Be careful heating the tip of the rod as it may burn or break. Some rods have a coating like shellac or urethane and it will melt. I found this out when I was burning off the tags from the guide wraps.

I hold the tip top with a pair of needle holders/hemostats and then heat the tip top with an alcohol lamp until it is pretty hot. At the same time I heat the adhesive stick until it starts to burn. Then I blow out the fire on the adhesive and apply adhesive to the hole in the tip top - then quickly add a little to the rod blank and shove them together and rotate it into place. You can trap air inside the tip top and it will push apart. I think heating the tip top tends to draw a little adhesive up into the tip top.

Go slow and it should work out just fine.

If you use too much adhesive, it bunches up and flow out onto the blank and exterior of the tip top. I find it hard to remove. You really only need a very small amount. The adhesive sticks that you typically purchase would probably last for several hundred or thousand rods.

Hope this helps.

Good luck.
Orthoman