Lowes hardware carries Pink Fiberglass Rebar in 10 foot lengths. You have to sand down the ends of the rods to get the Hagz gear onto it, as it's a little bigger than 1/2 inch. It has the grooves in it like real steel rebar, and those have to be sanded down to get the Hagz pieces on. The top piece is pretty easy, sand it until it fits. Epoxy it on, then double peen the Hagz with a punch and a hammer. Let it dry.
The bottom Hagz stopper ring; you have to sand a foot of it down to fit the ring on ( a lot of sanding) or just use something else as a stopper on the bottom end. You can glue a steel nut right onto the fiberglass without sanding, just use fiberglass resin as the "glue". You can just tighten a hose clamp onto the fiberglass as the stopper. Lot's of ways to make a stopper for the bottom end. You can push a piece of fuel line up the rod as a stopper. Electrical tape can work in the field in a pinch. I sanded the entire 1 foot end down to get the Hagz ring on, slamming it up the rod with a socket and hammer to lock it in place. Then I epoxy'd it and double peened the ring with a hammer and punch. So far so good, lot of work, looks great and works great, but I could have save a bunch of time and put on a hose clamp to do the same thing, keep the trap from coming off the bottom end. That's all it does.
I have not found any real fiberglass rods like what we really need or want in Alaska. You can order them, but shipping is crazy. The best one's I have found on the internet are the tree stakes with the woven outside covering. They have been listed here on a Trapperman thread, that's how I saw them. But shipping is too costly to justify buying them of course. You can afford to buy 3/8" rods that are 5 foot long for Muskrat trapping from Grainger. They are smooth rod, not too expensive to ship. They are very nice and come in a heavy shipping tube in groups of 4 sticks per tube at Grainger.com. The driveway markers and such do not fit the Hagz well enough to work.
I made 3 dozen Pinkbar rods. I set 2 dozen up for footholds and another dozen rods set up for bottom edge sets. I painted them afterwards with Krylon spray paint, couple coats. You better wear leather gloves until you get some paint on them and even then they will still poke you now and then. You cannot see the fiberglass splinter in your hand, but you can feel that sucker for days, stuck in your skin. I still use cable drowners and rocks from the banks but not every set like before. Bottom edge sets are incredibly fast and open a whole new world up here with a 10 foot pole rigged and ready. Having the ability to slam a set in a pond without rocks in 2-3 minutes is priceless. The time it saves is more important than the weight you save. I just started using them, so I don't know how long they will last or hold up to the abuse. Finding poles and sticks to use in the frozen dark sucks. It's so time consuming. These change that, even if they are not the best, they are better than we have had access to before. I still want some real tree stakes if Ted from Teds Fur Shed is reading this and can get them shipped here at a reasonable price.
