"the skinny" - chapter eight - dipsticks at work

part one is winding up here

took the rod up to congress to be dipped

mike uses some fancy pants european varnish

epiphanies or something like that

I call it epiphanies anyways

crazy expensive stuff

I've come around to using it myowndamnself

just ordered over a gallon of the stuff

lotsa guys hook they retrieval device to a rotisserie motor

for a slow and consistent withdrawal of the rod from the varnish

mike had an old pflueger reel hooked up to do so

we dipped the rod

I cranked the reel s - l - o - w - l - y

eyes wide as this rod I'd crafted from crooked burnt sticks emerged

as a thing of absolute beauty

we hung it in the drying cabinet

I went home feeling pretty pleased w/ myself

another dip was in order

I wasn't in a hurry

speed kills remember?

except I had a trip coming up to the mighty san juan 

I wanted to fish my brand new bamboo

on the way up there anita and I stopped by congress and picked up the rod

encased in a rod sock and tube provided courtesy of senor shay

I'd have to come back later 

for the second dip

that was neither here nor there

we met steve on the san juan the next day

our buddy chris martinez drove over the mountain and met us with his drift boat

we had a nice float

shortly after we started I blooded that got am rod 

somewhere around the texas hole

I had done it

the journey was underway

"the skinny" - chapter seven - fuggin' ferrules and wrot wram wrapping - continued

so we're at home w/ the blank and wrapping

I'd wrapped three plastic rods w/ gudebrod "A" thread

once I got the hang of that it was pretty easy

if you've been reading a while you've seen plenty of pics of my wrapping stands

hand made out of alder

the rod rest notches are lined w/ adhesive backed foam

pieces are held in place by a rubber band stretched across the top of the rod 

and doubled back 

I don't use any thread tensioning device

I wrap w/ fly tying bobbin holder

which I allow to hang over the edge of the table and this works for me

I've made a couple little tensioner devices

but they never really worked as well for me

first rod I built I wrapped using a cardboard box

I still have it

I used a telephone book for tension

didn't like it

stumbled upon the bobbin

and have stuck w/ it ever since

when I told perry (local maker currently busting his ass fighting wildfire) about it

he said he was using one as well

makes thread management easier for me

wrapping w/ pearsall's gossamer is nothing like "A" thread

furtermore I used to mark off the beginning and end of each wrap w/ a slip of masking tape

ensuring they were all the same size

mike showed me how to start three wraps before you ramp up onto the guide

I've been doing it like that ever since

anyways it was a pain in the ass

I had to finish five wraps on the butt plus tipping each one

I have no idea how many times I had to do each one

before I found it acceptable

nor did I have nice tidy three turn tips either

oh well I'm learning and it looks okay

on to the tip

aye yi yi what a pain in the ass

the tip is very fine and delicate and it moves

nothing at all like wrapping the rigid butt

so I labor away and labor away at it until I think I've got it

I do have it - I'm done

except...shit...

all the guides are wrapped one flat over from where they should be

motherFUCK!

I bust out all the wraps and do it again

I think we had varnished the initial wraps on the butt up at mike's shop

and he sent me home w/ a vial of varnish

I'm pretty sure I varnished the remaining wraps at home 

four coats

anyways, now it really was looking like a fishing pole

I could even test cast it

and I'm sure I did

time to dip the rod

I'm stoked

time to go back to congress

"the skinny" - chapter seven - fuggin' ferrules and wrot wram wrapping

this one's quite fuzzy in my memory

mostly because it wasn't much of a hands-on lesson

more a demo I guess...

I think we may have corked up the rod as well

though we also had to wait on this to set as well

so this chapter may well have occured of the course of a couple visits to congress

and mike mighta shown me how to turn a grip

again I likely had little to do with this

I do remember he kept having me check it for hand feel

mike chucked up the rod pieces into the lathe 

showed me how to cut ferrule stations

whizhittt whizhitt

it was done

a far cry faster and simpler than fitting them by hand w/ sandpaper

the type of thing that could take most of the afternoon

then he crowned the ferrule tabs

again I don't much remember much of this

cleaned the ferrules inside and out and glued them to the rod

down time waiting for glue to set was likely spent jrinking and shooting the shit

after which mike dressed the male to fit the female

and likely glued on the tip top

the next step remains fairly vivid

mike showed me how he wrapped

he wrapped above the grip - black red black red black

put a sig wrap at fourteen inches - red black red

I asked for another at sixteen inches as that was the bottom end of the slot limit at lees ferry

and my fishing buddy always wanted to keep a couple fish the last day to take home

and because of his ineptitude catching fish it was left up to me to catch them

it's now occurred to me I've missed a thing or two

at some point mike must have explained sizing the pieces and cutting them to size

which we did - surely before setting the ferrules I think

I also think the ferrules were blued

I think mike may have wrapped the stripper guide

and made the guide spacing reference marks

which remain on the rod to this day if you look closely enough

so anyways, I took the rod pieces home to finish wrapping

"whatever you do don't put those pieces together and wiggle or pretend cast that"

okay sez I  - I won't

"the skinny" - chapter six - this is gonna take forever...

