Hardy Matchmaker (fibreglass)

[Marc]

Hi,

I have a 13ft Hardy match maker that's in as near to perfect as I can wish for a rod of its age. The only thing I have issue with is that the butt ring and one of the intermediates has some cracking of the varnish over the whippings. It seems that they have only had one coat of varnish, two at best. Can I just varnish over the cracks? Or do I need to strip the whole ring off? Seems a shame as the whippings are fine.
Also, the rings have a minute amount of wobble. I assume this to be the case with a glass blank being fairly hard to place anything on and remain steady.

[JohnL]

You have nothing to loose by giving it a couple of coats of varnish. I'm surprised at Hardys but most makers rarely put on enough.