hi my name is Bill oyster and every year I teach hundreds of people to make bamboo fly rods but today I'm going to be talking about bamboo fly rod
[Music]
ferrule there's a right and a wrong way to put together a bamboo fly rod and it's completely different than a graphite Rod so let's take a look at how to do it with the bamboo first when we're trying to assemble it what you're going to do is you're going to put your thumb on top of a flat on the butt section and on top of a flat on the tip section that'll help you get things lined up and your hands should be close together to join the rod the rule of thumb is you put it together with your hands together and you take it apart with your hands far apart together close to the feral and apart not just from each other but far apart from the feral as well all right before you start pushing to put the rod together it's critical that it's in proper alignment up and down so what you're going to do is you touch the ends and then you just waggle that tip while pressing together gently you'll feel sort of a chunk chunk sensation as it begins to step into place what's happening is as it swings through its Arc it will hit proper alignment take a little jump and then it'll do it again and again and after a couple those little slips we've got things moving in the right direction at that point after you feel that step stepping into place we'll push and slide it all the way together to the very end of the male slide every time you assemble a bamboo Rod it should go all the way together it's not like a graphite where you put it together till it's tight in bamboo Rod you put it together all the way and it does not need to be tight because it's not a friction fit it's a suction fit when your hand hands are far apart this will help keep it in alignment when you're pulling apart you don't want to pull like this because that'll pull at a bad angle and it'll put a lot of stress at the dangerous spot next to the feral we want our hands as far from that as possible so even if you're out of alignment a little bit it can move and flex and pull straight apart you hear that suction pop there that's what was holding the rod together so once more touch it waggle gently as you press you feel it stepping into place after you feel that stepping then you push straight in all the way to take it apart your hands are far not just from each other but also far more critically far apart from the feral nice straight line pull it's like you're in a shooting pull position here don't pull from in here nice straight line pop it right
apart whether you've been through one of our classes or purchased a c custom rod from us your ferrule will initially fit perfectly easy together easy apart but at some point few months down the road whether you fished it every day or haven't touched it once your feral fit can become tight and a little difficult to use and you should never struggle with your ferrules these should fit nice and easy but they require a little bit of Maintenance I'm going to show you the way that we maintain these feral fit and it will keep them fitting like brand new we use this stuff right here it's called Renaissance wax and uh we do sell it if you don't want to get it from us get it from somewhere uh if you bought a custom rod from us you've already got some in your care kit but uh it does a perfect job of keeping these things fitting the way they're supposed to we're going to start with the male feral and all you're going to need to do is dip your finger in it and it's just the tiniest little bit that you'll need and we're just going to spin the feral against your finger up and down really work it into it all right when you've got the whole slide covered really well important little detail you're going to take a paper towel or a rag and you need to wipe it all back off again if you allow it to build up it can cause more problems it can make it more tacky and sticky so you want to make sure you get it all right back off again now for the female feral we've got to get it inside the feral so you're going to need a Q-tip and you can just spin a little against the
Q-tip and then inside the female feral really work it over really well up down round and around get all that nasty oxidation off of there and you can see that blackness coming out of it and uh get it polished right back up the way it's supposed to be don't forget to remove the excess we're going to use the clean side put it in all the way Spin and and drag it out if you ever do get some buildup in there causing you problems because you've been doing this a lot you can just use mineral spirits to clean off clean it out go back to zero and start over again all right so wipe it on get it all right back off again and at that point your Pharaoh fit should be fitting easy and perfect all the way in all the way out if you fish bamboo rods long enough and if you spend more time fishing them than maintain in them at some point you might get a rod stuck together maybe it was cold outside your hands are tired everything's wet it was difficult to get together but you just jammed it went fishing and at the end of the day you can't get the thing apart there's a simple trick that'll help you deal with this makes it no big deal and that's what I'm going to demonstrate for you right now so the first thing you need to do is find another human being if you're by yourself just stick it in the back of your car uh get the thing home get it the parking lots usually not hard to find another human being these days so howdy human being howdy fellow human and what you're going to do is you're going to set them up as if they're all by themselves and they're going to pull it apart correctly most critically no hand anywhere near the feral nice straight line pull so make sure that they're all set up first all right there you go and then once you get them in the proper position you're going to come in on the opposite side of the rod and you're also going to do everything correctly so hands as far from the feral as possible nice straight line pull if he's taller shorter than you you can just angle it like this so that you can both deal with it all right and then you're going to count it down and on three you're going to both push and you're going to both pull like this one two three go and you'll pop it right apart nice and safe No Mess no fuss time to get out your Renaissance wax clean them back up again if you follow these tips dealing with your should never detract from your fishing experience hope thisĀ helps