Blast from the past

I've just been given an old, very old, Prowler Plus to refurbish. The rod had been bought second hand and there was a chunk of cork missing. Other than that it was in excellent condition. Below is a picture of it with the replacement cork fitted prior to final sanding.

(Click to enlarge)

The reel seat is an unbranded and rather agricultural trigger grip, but it was finding that Harrison's had a stock of them they had no use for that I started building lure rods for the burgeoning band of multiplier users. I'm guessing that was around 1995, and the Prowler Plus was developed a couple of years after that I think. The supply of those reel seats ran out just at the time that the much nicer Fuji trigger seats became available in the UK as the mid-nineties lure boom took off.

It was also interesting to note that back in those days the plastic buttons I finish the handles off with weren't available with narrow enough stems to fit inside slim blanks, but now they are. Blank technology must have moved on a little, too, since those days.

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