Dear Annfire, thanks ever so much I took back several curtain rods (I needed one that extends to over 125") and was about to take back the one I purchased tonight before I looked online and happened upon this discussion and your brilliant answer! I now see if the instructions were complete no one would have this problem; hence major issues with things made in China. I too am totally exhausted! Again thanks dear and God bless you. Deborah Ann Smith.

Well - I did figure out the part about removing the finials but when I did they are too small to fit into the larger rod. The finials just fall out. Thinking Gorilla glue

Holy sneakers!! Thank you! It just took me and my bf 2 days to put together a dumb ass dresser and I was thinking these rods were going to be easy breezy.....nope! Off to hang curtains correctly thanks to this thread. Thanks again!

Thanks! It worked perfectly!

Thank you! I am glad to see that i was not the only person who couldn't figure this out! Gotta love the internet for moments like this!

Annfire. I love you. Thanks so much! I was so close to returning mine!!

Ty guys SO much! Srsly, I thought I was gonna toss it out the window.

The last time I neded an extra long rod I purchased closet dowling. Back then it was sold by the foot, but I think now it's sold in lengths of 4/6/8/10 and maybe 12' l engths. I bought wood finials and brackets, painted everything, and the install couldn't have been any easier. Using rings or clips for the drapes makes it easy for opening/closing. You can purchase the dowling in various circumstances, maybe 1 1/2" or 2" being the largest. HD, Lowe's and other big box stores should have it.

I ran into this problem 10 years ago, and now, when it came time to hang curtains in a different house, I could remember that there was a trick to it, but I could not remember what to do. THANK YOU!

Can anybody help?

I bought 48-86 udjustable rod but I only needed 48 rod .And I can't figure out how do I use one rod and add finials without the other(udjustable)rod

What do I donow.Tottally frustrated

kokiogwe2000 Let me know if you figure it out - I can't!!!

You can't just use one of them. It wasn't meant to work that way. It should compact down to 48", but if it's too wide, you need to buy a smaller size or find a different brand that works for you.

Thank you . I've been racking my brain too

Ann Fire - Thank you for your post. I purchased a set today. The box I got must have been a returned item because when I opened the box it had no instructions, no hardware and no brackets. So I went on line to see if the rods were defective because I could not assemble them. That being said I need to drive a total of 1 1/2 hour round trip to exchange the package because of the missing parts. I wish customer service would really ensure that all the parts are there before putting them back on the self.

Thank you annfire. I would never have thought of that!

I actually called the manufacturer on this, but was googling while the representative looked up the answer. Thank you for the direction, I asked them to edit their directions to include this information.

Oh wow, I almost had to ask my wife, and then lose man-points. Thanks for bailing me out!

Thanks! Just used your advice with success.

i bought this one from walmart. Was feeling like an idiot cuz i couldnt figure it out either (Thank goodness for google. I don't see how I survived growing up without Google) to answer the last part about the female piece mine actually came with a extra piece to it looks a little like thisthat goes on tge end of the pretty end piece that makes it fit nice n snug. Thank goodness cuz i woulda been glueing pieces together as well lol

Like paula8100 I thought the same thing - WHY OH WHY did they assemble it so we have to remove the finnial (decorative screw on end thingy) and move stuff around and confuse the check out of people? And I figured it out.

I bought the same curtain rod set in different lengths - one 36" - 66" set and one 66" - 120" set. The only difference between the sets was that the longer set had an extra larger rod. So, they assemble the packages as if they are the shorter length set and then add the extra rod to make it the longer length set. Hope that makes sense. It's still odd but I suppose it's efficient in the assembly process. It would be nice if they'd add a little note to the bottom of the instructions to tell us how to do this, though. Thank heaven for the internet!!!

thank you, thank you, thankyou!

Oh my goodness, so thankful I found this question! I literally just returned one at Target thinking they put the wrong middle piece in the box and got another one with the same "issue". Why do they package it like that, and give no instructions!! figured it out this time around!!

Just take off both of the tibial and there you go.

After I do this There is nothing to screw the finial into - I only have 2 screws for 6 holes - 1 for a finial and 1 to connect the inner rod - how do you attach the finial on the other piece without a screw to attach it to

Thank you Annfire!! I had the same problem with curtain rods and I didn’t want to wait till business hours tomorrow to fit the rods! Thank you for posting this help!

The filial isn't removable so I am screwed!

I was just about to spend an hour failing, and I thought to look here. Horrendous customer service to not have just that tiny bit of information printed on the box. Thanks very much for posting the puzzle solution.

Counter-intuitive yet brilliant! I agree that directions would help those of us who are not engineers!

