0 wt bamboo

**Brett** · 03-17-2010, 09:13 PM

So a while back I worked out a trade with a fellow on another board and I ended up with his last Tony Spezio blank. I must say that although it is a beautiful and tremendously unique blank, it was very difficult to wrap. The tips were as fine as most graphite blanks, and the flats were so small, it was hard to find the right line to wrap on. However, in the end I couldn't be much happier with the result. On the advice of the fellow I traded with, I cut the blank from 75 to 69 inches. Initially, the blank was very long in the thin tip section, and this was a cause of concern. It did not seem like the rod would have been able to handle fish much more than six inches, with the thin tips being so long. In the end, the shortened blank seems to be the perfect length. I used chrome Snake Brand guides, as well as an emerald agate stripping guide. The grip was cut down to size along with the reel seat. They were cut down to match the size of the 2" Forbes reel that goes with the rod. I did run into some difficulty with the grip as I was sealing it, resulting in some hacking/pitting at the ends of the grip. I sure learned a lesson about room temperatures and its correlation with the drying speed of different compounds! Please enjoy the (shoddy) pictures!