if you've been reading here for a while

you know that both mike and I like to jrink

I'd show up around eight thirty am and mike would hand me a beer

"yer four behind" he'd say

 Iusually spent the night in the ranch house on the couch

work a few hours sat morning and drive home

I think I finished planing all the butt strips

threw the tip strips onto the forms 

planed them to butt numbers

flipped the forms over and set for tips

and yer back for more

fuck my right arm was tired

fingertips on my left hand were marked by razor thin slices

taken by the edges of the bamboo

it was like handling glass only worse cuz you get cut

often

I'm not sure I finished planing those strips that trip or not

eventually they were done

if you have never seen a tip strip before it's glued up

you would not believe how fucking tiny that thing is

tiny as it is it carries the cross section of an equilateral triangle 

whippier than shit

it still kinda boggles my mind

could it be that we're ready to glue?

we are we're ready to glue!

make or break moment number one

wow - I've neglected to mention node staggering

easy

I go I - IV II - V III = VI

get it?  got it?  good

some will some won't and that's neither here nor there

I also didn't speak to mike's constant encouragement and necessary guidance

there kept me going as I was ready to quit

my right shoulder bicep forearm wrist and palm were trashed

I hated planing

fortunately things get easier and easier as you go along

now i think nothing of it and can plane a butt to numbers in a morning

tips take an afternoon

no physical wear and tear and (hopefully) no snags

glue day is simple and my goodness nothing else to do until tomorrow

may as well get jrunk so we do

wanna read about it?  

put the strips in order I II II IV V VI both strips

tape them into place

set the plane to red cunt hair depth and take off the apexes

mix glue - well that's what I go now

we use different glues mike and I so I don't remember if we mixed

smear w/ glue up down and back up the sections

jrink smoke

fold six pcs to hex shape both pcs

run through binder both directions

hang in cabinet

jrink smoke

the rest of the day was filled with waiting jrinking and smoking

I think that a chunk of hash appeared at some point

of course I sampled that

I'm asleep when mike gets up at two am as he does most every day

he strips the string and heat sets the glue

this glue is some kinda fancy expensive shit 

designed to glue the lining into aircraft windshields

I get up in the morning drink a couple cups of coffee and sand until my arms are ready to fall out

then I sand some more

holy crap this thing is finally starting to look like a fishing pole

I take it home w/ considerable pride to show my wife

things are coming together and I'm about half way done

"the skinny" - chapter five - fuck this is tough stuff

so the next saturday I'm up again

and those crooked burnt sticks are ready for planing

"I've got a machine but it's not likely that you will

maybe you should rough by hand"

I'll try and I did

half the day later with a light head and heavy arms

I say "we'll zip the rest"

so we zip them and we're done in far less time than it took me

to do that one - in the end it was well worthwhile

mike delivers a block of instruction for setting forms

my mind is kinda swimming now

we're marking forms (every five inches if ya din't know)

marking each mark w/ a spot of tape and a number

that looks like this

0 0.70

0.081

0.094

0.115

no wonder my head spins or was it swims

I used to teach decimals to kids and told them

"don't really worry about things past the hundredths round up or down and go with it

we don't really use the deeper decimals"

and we don't or didn't we are now

having them and reading a screwy gauge and adjusting to reach the desired decimal

*I know I've got a picture of this bassackwards gauge bear w/ me*

tis second nature now but a true pain in the ass 

the first time I tried it out on my own w/out guidance

as with anything else worth doing

everything is difficult before it becomes easy

this shit was very difficult

I started planing

ohmyfuggingoldengildedass it was difficult

my scrawny arms were accustomed to swinging golf clubs

not making curls

imagine the repetitiveness and mindlessness of the nodework

add toil and measuring multiply by an exponent and yer almost there

consider the fact that the plane is bucking skipping and bouncing in my hand

mike advising me "easy easy"

my aching ass it's easy

we got it done

I was whooped and jrunk wasted really

I stayed the night to continue planing the next day

I had to get this done

I wasn't looking forward to it

as time went on - I think this was back in like 2006?  - I spent a lotta hours up there

