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restoring old rod blanks
I've refurbished a few old rods recently, some of the blanks were very old (even a 20+ year old lamiglas). I find that the best way to remove the old coating after all the old cork, foam, guides and threads have been removed (whether they were varnished as in the old rods or flex-coated) is to put the blank on the wrapper, run it slow-to-moderate speed and use a fine piece of steel wool to sand off the residual flex-coat. When done gently, I've never damaged a blank with this method.
Then I completely re-coat the entire rod with flex-coat (or Aft-coat) which restores the blank to a glossy finish that is very close to original look. Also, by lightly sanding and re-coating the whole rod, it removes any "grooves" left behind in the old flex coat from the original underwraps that would otherwise tend to "guide" the new threads when you re-wrap the blank.
A little alchol can also be helpful in clean up. I haven't had good look with acetone, and I don't like the idea of using strong solvents on a rod blank.
By the way, has anyone tried using gel-coat remover to clean up a rod? I was wondering if that would work safely.
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