Trucos de montaje

How To Make a Wing Burner
By Dave Ulmer (slicfoot)


Wing burners are available commercially through local fly shops or catalogues, but sometimes a size or particular shape you have in mind are not found. Or you don't want to wait to get one. Here is how to make your own. The photos shown are for a tent caddis, with the burner for a dragon fly wing shown at the end of the article.

Start with a strip of brass, (available at hobby shops, or hardware stores as shim stock.) ½ inch wide, .025 to .032 inch thick and about 8 and 1/4 inches long.

    1. Bend the strip in half and clamp it tightly with vise grips so the ends are even.

    2. With a hammer flatten the strip at the bend.

    3. Draw the shape you want on the open ends.

    4. Clamp the brass with the vise grips as shown below.

    5. With a saw and a file cut the brass to the desired shape while it is clamped in the vise grips. Smooth off the sharp edges with a file.

    6. The photo below shows a feather held in the burner. Use a lighter to burn the feather that is sticking out around the metal burner, but do NOT burn off the quill stem.

    7. This is the finished fly. The wing is about 1 1/4 inches long.

    8. Caddis and the wing burner.

Here is a wing burner made by the same method for a Dragonfly:

Give it a try. ~ Dave


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