Finding the "spine" of a rod blank

[Wally02]

Hello
I just bought my first blank to build, and I have an old rod building book that told me to find the spine of the blank and mark it.
I did as the book showed and slowly rolled the blank in my hand while one end was on the floor.
My question does the "spine" bend in two directions or just one.
Second once I find the "Spine" for a casting rod the guides should go on the opposite of the bend correct?
the spine, or bend shows me the way the rod would bend when fishing so, I deduced that, am I correct?
I picked up an old fly rod that only has the tip top guide on. I rolled it and found the tip top was turned 180 out from the bend or "spine"

[fishbait]

Wally, You got it. Casting guides on the top side and spinning on the underside. Have fun. A BBQ rotissary motor makes a good rod spinner for the finish coat. Be sure to rough up the blank where the handle goes and use lots of glue. And do a good job when you grind/file the tips of the guide seats to get a smooth transition from blank onto the guide foot, this is important.

[crabbait]

Not necessarily so, in answer to all your questions. For fly rod, you may want to locate the guides so that the spine is on the bottom. This will give more strength to the rod for fighting fish and for lifting line off the water.

For answers to these and all your other rod building questions, go to:

www.rodbuilding.org (http://www.rodbuilding.org)

[rob allen]

First of all ever rod has not one spine but 2 a positive and a negative the larger one being the positive the guides should line up along one of the two spines. In reality hardly any people are not good enough fishermen to know if a rod is spiined + or - or to be able to notice a difference between a rod spined on the positive or negative spine. In modern graphite rods the spine so unimportnat it doesn't matter how you do it. Having said that you rod must be spined! having the guides wrapped on the blank between the spines will cause the rod to be weak and will have neither proper loading or lifting power and is quite likely to break.
Although it doesn't matter i'd always put the guides on opposite the positive(big) spine.

To find the spine:
1. wrap a piece of masking tape around the blank in the upper area of the sections.
2. put the large end of the blank on a hard flat surface
3. place one hand in the middle of the piece to hold the blank flat against the hard surface
4. with the other hand flex the section and roll it it the palm of your hand
5. as you roll it you should feel 2 "jumps" locate the largest one
6. roll the blank back and forth slowly across the largest "jump" to find the center of it.
7 mark the piece of masking tape with a pen or pencil

That puts a mark 180 degrees off from the spine,
i tend to agree with what was mentioned above
spin and fly rods should be spined 180 off the spine anc casting wods should be on the spine.

[Gobbaworms]

Wally,
Welcome to rod building. The ones I built myself are some of the most treasured.
The rod will naturally "want" to bend in a certain direction. The outside of the bend is the effective spine. So if I understand your first question, just one.
#2 For casting rods, my opinion is yes.
#3 yes
#4 provides for better casting on fly rods. Another way to think about it, the inside of the bend is the stiff part of the rod.
Have fun. Post some pics when you're done.

[Wally02]

Thanks everyone for all of the input. I am saving this post to add to my rod building book.
I havn't heard anything befor eabout + and - spines, great stuff!!! thanks alot
Wally :grin: