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Home Brew Rod Drier - Turner

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I had the bright idea (or maybe not so bright) to make a multiple rod turner with a rotisserie motor as a drive.  I figured Super Bowl Sunday would be perfect to do it.  Nobody would bother me most of the day.  

 

The rot motor turns at about 1.8 RPM.  A little slow for my taste I looked up a bunch of conversations.  A web search should guys liking anywhere from 3 to 8 RPM.  I figured on a calculation that should give me about 5.  I cut a bunch of pulleys out of a piece of 1x6x24 aluminum bar stock.  Beside the fact that my big mill started chattering it was a near total failure.  I cut them backwards.  No clue what got in my head, but I cut five big wheels for the drives, and a small wheel for the drive motor.  I realized it as soon as I picked up the pulleys off the table.  Just for S&G I hooked one up and it would turn about 1 RPM every six weeks.  LOL.  

 

Yesterday I cut a much bigger pulley for the rot motor the math said I should turn about 3RPM if I used the existing rod drive pulleys.  It turns at about 3RPM.  On the low end of the spectrum, but probably ok.  I found the rot motor would only turn two drives, but I don't think its the rot motor.  I think its parasitic drag from the high tension the belts need to not slip.  My fault really.  I'll probably redo the pulleys with a proper v-groove and get two friction surfaces instead of one.  Right now they just have a flat bottom o-ring slot.  

 

My goal was five rod drier stations and one higher speed wrapping station.  Not going to happen with the rot motor no matter what I do I think.  

 

rod drives.jpg

 

I'm not really into rod building or rod repair, but from time to time I buy rods (at a pretty good price) from one of my vendors and donate them to the local high school fishing team, or for youth events in the area.  After years of being involved in motorcycling events and fishing events I've noticed that those who donate stuff are often not mentioned or recognized.  So I get some name recognition anyway I like to laminate on a water slide decal that says provided by CNC Molds N Stuff with my web url.  I got a real kick out of it last year.  Two different young guys I fished with in a local draw team club where using rods I donated to the high school team.  No matter where those donated rods wind up over time every time somebody picks one up they will be exposed to my company name.  

 

A local guide also buys some rods from me too.  I give him a pretty good discount.  Not because he's a guide, but because we are friends and he has done the same for me in the past.  It also helps to get my order amounts up so I can get free freight.  He saw the decals on a batch of rods and told me if I wanted I could put my name on the rods he gets from me too.  

 

A while back I found a laser printable water slide sheet.  I bought some in clear and some in white.  My Ricoh laser has smearing an reprinting (to hot maybe) issues, but a Brother I picked up a while back at an office closing and auction does a really nice job.  The nice thing about the laser printed material is no fixative is required.  One less step to produce us decals.  

 

These are some I did on the Ricoh last time.  

http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/13370-all-four-labeled/

 

I'll post pictures of those printed with the Brother printer next time I finish a batch.  Now if only I had a color laser printer...

 

Now I have about 20 rods that need decals.  With one drying station that will take me about a month.  LOL.  

 

I also like to repair my own rods.  There are two local guys who repair rods as a business... sorta.  I don't mind paying somebody to put a new guide on a rod, but they both get to it whenever they feel like it and sometimes they don't feel like it for a loooooooooong time.  I also like to add open hook style hook keepers to my plastics rods.  Especially on split grip rods.  This allows me to secure a bait without unrigging it.  

 

So...  I started looking through my junk and found a 24V gear motor I had picked up in a junk buy.  (I bought 30 or so assorted motors for $100 one day at a yard sale).  Last night I hooked it to a power supply thinking it would turn 20 or 30 RPM.  It spun much faster and with so much torque it jumped off the work bench which fortunately jerked the lead wires out of the power supply.  Oops.  I do have a 24V speed control around somewhere.  This might be just the ticket 

 

I'll try to post updates to my progress.  

 

 

 

 

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Well, my 24V gear motor turns nicely on 12V.  About the right speed for rod wrapping.  Maybe a touch fast.  It will be perfect after I chase down a foot control switch for it, so I don't have to take my eyes off the wrap.  

 

Here are some quick and dirty hook keepers I installed yesterday on three rods.  

 

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I'm obviously not a rod builder, but these hook keepers allow me hang a hook without unrigging the bait. Maybe the time saved will allow me to make a few more casts in the course of a day. I specifically looked for split grip rods so I could put this keeper behind the reel so they would not foul line when casting or pitching.

 

Keeper 2.jpg

 

I used 5 minute epoxy instead of flex coat epoxy, because I didn't figure that stiffer resin would have any affect on the action when applied behind the reel seat. If I was doing anything in front of the reel seat I would have used flex coat. I was doing three rods at the same time, and I had just barely finished coating the third one, when the resin in my mixing cup kicked over from syrup to firm gel. I think for fast jobs like this in the future I'll see if I can find some 20 minute resin.

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Edited by Bob La Londe
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I know guys like to tinker, but why not just buy a cheap 120V AC  motor that runs at the speed you want.  My crankbait rack runs at 6 rpm on AC power, has plenty of torque, and cost me $7 10 years ago.  Other guys use rotisserie motors or motors salvaged from microwave turntables.  My rack is for 6 lures.  Maybe you need something much larger for a commercial application, but I bet a motor that would suit is made by somebody.

Edited by BobP
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11 hours ago, BobP said:

I know guys like to tinker, but why not just buy a cheap 120V AC  motor that runs at the speed you want.  My crankbait rack runs at 6 rpm on AC power, has plenty of torque, and cost me $7 10 years ago.  Other guys use rotisserie motors or motors salvaged from microwave turntables.  My rack is for 6 lures.  Maybe you need something much larger for a commercial application, but I bet a motor that would suit is made by somebody.

 

 

I'm not quite sure where you are going with that?  I already have a gear motor with enough torque to spin a dozen rods if I want to.    I can speed control it just by varying the voltage or with pulse width modulation.  I have the controls to do either on the shelf.  Just really haven't messed with it.  Mostly I use it for rod drying.  

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Sorry, I lost the train somewhere in your first post.  5 min epoxy will turn a very unattractive brown from UV exposure and it is only water resistant, not waterproof like the 30 min variety.  When repairing guide wraps, I sometime use Devcon Two Ton thinned with a few drops of denatured alcohol and it has worked fine and hardens much more quickly than Flexcoat.  Flexcoat is a good wrap epoxy but it’s expensive compared to some alternatives.  I think you could use Envirotex Lite and get as good a result for a fraction of the price.  Both contain solvent that enables them to soak into the guide wrap threads and the work times for both are long enough that one batch will let you coat all the guides on a rod.

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16 hours ago, BobP said:

Sorry, I lost the train somewhere in your first post.  5 min epoxy will turn a very unattractive brown from UV exposure and it is only water resistant, not waterproof like the 30 min variety.  When repairing guide wraps, I sometime use Devcon Two Ton thinned with a few drops of denatured alcohol and it has worked fine and hardens much more quickly than Flexcoat.  Flexcoat is a good wrap epoxy but it’s expensive compared to some alternatives.  I think you could use Envirotex Lite and get as good a result for a fraction of the price.  Both contain solvent that enables them to soak into the guide wrap threads and the work times for both are long enough that one batch will let you coat all the guides on a rod.

 

Yeah, I have experienced  the yellowing of five minute.  It also gets brittle when it yellows.  Works great for tip tops, but on wraps it just doesn't hold up.  I definitely found that out the hard way.  LOL.  

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