Tying Speed

[bones]

I'd guess about 40

By the way, don't you think that prep time needs to be calculated into the total time?

Yes I do but there is only one feather per fly involved here and quality is not an issue, so prep time is relatively small


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harry mason
[url=http://www.troutflies.com:481c5]http://www.troutflies.com[/url:481c5]

[ohiotuber]

Them......139
me........2 foam spiders
Mike

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This site's about sharing!

[RonMT]

My guess would be 30 at the outside. Ron

[featherchucker]

Ok, now that this is a guessing competition.......I wanna know what do WE win?

And.......was anybody bleeding after this frothy frenzy of feathers and hooks?

Anyway I'll say about 90.

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I fish, therefore I swam.

[Betty Hiner]

d'know ...
last spring I tied slightly over 200 jig head maraboo flies in just under 8 hours (plus a small assortment of other ones thrown in as requested ... the kids picked what they wanted and what colors). That's about 25 per hour. OK, I'll say 30. You've got to be a better tyer than I am!

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Trouts don't live in ugly places

... and the answer is, ta ta

the highest number of flies tied was 68.
The second highest was 46.
There were two tiers tied at 45.

What amazed me about the final counts was the differential between 68 and the next 3 tiers. Considering that I was among the 45/46 group: was not disturbed or delayed by the heckling; tied at full speed throughout the full hour; did not break the thread or drop any tool; take a drink of water or get interupted in any way; I am unable to figure out why there was such a marked difference between 1st and the next 3 tiers. That means the 1st place finisher was tying at a speed 1-1/2 times as fast as the average of the next 3 tiers! Obviously he did it but I'll be dipped if I can figure out how. Amazing is all I can say.

Again, there was no 'quality' issue but you still had to complete the fly.

Featherchucker - Yes. There were some pri*ked(I guess since that word is forbidden I'll substitute 'punctured') fingers(:

Interesting side note: The winner won a fly tying lamp. The winner from last year had won that same lamp and warned this years winner to be careful not to get burnt by the lamp because it gets exceedingly hot. He also warned about not tying anything with shiney materials because after a short time the reflection of the light off of the material will really hurt the eyes. How's that for an endorsement?

Allan

[This message has been edited by tyeflies (edited 15 November 2005).]

[Betty Hiner]

Magic in 200? Nah, just insanity! Then again, I had 8 hours! And hordes of incessant kids to push me onward!

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Trouts don't live in ugly places

[Don Bastian]

Thanks, Allan, for starting this topic.

I shouldn't be here - too busy getting ready for the Symposium this weekend - but I couldn't resist.

Having tied commercially for 12 or so years, sometimes more than eight hours per day, I want to make a couple points. First, I believe that most "professional" factory fly tiers would kick our collective asses - bigtime - in this contest. I heard of one woman tier at a factory in Thailand who can tie 54 DOZEN Joe's Hoppers in two days! Now, her materials are pre-selected, prepared, and materials ready to go, delivered to her work station, but is that not what Jim Krul's boys did last Sunday in Danbury?
Regardless of how easy or difficult the pattern, experience, the more the better, IMHO, counts the most in this contest. Doing this for a living, day after day, makes one an extremely fast fly tier.

I once tied fifteen dozen drys in one day and thought it quite an accomplishment. I know a young fellow who, some years ago, was tying commercially for Blue Ribbon Flies. He procrastinated and screwed around and then had to force his face against the grindstone to get the order done on time. He slept very little, but in ten days tied 180 DOZEN dry flies. This particular person gave up commercial tying after that "burning-the-candle-at-both-ends" marathon.

Not prior to my commercial experience, but within six to eight months after I began tying commercially, I could (and still can!) tie a Comparadun in three minutes. But during an hour straight run, lose some momentum and can only tie about 16 to 18 Comparaduns per hour. I can tie a dozen Catskill drys in 35 minutes. I can tie the Lawson simplified version of a Marinaro Thorax Dun in less than three minutes.
Of course, these times are with materials prepared in advance. Hackles selected, but not trimmed.
My fastest pace was five dozen flies per hour, they were size #24 Midge Larva. I did thirty dozen of those in one day of just under six hours tying.

All that said, I think I could have approached five dozen thread body Soft-hackles in this contest.

So I agree with the guy who said 60, but will make my guess a little lower to be different.

I say 54 flies tied by the winner.

PS - every fly I tie is technically correct. If a fly I tie doesn't pass my personal strict quality control, it won't go into the "sell" bin. I usually stop & repeat a particular step if necessary to have each fly that leaves my vise be a well tied fly. I feel there should be quality control on this contest, flies not meeting the criteria of correct proportions should be canned.

"If you can't tie a good fly, speed is insignificant." That's a quote from me. I just made it up.

DB

Well, back to the vise...

[Don Bastian]

Silly me.
This post was two pages long and I didn't notice. Posted my reply after the answer was posted. I can be such a dork. LOL!

DB

[Jim Cramer]

Tyeflies,

You stated very clearly that the tiers were given a hen neck so I included the stripping time of the neck ( less than a minute) in the hour allotted. I'm not sizing individual feathers, merely stripping them from the neck and and placing them on the work space in front of me so I don't have to continuously pick up the neck and pluck a feather.