this was a coupla months ago

continued II

things proceed very slowly

escpecially when you don't know what yer doing

it's always fun when yer splitting a new culm

learning to do it with two left hands w/ ten little toes is tricky

eventually after a half dozen (culms) or so 

yer steering yer splits and getting consistency

without even thinking about it

that was a short and easy afternoon's work

feeling each other out

mike didn't know it at the time and he would find out eventually

I was a serious and dedicated student

I was not going to squander this opportunity

showed up around seven thirty the next saturday morning

for a long hard daze work

we heated and crushed nodes

all fucking day - this is incredibly tedious work

(as readers of my blog have read more than once)

say you've got three nodes per section

six strips per section means eighteen nodes to crush

times two for a two piece times three for a three

each node gets heated and crushed twice

you could fall asleep

(note - both mike and I have streamlined this process a bit 

mike uses the sweet nodemaster 500 or 5000 I don't remember

while I employ a timer to keep heating [relatively] consistent)

mike quickly showed me the key to enduring such drudgery

and handed me an icy cold bottle of budweiser from the keginator

still wearisome but made a bit more pleasant 

as the heating and crushing continue

must be crushing nodes

I don't know how we could have gotten anything else that day

all I've got to show for it is a dozen burnt crooked sticks

chances are pretty good I drove home w/ a pretty good buzz

really not a good call ever

it won't be the last time...

"the skinny" - chapter four - feelers

once I got it my mind to do this

I started putting out feelers on-line

rodmakers chat on thursday evenings put me in touch w/ guys like...

ron kusse john channer and others

who readily offered advice and tips

they were a truly invaluable resource

I put forth my idea

learn to build bamboo rods 

so I could stay busy during retirement

I got an invite from an az rodmaker to visit his shoppe

I drove an hour and fifteen minutes northwest to congress, az

where I was greeted by a countless number of giant white (deaf) great danes

a handful or two chow chows yapping to beat the band

a hippie looking guy w/ long gray ponytail and full gray beard

wandered out of the shoppe shook my hand and said

"I'm mike shay - let's build you a bamboo rod"

we toured the shoppe

mike selected a culm and we flamed and split that sumbitch

and my education was underway...

"the skinny" - chapter three - flashforward continued...

fished that schliske four weight pretty much exclusively over the course of two years

it became an extension of my arm my mind and even my heart

casting was effortless thoughtless

visual landing the fly and go

the rod simply did whatever I asked it to do

and to feel it come alive after sticking a hot fish

my word there was nothing like it

the thing had a life of its own

I started to try to figure out how I could get a bamboo five weight

and a three weight

that would be enough

I could not afford or justify either

could I build one?

not immediately of course 

I'd have to learn how to do it

ideally have someone show me how to do it right

shorten the learning curve

how can we make this happen?

set a reasonable timeline

how about learn to do it before I retire

so I have something to keep idle hands working

I envisioned myself an old fart puttering around in a garage shoppe

I just didn't see it happening so quickly

some time around then

a bamboo rod maker packed up his shop in southern california

and headed to a small ranch near wickenburg

where he set up in an outbuilding and took care of the numerous pets and stock

and continued practicing his craft

I knew nothing at the time of this profound development

"the skinny" - chapter three - flashforward

not much background left

I met matt at river hill campground on the rio g

we fished a bit and talked some shit

it was fun

I'd been trying for years to get a nice bent rod shot of myself

difficult to do when you usually fish alone

anita sucks at taking pictures

was out on the water w/ schliske for ten minutes

bingo it's done

and it's classic

this pic has been seen by who knows how many people

it remains a favorite 

and is the model/whatever for my logo...
as well as part of an abra ad

we had been sitting on the bank
enjoying a cool smoke

matt flipped his fly out into the water and bingo got hit immediately
this seemed like a pretty good indication
that we should be fishing
moments later I was bent to the cork
by a fourteen inch brookie

earlier in the day I'd been out w/ my wife
and I stuck her in the cheek w/ a stimi
fortunately it was barbless
and she took it like a trooper

honestly she should have known better than to be standing back there
it certainly wasn't her first rodeo

