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