Three New Fiberglass builds

[Herkileez]

Just finished the grips on three fiberglass builds, experimenting with birch/fir bark and burled cork. Still need to do the wraps on the yellow and orange blanks...Two 8' 5wts and a 7'6" 4 wt.

 

[troutstalker]

Just finished the grips on three fiberglass builds, experimenting with birch/fir bark and burled cork. Still need to do the wraps on the yellow and orange blanks.

View attachment 101563

Beautiful grips sir!

 

[Bambooflyguy]

Those look great Herk! Now I’m thinking I need to try some……

 

[Herkileez]

Those look great Herk! Now I’m thinking I need to try some……

I decided to put the grips on glass, as I just couldn't see them on black graphite blanks. I think they'd be perfect on bamboo.

 

[Bambooflyguy]

Those would look good on any rod! Where do you get your bark from? (Besides trees…..)

 

[Buzzy]

Beautiful grips sir!

Like what he said! Beautiful!

 

[RCF]

Just one word: Gorgeous

 

[Salmo_g]

How does the birch and fir bark hold up as rod grip material? I was going to ask about bark in general; then I realized that cork is actually a bark, and I know its track record is solid.

 

[Herkileez]

Those would look good on any rod! Where do you get your bark from? (Besides trees…..)

I found some sheets of bb on FB marketplace. It was quite thin (22 discs per inch), so was a lot ot work cutting and gluing each. I would really like to find some thicker material. There are lots of options, besides bb, that can turn out some pretty nice grips. The yellow, orange blanks only used 1/2 doz bb discs as spacers for mid section, the rest was types of burled cork.

 

[Herkileez]

How does the birch and fir bark hold up as rod grip material? I was going to ask about bark in general; then I realized that cork is actually a bark, and I know its track record is solid.

Birch bark is much stronger than cork (and harder to work with). It was used for canoes, shelter and containers by indigenous people. Fir bark works well as an accent. It doesn't have a lot of fibrous strength, so might tend to crumble if used on its own.

 

[Fourbtgait]

Birch bark is much stronger than cork (and harder to work with). It was used for canoes, shelter and containers by indigenous people. Fir bark works well as an accent. It doesn't have a lot of fibrous strength, so might tend to crumble if used on its own.

Maybe some epoxy for the fir?

 

[Herkileez]

Maybe some epoxy for the fir?

All epoxied to the blank, so nothing will move.

 

[Fourbtgait]

All epoxied to the blank, so nothing will move.

I was thinking the outside surface because you mentioned it crumbles

 

[Herkileez]

I was thinking the outside surface because you mentioned it crumbles

I probably made it sound worse than it is. It's not as hard, or fibrous as birch bark and is much easier to sand...probably same overall strength and consistancy as burnt cork rings.