Cane refurbish - varnish or hard wax or ?

Finally pulling trigger on refurbishing an old H-I Governor. Have tied flies for years but this is first dip into rod work of any kind. Read enough great information to confuse me, though Al Campbell's teachings have been extra helpful (Had honor of meeting him in Rapid City and he was bigger than life. Miss him). Been practicing skills and acquiring basic tools/supplies. So far, sanded the rod finish and rubbed with tongue oil - followed by hard wax each time - 4 times. Before I wrap guides, etc, do I want to (or can I?) leave as a waxed finish or should the rod finish truly be varnish or polyurethane?

I intend to periodically fish the rod. Have built handful of primitive items and love a hard wax finish on wood but could use advice from experience. Looking forward to doing the work to bring this rod back to fight another fish.. Thank you in advance.

grassman

I am by no means an expert on cane rods, but I can tell you from my own experience, the few cane rods that I have refurbished for fellows, were done using Exterior Marine Spar Varnish. This was done mainly because the origin finish was such and I wanted to match the rod as close to original as possible. Coated the blank with Spar Varnish while rotating on my rod drier. 24hrs later, completed the wraps to match and coated them with the same varnish. Rods were beautiful once completed. Not sure if the hard wax that you have already applied might cause you some adhesion problems with the varnish on the thread wraps?
Perhaps you may want to visit www.rodguild.com and asked that question there, for I know the real cane experts are also members to that site.

I don't think that wax is a good choice.

Like David said, the wax may cause some adhesion problems when finishing the thread wraps.
The usual choice is to finish with spar varnish or a polyurethane.

Personally, I would stay away from any wax until the rod is completed and then maybe add a coat of wax once the finish has had a long period to dry.

Also, when finishing the wraps, you may want to thin your finish to get better penetration into the thread wraps.

Brian

Brian and David, thank you for the wisdom. I'll drop back a step and do this the right way..

The rod was rescued years ago from a friend's trash pile. Have wanted to learn rod building so I inspected this one and have determined it's salvageable and the bamboo is in good shape. Once I found it is not museum worthy it's become my challenge to maybe simply breathe some life back into it. Thank you for taking time to share your thoughts.

grassman

It is always nice to be able to take an old rod and refurbish it to fish again. IMO, what is even better as a rod builder, is when you take that old rod you know little about, possibly make an error or mistake somewhere during the refurbish, but then 'MAKE A SAVE' without ruining that refurbish. We have all been there somewhere along the line, although we might not want to admit it..............that's how be become good at what we do.............good luck with your rod project. We'd like to see the end result in a pic if that's possible.