Hi all,

I won the November drawing for the RL Nunley bamboo rod blank. I thought about trying to finish the rod myself. I've never really done any rod building and thought about practicing on some cheap graphite blanks. Then I thought about having someone I know finish it or paying someone near me to finish it. I ended up deciding to contact Bob Nunley and asking him to finish it for me. He agreed to finish it for me.

Since I was going fishing in the area over the past weekend, I just dropped off the blank at his shop. I stopped in this past Monday to drop off the blank and talk about what kind of hardware I wanted.

Well, about two hours flew by in no time. He showed me around his shop and told me about his process of making bamboo rods. He showed me how a piece of cane is made into a rod. He explained the entire process...of how he makes the strips, the gluing process, the binding process, the heat treating, sanding, varnishing....the whole 9 yards. The whole thing is a meticulous and time consuming process.

Bob had a few examples of rods that he's been working on and some restoration projects. The whole thing is pretty amazing. The time spent producing a rod is pretty incredible. Bob said he had just done some work to his web site. I took a look and it shows some of his shop. I took some pics of some of his handi-work.

This is the blank as it is now:


Here is some unsplit bamboo and wood used for reel seats:



TO BE CONTINUED