Jack,
Many of the older production bamboo rods were built with less guides than they really should have had. In a lot of cases, you can see "ghosting" of the original location of the guides and can determine the original location of the guids that way after you clean off the varnish. As far as similar to graphite, they are in a way. Guides should be placed based on the taper of the rod and what give you the best distribution of the stress on the sections.

here is a website that has a lot of information on it on tapers, and more importantly a section where you can calculate guide spacing for your rod. Also, There is a member of FAOL that has done the same thing, (I would give the information out about who it is and his program but I would consider that a breach of what he has entrusted to me) and maybe he can expound on that with you. [url=http://www.uwm.edu/~stetzer/guideN.html:66e1b]http://www.uwm.edu/~stetzer/guideN.html[/url:66e1b]

On removing the old varnish from rods like that, I would recommend using Citrus Stripper and staying away from the sandpaper, the sandpaper can cause some damage to the boo that is irreversable.

in many many cases, you can vastly improve the quality of rebuilding some of these older sticks by rearranging the guide spacing, and giving them a much more aesthetic appeal with replacement of the cork and reel seats. Good luck with them and have fun!!!

[This message has been edited by dleo6446 (edited 08 March 2006).]