I just wrapped my first guide ever. I made some boneheaded mistakes like pulling the finish loop the wrong way twice, and cutting into my threads once, which turned into great practice as it made me re-wrap several times. I like the gold and navy blue color, but all the hardware is silver colored. Gold thread is the only metalic thread I have, but I have a few other non-metalics I can use instead of silver. How will the gold+siver hardware look when finished? It is not too late to start over.
Bedlam, I have a spare spool of metalic silver rod wrapping thread, if you would like it P.M. me your address and I will mail it to you free of charge !
Bedlam, I’m not a great rod builder but I’ve been doing it for 12 years now and the last rod I build I ended up redoing every wrap on the whole rod save one before I was done, just to satisfy myself. It goes with the territory.
The blue and gold theme with silver hardware doesn’t bother me as long as they go well with the color of the blank. Bottom line, though, is it has to look right to you…if you aren’t sure, you probably want to use silver instead. That would look sharp, too.
Welcome to rod building. It’s a blast, and like all things fly fishing, highly addictive. And that’s okay.
Still a newbie but, I agree with Dave. I don’t think there is a rule book for color choices. Take a look at some of the rods folks are building/buying. They are almost psychedelic. I’m a little more subtle myself but, my granddaughter wanted pink wraps with purple accents. Turned out to be quite the girlie rod. If it pleases you you have done well.
Bill
Your wraps look good but, in my opinion, your gold trims need to be maybe three wraps. That way it doesn’t draw so much attention to the wraps. It is supposed to be an accent color, that way it also won’t clash with the silver guides. After all, most guides are silver of some type. There is nothing wrong with the color combination, just the thickness of your tipping.
Anyone that has built a rod has made bone headed mistakes. You are far from alone.
I quite often have chrome guides with some other color metallic tipping. Gold, bronze, pewter. Once the rod is finished, the guides do not play that big a part in the color scheme. As stated before, you can use silver for the tipping or order up a set of gold colored guides. Mudhole has them.
My choice would be ProWrap Gunsmoke or Pewter or Gudebrod Pewter. That would tie all of the colors of the blank, hardware, and main wraps together very nicely and be quite elegant, too.
I was able to finish the wraps. I reduced the accent wraps as I traveled up the rod using uv epoxy to help. The final wrap is a single thread in width. I’ve got one more ferrule to wrap then I get to break out the epoxy.
