on one of the tips.

After I purchased this rod I sent this rod off to a rod restorer to be revarnished and rewrapped and to get a new reel seat. It looks like he removed the repair wrap and simply varnished over the weak spot. I forgot that there was a repair wrap and didn't ask the repair guy what he did. You can see below that the rod broke exactly where the repair wrap was.

Morale of the story. Always closely inspect your rod before and after you get it back from restoration.

 

[Bambooflyguy]

That’s why I do my own.....and break them....and scarf them.....

 

[Mike Monsos]

Mystery solved. I would venture to say that there was a delamination, and the wrap was to hold things together. After stripping the rod, regluing the spot might have been believed to have made the repair. Too bad the damage was a bit more than originally thought. Other than that, the restoration work looks amazing for what you started with.

 

[Tim Cottage]

An unfortunate oversight by the restorationist.

 

[Stonedfish]

Bummer. I know nothing about bamboo.
Can a new section be made to repair the rod or is it a future tomato stake?
SF

 

[Dave Westburg]

Going to see if the break can be scarfed. A scarf is where they cut the bamboo on an angle and glue and bind it back together. May be more trouble than it's worth. I have a spare tip I can use.

 

[Merle]

Scarf joints are amazingly strong, especially if the right adhesive is used. When I built my pram I had to splice sheets of plywood together (couldn't find any 10 ft sheets). I fabbed up a scarfing fixture that my circular saw rode on at an approximately 11 degree angle giving me about a 6" exposure on a 1/4" thick sheet of plywood. Before the final glue up I cut out and made some test coupons to break, and the scarf joint was stronger than the original wood.

On that project I was using System 3 Gel Magic epoxy adhesive. I don't know if that would be a good choice for the rod work, but I bet you could fab up a scarfing fixture pretty easily.

Andy

 

[Mike Monsos]

I think I'd keep the broken tip and just fish the second tip section, but that's just my approach. You could have a section made to accept the ferrule and keep the original length using the remainder of the original (but have to worry about other weak areas in the original broken tip). Or you could have an entire tip section made to closely match the original.

Nothing wrong with single tip rods in my opinion.

Mike

 

[Dave Westburg]

It's a beautiful rod that casts a long long way with little effort. Here are some pics of the rod after I had it restored.