Years ago, I had the opportunity to take a split-cane (bamboo) fly rod making class in Paonia, Colorado. The relaxation (Zen) of planing bamboo strips got me hooked. The fact that the outcome is a piece of useable art is an amazing feeling. My first rods ended up being for family, friends, and donations for charity fundraisers. I’ve honed my skills and decided it was time to sell rods.
My friends that don’t fly fish (I know, I should probably find new friends, but heck they’re good people) told me they wanted bamboo casting/spinning rods. I found some good tapers and have made at least a dozen of them. I’ve had excellent feedback on those casting/spinning rods.
The Rod Making Process
It takes up to 2 months to complete a spit-cane rod. The following is an extremely short summary of how I make a bamboo fishing rod…
It all starts with a Tonkin bamboo culm. I inspect the culm and mark defects. Only the best part of the culm is used.
The culm is then flamed with a torch. The purpose of flaming is to dry the culm and strength the power-fibers that make bamboo such a wonderful material for fishing rods. As a side effect, flaming gives the bamboo a rich caramel color.
Next, the culm is cut to rough lengths for each section of the rod, then split into strips (approximately 16 to 20 strips depending on defects). I split the culm as to avoid the marked defects. Any strips with defects get put in the scrap bamboo pile.
Once I’ve selected the best strips for a rod, the leaf nodes get addressed and strips straightened. The nodes are knocked down, heat pressed in a vise, and smoothed with a file.
(Bottom) Strip after it’s been pressed and filed
The process of straightening involves an oven, an alcohol burner, and/or a heat gun, and a vice. Heat softens the bamboo and makes it possible to straighten each strip. Once they’re straight, the strips are laid out, marked, and cut to working length.
Next, strips are planed into rough equilateral triangles using a wooden roughing planing form.
Steel planing forms are used to get the strips to final dimensions. A dial indicator is placed and calibrated in a “standard,” then used to set each planing form “station” to its specific depth.
The strips are planed, continually flipped and checked for chips/defects, and measured to make sure they are true equilateral triangles.
The photo on the left is a comparison of an original split strip (top), a roughed triangle strip (bottom left), and a final strip (bottom right).
As strips, get close to their final dimensions, the rod sections are bound together with twine to find any gaps or defects. Occasionally a strip will have a gap or planing error, the strip and adjacent strips will either get further planing to correct the issue, or the strip will be thrown out and a new strip will be planed to replace it. Once the 6 strips for each rod section are planed to the correct dimensions, they’re glued together to make a hex rod blank. I remove the twine and glue from the blank, then sand it. The blank is inspected again for gaps and defects. If the blank has gaps or defects, it is thrown out and a new blank is made. The blank sections get silver-nickel ferrules, many rubbed coats of a clear coat, a custom cork handle (fly rods can have an optional mortise handle), a reel seat, and guides (wrapped with your choice of color(s)). The wraps get a clear finish (created especially for rod wraps) to complete the finish. Your rod is then inspected, tested, put in a rod sock and aluminum rod tube, and shipped to you!
