Tenkara USA

Yesterday I went fishing in the cold and all of the joints in my rod froze up. I was able to get them all collapsed but for the joint between sections two and three. While trying to exert a bit of force, the first section somehow managed to come out of being collapsed and I snapped the "chinese finger trap" fabric off.

I know it's covered under warranty, but I'd still like to try fixing it. I understand it should be pretty easy - this is my plan:
1. Cut fabric just high enough to remove old piece of rod.
2. Place fabric on rod tip.
3. Glue in place.

Easy enough, but what glue/adhesive to use??? I've been debating this all day and have no idea what to use. It obviously needs to be waterproof and strong since the line/fighting fish is connected by the adhesive/"chinese finger trap" alone

I'd love your suggestions, and I'll post up as things progress. For now, here's a pic of the broken piece.

erik,

Very sorry to hear about the broken rod.

The "chinese finger trap" cord is translated by Google as "lillian" - although I am sure it is actually "lily yarn" from the shape of the weaving device which makes it, which gets translated from English into Japanese katakana as リリヤーン, which then gets translated back into English as "lillian".

Anyway, as I see it you have four choices:
1) send Daniel an email and ask his advice - you might not get an answer for a while because he's on vacation.

2) contact Michael Hackney, who broke a rod in the same spot and ask him what glue he used. I also don't know whether he reattached the metal fitting or just the yarn. viewtopic.php?f=9&t=114&view=next

3) do what I did when the lillian on my first tenkara rod broke (the rod was pretty old when I got it and the lillian was by then very weak). I just inserted the rodtip into the hollow center of a similar cord and glued it on with a liberal amount of Griff's Thick head cement. I suspect any head cement would do but make sure it saturates the cord to get a good bond to the rod. I used it that way for the better part of a year with no problems, and caught some nice fish with it.

4) just send it in and get a replacement tip.

I can't really make a recommendation, although if it was my rod, I'd probably do again what I did before.

Hey Erik,

Thanks for taking a stab at fixing it yourself. It is indeed pretty easy. Should you have problems with it, of course, we'll always honor our warranty for issues like this.

To fix the lilian (i.e. chinese finger trap), you're right on the mark, cut a small piece off, fit it over and finish it.

I'd recommend once you fit it over, you apply a little bit of heat to the fabric to help meld it to the tip. Just a small candle, or a quick pass of a lighter should do the trick. Careful not to burn it much, but a little heat goes a long way. I have used a rod I fixed after applying a little heat, without further glue, but would recommend a coat of glue to finish your rod.

I have not played with glues available yet, and would be curious to hear of recommendations anyone may have. This could be the fun, personalization part of your rod. Just a tiny drop of resin/ epoxy should do the trick. I'll look further into this.

If you have problems, let me know, we have tips available to send you.

Thanks for the quick replies!

Here's what I did:
1. Cut existing lilian yarn from broken rod tip and removed all pieces of the broken rod form the yarn. Easier said than done - this step took longer than everything else combined.
2.Sleeved yarn over rod. I estimated the yarn comes from the manufacturer around 2.5 cm sleeved over the rod tip. I did 3 cm for extra measure, which didn't leave me much left over yarn - hopefully it will be enough. I now have about 1.5 cm from tip to knot to tie on to...not very long.
3. Quick pass of a lighter
4. Apply adhesive. I used Seam Grip since I already had it out to repair leaky waders.


CM_Stewart - where did you get your replacement lilian yarn? I search google, but with poor results.

Here are a few pictures:





Tomorrow I'll test it, once the adhesive has dried. I hope it works - I've got a goal to catch a fish on a dry fly every month this year!

Erik,

What I used was not specifically "replacement lillian yarn", it was just a piece of hollow braided material that was large enough to fit over the rod tip (larger diameter than fly line backing, but not quite as large as the actual red lillian that came with the rod). I don't remember what I took it from 'cause it's been laying around for a while. If it turns out that you don't have enough of the yarn beyond the rod tip I still have a couple feet of the material so I can send you a few inches. As far as the amount I put over the rod tip, I would guess it was no more than 1.5 cm, and I left 2.5 cm from the rod tip to the knot near the end of the lillian.

If anyone else ever needs to replace a lillian, I'll extend the same offer to them (unless Daniel has or gets the real thing for replacements).

Zap-a-Gap works well for these repairs....replace the fabric on the rod tip. Whip finish it to the rod with 8/0 Unithread. Saturate the fabric on the rod with Zap-a-gap and hit it with Zip Kicker ( an instant hardener for Zap) . It will be on securely until the next Millenium.

Looks like you did a good job repairing the broken tip. And you right there's not much left of the yarn but it looks like there's just enough. Hope all goes well the next time you fish with it.

Repair worked, and I caught fish yesterday on my favorite creek.

Just as an FYI, to get the tip back in I had to untie the knot in the lilian yarn and twist as I pushed the tip section through.

This looks well done. Again, I like your initiative on doing it. We plan to start offering replacement parts in the next month or so, and I'll try offering lilian segments as well.

You have enough lilian in there, you really don't need much more than that.

I'm just a bit confused about where you say:

Just as an FYI, to get the tip back in I had to untie the knot in the lilian yarn and twist as I pushed the tip section through.

Normally one doesn't have to get the very tip through the other segments, you collapse the thicker segments then finally the tip, but our rods should offer enough space to accommodate the tip of the rod inside the thicker segment. Why did you have to push it through?

Daniel @ TenkaraUSA wrote: Why did you have to push it through?

I had completely removed the tip segment from the rest of the rod.

The knot, as it came stock, was larger than the tip segment and would not allow the tip to push through - I simply untied the knot and pushed it through.