Power wrapper trick for "too long" rods

[Cuttyhunker]

I had borrowed a Pac-Bay wrapper from a pal to rehab a bunch of estate and beat up bulk purchase rods.  This was my first experience with power wrapping/drying. These units come with 2 48" alum tracks that fasten together for the rod rollers, and thread tensioner dolly.  Assembled the machine is good for about 7 1/2 feet as the motors take up some space on the end.  Rods over 8' that needed work out near the tips were a pain.  Later in the season I was in the back room of a long time tackle shop getting some guides and they had a like wrapping machine on the long work bench.  The bench had a metal strip fastened to the length of the edge that was raised slightly above the level of the bench.  The 2 alum sections were never fastened together so when a "too long" rod shows up for repair they just separate the 2 sections against the metal lip to make the jig long enough. It never occurred to me when I was hassling with my "too longs", simple and effective. 

[oldmanjoe]

      Like opening the dining room table to put a leaf in , with out installing the leaf ...

[steelfish]

thanks for sharing the trick, I also have a Pacbay 2 section wrapper and depending on the rod lenght the last running guides as well as the tip I wrap them manually in my old manual wrapper, It didnt bothers me because I wrapped a lot of rods with that manual wrapper that I use it  just like another tool for me, but that trick you just share will serve a lot, my problem is now to get a larger working table for those 8 or 9ft one piece rods plus the motor space

[oc1]

I prefer long one-piece blanks, but cannot afford the shipping cost.  Since I have to make-do with two-, three- or four-piece blanks, I lay out the guides and then spine and wrap each section separately.
-steve

[Jeri]

I prefer long one-piece blanks, but cannot afford the shipping cost.  Since I have to make-do with two-, three- or four-piece blanks, I lay out the guides and then spine and wrap each section separately.
-steve

A very accomplished angler on our coast has a wisdom on multi-piece rods: 'It is already broken!'     

The number of joints does inevitable cause flat spots in a purist sense, but blank designers now are getting pretty close to very low joint problems. We have seen this on a number of our long surf rods, the one piece do slightly out perform a comparable 3 piece, but then we are dealing with rod blanks up to 15'-6" long. On the one piece that virtually guarantees that we have to wrap by hand. When we designed our workshop we installed kitchen counter tops all along each wall to make the work surfaces - 18' long, space to build all the standard 14' rods and capacity for the occasional slightly longer one. Put a small multi-section spinning rod on there, and it looks lost!!! 

[steelfish]

I prefer long one-piece blanks, but cannot afford the shipping cost.  Since I have to make-do with two-, three- or four-piece blanks, I lay out the guides and then spine and wrap each section separately.
-steve

A very accomplished angler on our coast has a wisdom on multi-piece rods: 'It is already broken!'     

The number of joints does inevitable cause flat spots in a purist sense, but blank designers now are getting pretty close to very low joint problems. We have seen this on a number of our long surf rods, the one piece do slightly out perform a comparable 3 piece, but then we are dealing with rod blanks up to 15'-6" long. On the one piece that virtually guarantees that we have to wrap by hand. When we designed our workshop we installed kitchen counter tops all along each wall to make the work surfaces - 18' long, space to build all the standard 14' rods and capacity for the occasional slightly longer one. Put a small multi-section spinning rod on there, and it looks lost!!! 

I would like to see a picture or two of your working table

[Cuttyhunker]

Steel,
Put together a couple of 6 or 8 ft folding tables.

[steelfish]

Steel,
Put together a couple of 6 or 8 ft folding tables.

ooh no problem with me, I actually dont have a permanent working table or working station, I move my 6ft folding table to my restroom or bedroom, etc I really need a new room in my house but its not doable currently, anyway, I was asking Jeri for a picture just to see his working shop, my waters are not a surf fishing paradise so, most guys use cheapo 2pc 7 - 9ft rods, I wanted to visualize a 15ft one piece rod resting on 4-6 roller stands on Jeri's shop.

[Jeri]

We don't use rollers for the rod binding, but large pet food tins filled with concrete and a polished stainless steel Y planted in the top. The weight of the blanks precludes using lighter weight stands, and we just use two per rod when doing the binding.

Then going up the wall, turning motors are fixed at one end, and shelves to mount just a single roller unit - loose, so we can adjust the position on the shelf to suit variations in guide placement - that is the rig for drying resin on bindings.

A couple of drying motors are mounted on the actual flat of the work bench, to allow rod turning when building rods with marbling, or when we really get busy.

[Cuttyhunker]

Steel,
Work space for me is easy in New England with a full basement, but the Florida built on a slab house not so much.  There is the garage but with no climate control, a limited asset.
Finally moved into a guest room as a semi-temp spot.  Folding table, cheapo 4X6 rug underneath to protect the carpeting, in solid black so I can now even find an errant dog spring. Cover over the bed to use it for tackle boxes etc while protecting the bedspread.  Can bug out in a couple of hours, like I was never there to keep mama happy for overflow guests.  She was skeptical at first, but behaving as a guest, in the guest room has maintained harmony in my universe.

[steelfish]

......... but behaving as a guest, in the guest room has maintained harmony in my universe.

[Cuttyhunker]

Was just thinking how to make the 2 piece expandable wrapper work on my "rod bench" in Mass which is a repurposed formica oval kitchen table with both leaves inserted.  The bench lip in front that I described in the first post won't work for me.  I plan to find a long enough straight edge to C-clamp to both ends of the table laying behind the wrapper tracks as my guide when I hit an overly lengthy blank.  A removable solution for the few long ones needing attention.

[oldmanjoe]

 Can you make a fold up straight edge with 2   1x4 boards with a hinge and 1x2 for the lip ?   
  My rails are aluminum garage door closer  that i can bolt together for any length .
  Can you mount the power head on a saw horse or end table and put the rest of the track on the table to stretch it out ?

[Cuttyhunker]

The angle iron sounds good, no warpage with that stuff. If I get too far over the edge of the table so the alum track is going to teeter I could throw a bunch of sinkers in it on the inboard side for balance