Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 76, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 March 1920 — New Guides for Bait-Casters [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

New Guides for Bait-Casters

' of the beneflclat results a of the war was the stlmuJ M lation of American manufacturers to provide snb- ■ stitutes for countless prodyz ucts which formerly had been Imported from other countries, notably Germany. In the majority of cases these home-manufactured products were just as good as the imported products had been, while In not a few instances they excelled them by a wide margin In point of merit and the cheapness and speed with which they could be turned out. One of the latest illustrations of what American enterprise and ingenuity can accomplish has just come to light In the announcement that a Chicago lapidary has perfected a method of manufacturing agate guides for fishing rods which are not only far superior to those which .formerly came from Germany—that being practically the only country to make them before the war. but which can be turned out in a fraction of the time required by the German methods.

Fishing rod guides made of agate have long been considered by expert fishermen to be the best for the purpose; they give a fine appearance to the rod. are practically indestructible, and permit of such smooth finish that the wear on the line is reduced to a minimum. The Germans were the first to discover these merits of the agate guides and soon had a virtual monopoly of the trade throughout the world. Once having established this, and after creating the belief that good agate guides could not be made in any other country, they grew less particular about the quality of the goods they turned out. As a matter of fact, during the last decade they were unable to keep pace with the demand in this and other countries where fishing is much In vogue, because of the very slowness of the methods ti\ey employed.

The guides were all made up in the mountain country of Germany, where ft was really a family proposition, a whole family drilling and grinding guides during the winter months hy the crudest hand methods and then in the spring selling their winter’s output to the commercial buyers, through whom it finally reached America. Uniformity of size and style, and uniformity of finish and degree of accuracy could not be maintained by so many different hands of more or less experience, especially under pressure of a large demand, and the result was that much inferior work began to be foisted upon the American market To hide the inferiority of their workmanship and the many blemishes in their guides, the German makers dyed them a dee'p dark red color by boiling them in an iron solution. This practice also enabled them to. slip through many imitation agate guides, which were made of nothing but hard glass, and this was the more easily done because buyers had been led to believe that genuine agate guides should be ‘ red in color. This was the situation when a Chicago lapidary of many years’ experience, whose father and grandfather had been lapidaries before him in Amsterdam and familiar with the German methods of making guides, turned his attention to their manufacture on a modern scientific basis. The result of his efforts was the development of a remarkable cutting drill by means of which he is enabled to turn out large quantities of mechanically perfect guides In a comparatively short time, each guide being left the natural color of the raw agate. This drill not only wojks with absolute precision, but wilt bore a hole of any desired size through a onefourth inch slab of aggte in from fifteen to twenty minutes, as against this, it took the German guide makers from fifteen to twenty hours to bore a similar hole through a piece of genuine agate, using for this purpose a so-called “bow” drill. This drill was operated entirely by hand and consisted of a stout piece of wood bent into the shape of a bow by means of a leather thong, which in turn, was wound several times around a wooden spool four or five inches in length and half an inch tn diameter. In the lower part of the spool was / . — — ’

by Robert H. Moulton

fastened the drill which did the boring, while the upper part of the spool was fitted Into a hole In a horizontal piece of wood three feet long and two inches square. This piece of wood was clamped at one end to another upright and stationary piece of wood, while the other end was held by the left hand of the person drilling and pressed against his chest. With his right hand he worked the bow in such fashion as to cause the spool to rotate back and forth, a few turns at a time, thus working the drill and eventually making a hole through the piece of agate. Only through long practice could a perfect hole be drilled in this manner, and the process, as may be Imagined, was very tedious and Involved much labor. Agate is an exceedingly hard mineral and the hardest variety comes from certain volcanic regions in Uruguay. It is imported to this country by the Chicago lapidary through the American consul, who has It boxed and shipped to Chicago, the raw stone, traveling some 6.000 miles reach the end of their journey. One box will contain ten thousand dollars worth of agate. When a shipment arrives the guide maker examines each piece of stone through a magnifying glass to locate any flaws and determine the best and most economical way of cutting it into slabs A revolving circular steel knife is then used to cut the piece of agate into slabs about one-fourth of an inch in thickness. These slabs are then cut up into smaller pieces about an inch square. The small pieces ’are then fitted into the machine for drilling, the size the drill used depending upon the size of the guide to be made. When a hole is finally bored through a piece of agate it is next ground into a circular shape on a grindstone by hand. This grinding takes but a few seconds and the circular ring is then given a more exact shape on another grinding machine. The next step is to bevel the sharp inner and outer edges of the agate ring. Finally the rings are polished and mounted in metal holders, either as guides or tips, ready to be fitted to fishing rods.’ The finished product is a delight to the angler’s eye. The guides on a rod, as all baitcasters know, are an important part of its makeup. Fishing, as bait-cast-ers fish, is in no small part a matter c- mechanics. Rod, reel, line, leader, lure and hook are all essential parts of a delicate machine which the angler handies according to his skill—and luck. This delicate machine is no more efficient than its poorest part. And rough, untrue, undersized guides can play the mischief with the efficiency and durability of this Intricate machine. Balt-casting, aside from the playing

of the hooked fish—and backlashes —is an endless repetition of throwing out from 50 to 100 feet of line and reeling It in. So the Une must run freely from and-to the reel through the guides and Up. Friction makes for imperfection and inefficiency and damage. Friction means lost effort in the cast, greater strain on Jhe rod, more wear on line, and maybe the loss of a fish the biggest one always —and of a favorite lure. Possibly the most

important part of the bait-caster’s machine—because It is the connecting link between the angler and the sish —Is the line, line is a beautiful and delicate thing. It is made of braided silk because it must be small, supple, smooth and strong—small and supple, to lie compactly in the reel; smooth, to run with the least amount of friction through tip and guides —and leave the skin on your thumb; strong, to hold one of Dixie Carroll’s old “he-whops.” This beautiful delicate line must be cared for by the angler—not so much because it costs good money as because care is the price of safety. The bait-caster who knows his business and attends to it does not let hit line dry on the reel to mildew and become rotten; he dries it In the air. He turns* his line every few days, end for end. He carefully testa the casting end each day for strength. The enthusiast even keeps his pet lines in air-tight cases during the closed season. How, then, shall a bait-caster, with a joy-forever bamboo rod and a reel built like a watch and a pet line and a favorite lure, put up with guides and tip that are open to suspicion? He just can’t be expected to do it, that’s all. ’ “Other greyffes the angler may not have,” ■writes Dame Julianna Berners, “savynge but yf ony fisshe breke away after he is take on the hoke or elles that he catche nought, Whyche ben not grevous.” No; it is not grevous” to “catche nought,” for “catching fish Is not all of fishing.” And part of the other delights of fishing is using a castingrod—with perfect guide*.