Omg thank you. I was getting so frustrated cuz I couldn’t figure it out and the box says easy to install and fails to mention how to incorporate the middle rod.

Thank you!!! We spent a half an hour trying to figure out why that extra rod would not fit into the longer ride. If I hadn’t googled it, I would probably still be standing in my living room cussing over this! If they would just include a simple instruction or just an extra step in their directions, this would have saved all of us so much time and frustration! Thank you all so much glad it worked out

Thanks!!

No where in this entire comment thread is the 2nd finial question answered.

When the smaller tube is inserted between the two larger tubes, one of the finial ‘screw-in-ends’ is buried, so we are stuck still trying to figure out how to screw the second finial to a blank tube-end.

Assistance on this would be helpful.

I had something like this happen to me...then I flipped the second larger tube around and saw that in the other end of it had an insert to screw in the finial into.

If you see 1 rod is thinner, an 2 rods are thicker. Take the thinner rod off, an make sure both larger rods are on the side an slide the thinner one in the middle. I took me about 30 min to figure it out but it did good luck

We found that the insert piece for the finial that was in the end rod had actually stayed on the finial instead of remaining inside the rod when we unscrewed the final. Now it's loose and won't stay in so the finial is dangling. It looks like the only way to fix it is to take everything down again.

Thank you so much. By taking out the middle rod and making that the outer rod it can be adjusted to make it smaller in width. Thank you again.

I'm a 43 year old guy and I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown trying to figure this out LOL! Wish I had found this an hour ago lol

I have the same problem with 2 different makes.The assembly line is making it hard ! It seems the separate third piece is not the extra extension, It screwed into a filial as if it is an end piece. I took the filials off both so called end pieces and then it is possible to put all three together and screw in the filials. I nearly went crazy too and I took one back to Walmart because of it.. Bought the next one from Target and then discovered the same problem but solved it as above. They need to check assembly lines and include instructions for this problem, Both rods were from China.

I am so glad I found this thread! I opened everything, and read the instructions. Nowhere in the instructions did it say how to install the third rod. Thank goodness I only spent about 10 minutes looking at it like it was a defect before I went to forums!!!!

Yes, what you said works! I ordered a set of rods and thinking the packers at the factory must've been smoking something on their break and made the mistake of packing 3 finial end pieces so that the extension wouldn't fit inside the two ends, I exchanged it for the same one. When that set came- the same problem! So then I went to the order page and told them I was returning both. Then ordered a completely different set..on arrival,.same problem! I decided to look on YouTube or pose such a dumb question as to how do I put a 3 -piece rod set together?? Your thread appeared. Wow! Thank you so much. Now I just need to figure out which set I want to keep.

I know this post is about 11 years old but annfire - thank you. So simple. I was losing it, thank you!

I really thought this was my answer as I was about to start throwing things but ITS NOT! My “middle” rod does not have the screw-in for a finial! Waaaah!!! So I have 2 larger rods, one which is supposed to be the middle rod, or at least the illustration on the box shows it as the middle rod, and the other has finial attached. The smaller rod fits into the middle rod and has finial attached at other end. Middle rod will not fit into other larger rod. The middle rod appears to be designed to expand or be made smaller on one end - not sure which - but I’ve tried both. Nothing works. I’m so frustrated.

What does the other end look like if you unscrew the finial?

It’s the Housing for finial to screw into that will NOT come out - trust me. I ended up taking a hammer to the end of middle rod that is apparently supposed to be squeezed into other large rod. Yeah right. It didn’t feel right having to basically destroy the middle rod to make this work. God forbid I ever need this rod to be longer. I will not be buying #DecoWindow again. It did not need to be made to be this difficult.

And I’m not even impressed with the end result - not the rod’s fault - the finials are beautiful.

Thank goodness we have a computer and a working internet! How many people have returned these rods because they can't access Houzz? AnnFire: We trust you are well and happy! B and J O.

OMG! You were absolutely right Ann! I was so annoyed for hours. I called Target and they could not even fig it out. Thank you for saving me a trip to return this. The smaller middle peice was on the finnial.

What everybody else said 😂😂😂 thank you 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

Dear Staint AnnFire, Your solution was chosen by Google AI's Gemini for answering the same annoying problem I had with my 120" "impossible to fit" 3 piece curtain rod. 14 years after you posted the solution curtain rod manufacturers still don't include this in the instructions, and the crew at Home Depot who work this department couldn't figure it out either! Thank you for answering my prayers via Gemini!

OMG, I just returned a rod with beautiful finials because I thought I had 3 end pieces. Bought new set and thought, "Twice?" I must be going senile and not understand how rods work. Why don't the finials just come pre-attached to the 2 end pieces?????

ANYWAY, thank you!