Bill "tie2fish" Shuck Flymph Video Tutorials

[novabass]

What type of wax are you using Bill?

[tie2fish]

Paul ~ The wax is from a batch of tweaked 7-2-2 (ended up after three re-heats to be more like 8-2-2 to overcome my use of olive oil) that I cooked up a few years back. Unfortunately, I've not been able to duplicate it exactly. It is much softer than the nearly brittle wax that Jim Slattery uses, but serves well as both a dubbing wax and tying wax. I gave chunks of it to some of the other forum members and believe they found it to be usable.

[cassady]

Great video. I've appreciated Bill's tying for quite some time, and it was wonderful to see it in action. As is typical when watching a master tying (as others have noted), I picked up a few things I had never thought of.

Turned out my hackle pliers were too light for a good spin. I now have a heavier set on order along with some more Pearsall's thread.

I use a pretty light set of pliers (which I really like otherwise), soI have done as a workaround is a 7" length of coat hanger wire, straight with a hook bent into one end. Hook the loop end of the hackle pliers with the mini shephard's hook, and give it (the shephard's hook) a spin. Not as graceful, nor as motion-economic (one needs to pick up an extra tool, after all), but it works.

c

[zen leecher]

I wrapped some .20 lead wire on one of mine. It didn't grab the thread securely enough and would, at times, slide off. It was also an excuse to order some more Pearsall's silk thread.

[letumgo]

Yup, that batch of "Shuck Wax" is dang good stuff!

I have many different waxes that I use for making Flymph bodies and tying flies with. A have few different Leisenring wax blends from Jim Slattery (light colored & dark colored grape-sized chuncks & some small pea-size nuggets). Jim's wax seems to have more rosin content, making for a much firmer wax. The wax needs more warmth to make it pliable, but it has an iron grip once the silk thread is waxed with it. Chris Lee recently made up a batch of Leisenring wax, which is beautiful wax to work with - medium firmness and excellent tackiness. Bill Bailey's cobblers waxes and tying waxes are great too. Lots of options...

[Joe Billingsley]

Hi, folks. Been a while since I posted but I have been keeping up. Leaving in 5 days for my annual northern New Mexico trip so I'm getting excited.
Will most any commercial wax harden up enough after a day or so to hold the silk together? Or, I guess I should ask, will ANY commercial wax?

Thanks,
Joe

[William Anderson]

Joe, and others interested in the wax, we've talked several times about the Keene wax or the Leisenring wax, which are harder and tackier, they are interesting to work with and for their intended use may work best for some. As a rule, the harder and tackier the wax is, the quicker it sets up by melding the silk, dubbing and wax all together. It takes a bit of practice. The tin of waxes found in Pete Hidy's actual tying kit held what seemed to be a three part blend wax, not unlike many of the combinations we've made ourselves, and similar to Shuck Wax, but it also held a cake of straight beeswax, which works fine and a piece of cobbler's wax which has its uses. With many of the waxes you'll know by feel that by the time you've created a few bodies and carded them, the first of the batch will be usable without coming undone. Being a bit neurotic on this matter, I collect waxes like some collect bamboo rods. They all work, some better than others and some better for different purposes. In a pinch I've used chapstick (not for pre spun bodies, it would unravel, but works great for touch dubbing fine materials.)

Thanks again fellas for putting this thorough and methodical video together. The procedure can be done so quickly you'll miss the finer points, but this video takes the time to highlight each step. I just watched it again. I love it.

w

[William Anderson]

Joe, as I mentioned above, Pete used a variety of waxes. This is from his tying chest.

[Kelly L.]

Bill and Ray, I just watched all the videos. WOW. I am so thrilled that these important videos were done. Somebody finally did it. I thought the videos were incredible. I was tickled to death to see these fine works. I cannot thank the two of you enough! I wish I had seen these videos years ago. This will be so helpful to new folks just getting into tying. (especially flymphs)

[daringduffer]

Bill, may I suggest that you post a close-up of one such flymph, right after the videos shown? That would add to this wonderful tutorial.

dd