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Here's a good way to ensure a proper bond when dealing with pre-made grips. First, glue your reel seat and cure. Next, apply blue tape anywhere you don't want glue, ie. forward portion of your reel seat if not mortised/uplocking, and both ends of the grip (except with mortised/uplocking, in which case tape only the grip front if you don't want glue there.) Cork should be reamed to fit just snugly but not a force-fit. If the cork is reamed properly, you can simply spiral blue tape up the blank away from the forward grip point about a foot or so, apply glue rather lightly to the tape and bare blank below, and it will be slick enough to force the grip down without problems. I like Golf Smith epoxy, as it's waterproof, not too thin and sloppy, starts gelling in 1/2 hr. or so, which gives plenty of working time, and is formulated to not be brittle. Apply glue of choice thinly, twice the grip length up the blank, then slowly, gradually push the grip down the blank- over the spiraled tape first, then down on to the bare blank. Pause as the glue bunches up in front of the advancing grip (a good reason to put blue tape there, except with mortised/uplocking grips), back up the grip sl. and re-spread the bunched-up glue thinly and/or remove excess, then proceed as before, slowly. You should be able to easily slide the grip up and down the blank over the broad glue area, ensuring positive adhesion. Seat grip fully, wipe squeeze-out, then back-up sl. and remove tape. Re-seat grip fully, then clean-up with appropriate thinner/solvent- an easy chore, since you already removed most squeeze-out with the tape. With synthetic blanks you can twist the grip while sliding, which helps avoid glue bunching, and they have durable finishes which clean-up fine- even with a harsh solvent like acetone, so you can skip spiral-taping the blank with those. Bamboo blanks tend to have more vulnerable finishes which you may not want to smear half-way up to the stripper with glue, esp. if using epoxy. Every grip will be secure for the life of the rod with this method.

Regards, imdbatt