Trying to Learn Rope Dub Better

[Skip48]

Okay I have been trying to get better at this, but so busy with other things I have not advanced as much as I will or want to, but my first tie using Rope Dub technique from DonO is this jig below and was done using Ice Dub. Ice Dub as many of you know is not the easiest thing to dub with. Anyway I know it's not a fly, but it's still tying and still Rope Dub.

I do believe my crappie will hit this jig for sure!

So tell me what you think and please over look the jig head, LOL!

Skip

[melk]

Nice! How did you do the hed Skip48? Looks like a jig hook and maybe you did the epoxy boyd? Lots of sparkle on this one!
Mike

[Skip48]

Nice! How did you do the hed Skip48? Looks like a jig hook and maybe you did the epoxy boyd? Lots of sparkle on this one!
Mike

Thanks!
It is a jig head/hook and I just like to cross over from fly tying to jigs as well. I powder painted the head like that. The head I painted by dipping in a color called Galv. Silver and then had a handy eye dropper handy with some blue powder pint in it and just puffed it on with the eye dropper. It's not something that can be very exact, but I do a good many two color heads like that. After painted just cure in the oven and tie it.

Skip

[ducksterman]

Skip,
I believe the rope dub technique should give more of a rope and segmented look...personally I wouldn't use it on a streamer/jig fly.

[CharlaineC]

its all in how tight you make it it looks great honestly

[Skip48]

Thanks guys and this one is segmented and super tight, but hard to see in the picture and easier to see and feel in hand.

Ducksterman I fish jigs almost all the time where I live and had planned on doing more fly fishing in the spring for crappie, but last year they dropped the water 2' right when the crappie went to the banks and they moved off to 9 1/2' of water and stayed there all spring. Thisa year the lake is 8' low and the crappie didn't come to the banks much and stayed in water 6'-10' mostly. Also I have about given up on fly fishing due to my shoulder. I had a lot of trouble even tying for a while as I have an 18 year old massive tear in my rotator cuff and the bone doc doesn't even want to cut me because of all my other troubles. So I am pretty much stuck with not being able to hold my arm up at the shoulder much at all and even had to lower my vise so I could still tie.

Skip

[ducksterman]

BTW, Skip, my experience with ice dub ...my favorite ...is that the silver ones are longer shafted than the others....the others I believe may be easier to rope dub...I believe DonO uses ice dub doesn't he?

[Skip48]

BTW, Skip, my experience with ice dub ...my favorite ...is that the silver ones are longer shafted than the others....the others I believe may be easier to rope dub...I believe DonO uses ice dub doesn't he?

Yes I do think he does and I had noticed the silver seems to be the hardest to dub due to that length you mentioned. I have had some good luck using silver holo on some jigs before. I now have some crystal chenille (big kind) that I use for that in place of dub. Makes it easier to tie for customers and probably hold up longer that way, but I have some kind of affliction for Holo silver, LOL! I like that rope dub so much I bought a ton of them little boxes of dub, not sure I don't hve all they make now, LOL! I have OCD over buying materials I think. My wife says she knows I do, LOL!
Crappie seem to love sparkly type stuff.

I have been trying other things like Aussy Possum and that is giving me a bit of a time because I think maybe I am tying in too much at the start or that is what Don told me he thought I was doing to come up with the ugly stuff. Soon I know that I will get this down too, but it's not been easy since I am also so far behind tying my jigs I can't spend the time on what I want to do as I would like. Also just got a bunch of American Possum to play with and lots of flash pieces to add in and see how it comes out soon.

Skip

[DonO1]

Skip, as we talked about, you have a gob of sample rop-dubbed jigs headed your way. Lots of looks, materials, and applications. Like I tell everyone while I'm demonstrating the method at shows- this is the way I'm doing it, but you can use it any way you want. The RD is a 'base method', meaning you modify it slightly to get the results you want. Or, you can experiment to get some results you never though of. Or, you experiment with your dubbings to get the effects you want, using the method. The method allows you to use one base method for all of your dubbings, so once you get used to it, it becomes so natural you use it for everything- synthetic and natural. It is also very fast, tying up very durable flies in a fraction of the time.

Let's use your silver holo as an example. By how you prepare the dubbing, you can get a half-dozen 'looks' for the final version. Do you want hard, tapered, clean segments, or do you want a 'brushy' fly? Prepare the dubbing for the looks you want, and the Rope-dub will take care of the tie- easily (with a little practice). One modification could be to take the silver holo and chop up a hank into 1/2" long segments, and then blend that with some un-cut stuff. Start a rope, and then pick out lots of loose ends, and then finish roping tight. That will give a holo-brush with segments underneath. Do it on a wire core and it will be bullet-proof. Just remember to never spin the base thread or wire with the dubbing, and it will never break while twisting the dubbing. At the shows, I demo the ability of the technique by chopping up ice dub into a pile of 1/4" to 3/8" long segments. I then grab the dubbing pile and tie a tapered, segmented body in 30 seconds with no loop or wax or tools.

In that jig-group I also included some possum-fur jigs using the rope-dub. Natural, un-blended furs, straight from the hide, are some of the best applications of the RD technique, and are unique to the method.

[Skip48]

Thanks Don I can't wait to see the samples and am so looking forward to experimenting with all this stuff. I have a ton of materials and am excited about a whole new thing for me to play with.

Thanks again your the best!

Skip