The first of three cane poles that I acquired for restoration is now complete and awaiting trial by fish. An exciting and nervous day!
As received, this one was intact but run down. The cane looked mostly pretty good but the middle (third) section was not all that clever. Not only was it not particularly straight, it was uneven, kinked and split on several places. The tip I assume to be lancewood as it is very pale and in good order. There were no makers names anywhere but on removing the brass butt cap I did find a plug of newspaper inside dated 1905 (unidentified pole and update ). Being new to the restoration scene, I declined to resolder a small crack in the butt cap deciding to make an epoxy repair to get the project underway while I taught myself to solder on something cheaper.
I had no desire to lose the stains and marks associated with its long and possibly interesting heritage so rather than scraping off the old finish, I rubbed it down ready for re-varnishing only getting back to the timber in order to feather out failing varnish and sharp edges left after removing the rather rough, ready and rotten whippings. Every half original pole I have seen has, like all the refinished ones, been whipped in a single colour and ninety per cent of the time, that colour was black. This one, while not necessarily as it left the maker's bench, was clearly bound an awfully long time ago. The single 1/4" whippings on the bottom four sections were alternately thick black and creamy-yellow jasper and some kind of clear gut or mono that had yellowed with age. The tip section had a mixture of nice yellow spirals and banding. In the end I decided to match that yellow, Piper's 90/2 bronze looked just right once varnished, and use that not only on the tip but to replace that ugly mono over the whole length. I just used the closest shade of black and white jasper that I could find at the time (rayon ) in a thread of similar thickness to the yellow, to replace the rest. I have since acquired some more original jasper but I won't be changing it any time soon as the first thing I discovered is that re-whipping cane poles is a long job and uses miles of thread! Of course the key aspect of any restoration is surely to save the timber. Superficial details like whippings can be replaced at any time. To that end I always save a sample of threads and any replaced fittings along with copious notes and photographs for future reference.
One or two splits were opened up with pins and scraped as clean as possible with the point of a scalpel before being filled with Gorilla epoxy which dries clear. That aside, there was little left but to bind, seal and varnish it.
While I do use a pole with a solid wood (greenheart ) tip, I prefer split cane when using anything but hempseed. The seed rarely catches anything more dangerous than roach and most waters these days are stocked with bigger and more hard fighting species and I feel that it is probably not worth the risk. Consequently, I decided to make a spare tip from an old fly rod top section. It would be whipped to the same pattern as the original and make the pole more user friendly. I surprised myself by managing to successfully turn a male ferrule of the correct size and tapered profile that fits perfectly. I honestly wasn't sure that my old Atlas, 2nd world war, lease-lend lathe had it in it any more than I would, but we got away with it
The female socket that it fits into was not all that clever being unlined and with extremely thin and splintering bamboo inside the brass. To reinforce this, I thoroughly waxed the new male ferrule, thickly coated the inside of the socket with araldite and pushed the two together. I left it assembled for 48 hrs with fingers firmly crossed that I might be able to separate them again and it worked like magic. In fact because it is a tapered fit it takes very little force to get a nice connection that does not come loose in use.
A tip eye was easily fashioned using 1mm brass wire to the same dimensions as that on the original tip by winding it around the correct size drill shank and bending with pliers. The legs were gently hammered flat and the last blow was made with a file on the outside face to give a good grip for the thread. This is important because the rig is tied directly to the tip ring and ultimately, the thread is all that joins the angler to his fish.
With that task completed, all that remained was to purchase a quality rod bag from Harry H and to get it down to the water's edge for a trial. It performed admirably catching me just shy of ten pounds of lovely roach in the four to six ounce range in just four hours. The action is very nice with the fly rod tip blending nicely with the bamboo section below. As with all projects, use highlights one or two minor issues. Cosmetically, the tip hung a little low from the ferrule which has since been easily rectified with a little heat and functionally the third and fourth sections require pushing back together rather too often for my liking. I have now rectified that issue as well using the same technique as I used for the tip, namely heavily waxing the male ferrule and smearing araldite inside the female. Araldite might be cured in 24 hrs but it is still quite rubbery, so as soon as I thought it was safe, I separated the sections and again this has worked extremely well.
So, how did this un-attributed, possibly even home-made pole, fish? As good as every other that I own is the answer and I have a few now. The fly rod tip works well with the section below and does not look, feel or behave as though it had no right to be there. Of course it doesn't have the intrinsic financial value of a Sowerbutts or an Evans but in practice the only real life difference is probably in the quality of the cane. The sections are not quite as straight for one thing and the third in particular has something of an agricultural appearance with pronounced grooves below some of the nodes and it's not particularly round either. I always align my sections (even on the posh poles) so that they appear straight from above as I look along the pole and when assembled they all curve upwards. Then I mark the top of each section with a spot of white paint at each end. In use I line the spots up and fish with them all facing upwards and the natural weight of the pole counteracts the curve leaving it pretty damn straight. Originally, instead of a white spot, a centre punch mark was used but over time, and this one for example could easily be 117 yrs old, the sections curve and take sets making them redundant. The white paint spots on the other hand can be easily removed and repositioned.
Its first trial on my club lake was ideal. the weather was warm and the roach were taking hemp like they should, I had quite a bag of them of them with a couple of nice rudd and a small hybrid thrown in for good measure. In order to use as many of my growing collection of cane rods and poles as possible I tend to give them each a job. The Evans with the greenheart tip will still be my hemp pole while this one will probably end up as my canal pole where the hybrids run to a good size and the Fields will fish bread and corn on the club lake as it has already proved itself with some substantial tench. I've just pulled somebody's unfinished project from under the bench now, an old flamed and un-named version that looks to have potential. Every one finished is a craftsman's work saved and that means the world to me and I try to do them all justice whether they are by famous makers or not.