continued

memories grow hazy

I'd tired of the frustration I'd experienced w/ the long rod

futility

so I decided to spend a leisurely day

jrinking beer in the shade and fishing a spinning rod

corn and salmon eggs

there was a guy there w/ the same idea

I polished off my six pack

strolled back to campsite and loaded up a twelve pack

headed back to the shady spot

where the guy pulled out a bottle of crown royal and passed it my way

this continued throughout the course of the day

with nary a nibble to show for it

we didn't care we were lit

I was struck by extreme urgency

I had to shit like now

I started a ridiculous butt clenched quick walk to the outhouse 

a couple hundred yards

I thought I would make it

I did not

I cleaned myself up tossed my drawers and resumed fishing and jrinking

yuck

the sun went down

I was plastered

walked back to camp where phildo was preparing some baby back ribs on the grill

shit was spinning I was seeing double

figured I had better sit down

sat in a campchair beside the campfire

and pitched face first into the fire

I got the hell outta there right quick

crawled into my tent and sleeping bag

I awoke the next morning feeling and looking like death warmed over

I have a pic - you will not see it

we drove to wal mart in farmington

purchased necessary salves ointments and bandages

phildo ministered to my numerous wounds

I looked like shit but felt all right

I would be back

"the skinny" - chapter one - making a short story long

so we start at the beginning

a (former) friend and I took a road trip to farmington, new mexico, of all places

to play a five star golf course, of all things, in a highly unlikely place

we enjoyed camping and rather than stay in a motel

we pitched a tent in cottonwood campground

in navajo dam

on the bank of "holy shit, it's the mighty san juan!" phildo exclaimed...

"we need to do this again w/ fly rods"

I shrugged my shoulders and thinking about more golf, "sure"

next time around 

I was armed w/ some spinning rods packed in with my golf clubs

we'd fish in the morning and golf in the afternoon

and eat like kings at night

(think ribs shrimp carnitas etc)

phildo started to show me some fly casting ropes

it was a struggle

I donned his father's old (read shitty) waders

ridiculous outsized rubberized nylon size thirteen boot foot models

you could have fit four of me inside these things

I knew mase and he was kinda big but not this damn big

I didn't bother w/ any socks (big mistake) and wondered how to piss...

I wandered around most clumsily and aimlessly

futilely thrashing the air w/ an awkward long pole

occasionally dropping a ridiculous fly on the water to no avail

usually resulting in a hopeless bird's nest

that I'd have to sit down on the bank and untangle or cut off

I didn't know shit

neither did phildo

I fell of course filled my waders and kept it right the fuck up

now cold and damp my feet being abraded in those stoo-pit oversized boots

I loved it despite being infinitely frustrated and as uncomfortable as I've ever been in warm weather

phildo let me borrow the rod

and religiously I practiced every day in the alley behind my house

until I could move some line

I could cast but I still sucked

nevertheless I was determined to improve

I bought a few books and studied my ass off

I'm a very good student but this shit remained mostly frustrating

I kept at it in the alley

ventured out on my own 

eventually even sticking a few fish

by no means would I call myself proficient

but I could deliver a fly to the water

and somehow or another occasionally stick a trout

it was time to head back to the san juan...
round two it's gonna get ugly

this time I arrived w/ heightened anticipation
I had seen those huge fucking rainbows cruising about
and my mind raced w/ visions of sticking them
them mind you not simply one
I was gonna eat a fat trout filet cooked over my own campfire

I'd come armed w/ a 9ft 3in 5wt orvis pole
I bought spinning gear too just in case
I had knowledge
a little experience I could move line a bit
I understood the concept of dragfree drift

phildo didn't have a clue
he was armed w/ a custom built (by al ellis for his father, mase) bamboo rod
cast beautifully
false casting and dropping his fly everywhere but where it should be
he had a bookcase full of his late father's flyfishing library
and hadn't cracked one of them
he knew nothing but threw a tight loop

I got skunked
and it gets worse...

coming soon - "the skinny" or the evolution of a rod maker

over the years this thing has taken on a life of its own

what was going to be a showcase for rod building fly tying and fishing

has evolved into whatever the hell it is right now

a reflection (albeit shallow) of my life 

and I realize that I may have lost some readers/followers

as I share such inanities as golf, cooking, music, books and other random nonsense

I'd apologize but hey there's more to life than building bamboo rods

and I won't apologize for any liberties or indulgences I take here

it's my blog and I'll do what I want

since 2007 I've built over thirty bamboo (and one graphite) fly rods

each one a tedious process addressed a step at a time

this year saw a slowdown of sorts

a couple struggles  in need of solving

resulted in a paltry four rods this current season

I can live w/ that

I've learned patience over the years

and speed kills in this game

I'm going to go ahead and tell my stoop-it little story

just how it came to be that I entered into this arcane little world

from the seed sparking the interest to the opportunity to get my hands dirty 

actually building a bamboo fly rod

and finally establishing a shoppe of my own

humble as it may be

we hope you follow this story (it could be quite long - as in book length)

and enjoy it perhaps picking up a thing or two about a thing or two

that's my hope anyways...

stay tuned