Clear Cure Goo

[FishnDave]

I bought some Clear Cure Goo, and have tied a few flies with it. I have to say...I really like this stuff. I don't own a drying wheel, but was considering one. With this stuff, I may not ever need one. 3-5 seconds with the UV light is all it takes to cure the stuff...except the flexible CCG, which takes 10-12 seconds with the light.
I got the CCG Thick, which is nice for building heads fast. I got the CCG Thin, which is better for coating the heads of fur/hair flies, since it penetrates the fibers better. I got the brush-on CCG, which is extremely handy, and is what I used most on the mylar-minnow patterns. And I got the CCG Flexible, which cures to the feel and pliability of a medium-soft rubber. I used the Flexible CCG on the underside of the Craft Fur minnow pattern, to help keep the hair from getting tangled on the hook during casting.

There's other patterns I'd like to try with it, like scud/sowbug patterns, possibly some sort of crayfish pattern, etc. But here's some stuff I've tried it with so far. Keep in mind, I tied these to fish with, not for artful showpieces (that my disclaimer, which means...I'm a hack tyer.)

This is the Craft Fur minnow with the Flexible CCG "belly", and I used the Thin formula for the head.


The one below, I used the Thick formula for the head of the fly.


This one I also used the thick. Could have built up a better head, but basically I just wanted to fix the conehead weight into a position that would guarantee the hook would ride under the fly (I angled the conehead so more than 50% of the cones' weight is on the point-size of the hook shank). Once I added the thick CCG, I zapped it with the UV light for 5 seconds, and it was done.


For the patterns below, I used the brush-on CCG.




Same with these last two. I used fingernail polish to paint the backs black, and the bellies white (yellow in the top one), and gills in the bottom one. I let that dry for a couple minutes before coating it with the CCG and curing it with the UV light.




As mentioned on their website, the CCG (other than the Flexible formula) cures hard, but has sort of a tacky feel to it. As per their recommendation, I brushed a quick thin layer of clear Sally Hansen's over the cured CCG.

Everything above used just a single application of CCG. I could add another layer of CCG to make some of these minnow bodies/heads even more smooth and pretty...but I think I'll just fish with 'em as is.