I got this idea to bind without a binder from Ray Gould's book first off, so thank you to Ray. It's an inexspensive method of binding using braided sleeve and a rack made from scrap 2 x 4's. My rack is 2' wide and 6' high with hardwood plates on the top and bottom. You will need 4 open eye bolts w/lag bolt thread for the bottom and 4 open eye bolts with S.A.E. thread with nuts and washers for the top. The bottom eyes are turned in permanentely. On top you drill 4 holes lined up with the bottom hooks, you insert the eyes from the bottom amd turn the nuts on a full width. I use 1/4" sleeve for butts/ big mids and 1/8" for small mids/tips/. The cost of sleeve to bind 3 rod sections is under $5.00 as you only need to buy the amount you need. I get the sleeve from cableorganizer.com. Order more then you think you need as the stretching causes the length to shorten. It's called PET Braided sleeving. The 1/8 is 25 cents a foot and the 1/4 is 28 cents a foot
These first 2 pictures show the top/ bottom of the rack.
This next picture shows the sleeve, relaxed.
This one shows how the sleeve expands like the old Chinese Finger Puzzles whem compressed together.
Next you see the sleeve started on the butt end of a rod section. You just push the end of the sleeve against the butt end of a shaft and continue snaking
it on. Before doing this, you must roll the section up and wipe off as much excess glue as you can. I remove the tape as I'm sliding the sleeve on only
leaving the last one or two pieces on the tips.
We see a section encased in sleeve with about a foot and a half of slack over each end. Now you can roll the section to seat the splines together better.
Now the sections are secured in the rack and under a lot of tension. I use wire rope connectors to make loops in the bottom and top then turn the top
nuts pulling the sleeve real tight.
I use Shell epon to glue up so I let the sections sit overnite. Next day I take them off and trim the over hang of sleeve at each end to around an inch.
Then I slit the overhang in half.
Having done that, I just peel the sleeve back over itself and I'm done.
For me this works great. I've only used Epon with this method because it sets up so slow. Big advantage for removal. You can put a lot of pressure on
sections with no damage. I think that closes seams also that string binders might leave open. What I like is very little or no twist in the sections.
You'll get an ocassional small bow, but the results are normally great.
Billy
