been wanting to tie some of the FEB patterns listed here, great flies, but I don’t have any antron yarn on hand at the moment. Is there a good substitute for antron yarn that will work just as well ??
thx’s
Mike
Any yarn will work…e.g. for a thin body I have used punch yarn…
other stranded yarns can be used full thickness or untwist the strands and use one ,two or three strands…
Needleloft yarn [nylon] I feel is a good antron substitute…inexpensive and available…
I’ve been experimenting with some of this craft fur I have laying around, I think it’s an acrylic yarn material. It furls nicely, but not sure how well it’ll shed water like antron does. I’ve heard that poly yarn (polypropylene yarn) works too.
I was also wondering if anyone coats the furled extended body to help protect it from being unraveled or coming apart ?
Mike
Yep any yarn will work. Antron is just a trademarked name for a nylon primarily used in the carpet business. Fly tying uses it because of it durability, and likely because there’s a Wapsi packaging facility close to a carpet mill somewhere? Who knows?
Most yarns are nylon or acrylic, another type of polymer fiber. Orlon is a trademarked name for acrylic fiber. Wool yarn is common, and cotton is available, but cotton will absorb water, wool and all the synthetic/polymer fiber s will not. So unless you’re tying a sub-surface fly, Use anything but cotton.
I use any nylon/acrylic I find in the color I’m looking for. Go to the big craft stores and look for ‘plastic canvas yarn’. It’s usually sold in mini-skeins about the size of a big magic marker.
These 4 are acrylic 10yrd-skeins I picked up for 25? [FONT=Verdana][SIZE=2]each [/SIZE][/FONT]in a clearance bin at Michaels. The blue is 20yrds and was 99? [FONT=Verdana][SIZE=2]regular price. It doesn’t say what it’s made of. [/SIZE][/FONT](pencil shown for scale).
Wow, thanks Bass Bug, great info to know! 
I have, or I should say my daughter does, a ton of acrylic skeins of yarn all different colors. Plus a whole container full of poly yarn.
does it help to coat the extensions with any type of sealer to protect it?
I made a couple of extensions with the poly yarn and it seems to work very well. I’m gonna try of other yarns today and give’em a try this week
Mike
probably 100% acrylic ;)
My best luck so far has been with polypropylene yarn. It makes for a bit fuller body on the hoppers, but you could use partial strands for the thinner bodies on caddises and such.
Yes, I use drop of a Flex Seal/Fleximent after furling.
I’ve been tying these ‘FEB’ bodies for Damsel and Dragon patterns for a few years. Never thought it was anything new, dont even remeber how I came across the techniquie, but I tie and twist them on the hook. See if these pics explain it clear enough.
Most yarn is 4 strand. Cut a 6" inch piece and unravel the strands in 1 and 2 or 3 strands for different thickness bodies.
Tie on to hook securly. Twist the yarn keeping enough backward tension to keep it taut. (The first pic is only 1 strand of the yarn.)
Lay a bodkin across the point where you the end to be and maintaining tension, fold over bodkin and lay down along hook.
Remove bodkin and yarn with furl. Tie off with a few secure wraps the twist by hand to tighten up. For Damsel and Dragon, I use a sharpie and mark the black bands on the ‘tail’ then add a generous drop of flex seal, and distribute by pinching yarn between thumb and forefinger and working it in the entire length. One good drop worked in all of extended body will add just enough holding power to keep from untwisting, but will be plenty flexible. It soaks in enbough you cant tell it was used.
Hold your mouse cursor overthe pics. The pics are numbered for the tying process 1 through 5, But I cant control the order they display on here.
I LOVE the FEB’s!!
I have watched Bluegill furl up the bodies from the polypropylene yarns, just thick enough, to make them look all the world like the woven bodies! One color top and bottom, the other color on the sides. Have never been good at the weaving thing, but I sure can furl 'em!!!
Thanks Bass_Bug, you’ve given me a whole bunch of ideas now and you’ve been a great help. I just started working with FEB’s myself.
Been wanting to tie some of John Scott’s FEB hoppers so now off to the vise ;).
Betty, the only weave technique I’ve been able to master … somewhat, is the granny knot weave. If ya get it right it give a nice appearance and profile. I learned it by tying Dirk Burton’s tussle bug. The smallmouths luv this one.
Mike
Mike,
Thank you for that idea!! I can weave, BUT, I can also furl a la Bluegill, maybe half a dozen finished flies in the time it takes me to weave just one!!
I’m all for quick and easy!!!
Betty, here’s a link to that tussle bug if you your interested. He lays it out very well for the weave pattern. http://www.loup-garou.net/tussle.html
I’ve been trying to master the shuttle weave, but that’s a really tricky weave and takes a lot of patience .
Mike
Mike, I like that weave techniqe, looks very simple.
Here are a couple of my Damsels and a Dragon. The top Damsel was made with 1 strand or yarn, the second, was made with 2. The Dragon was made with 3.
This other pic is the only weave I’ve tried. Shooting for 2 colors, one on top, one on bottom. After a couple tries I got it to look CLOSE to the pattern I was trying to copy. It’s hard to a get a good pic showing the side without the legs getting in the way. The good looking one was the pattern, what it supposed to look like.
Those weaves look great, nice job. Once you master the granny knot weave they look very nice. Add that little bit depth and appeal to the fly IMHO.
I’d post some pics I have but my camera is no longer with us … lost it a couple of months ago somewhere! Just not in the budget for a new one yet :sad:
Mike
that stuff works good fer several body types… i tie flies with weaved bodies as well and you can use this yarn as it is for braiding size 10 or12 flies or take out strands as needed for smaller weaved paterns…
The yarn topic made me remember a good yarn material source. My teenage son was into camo everything when he started hunting a few years ago. He wanted his grandma to knit him a scarf with the camo-colored variegated yarn he saw an WallyWorld. I was checking out the left over and realized it had 9 different colors from black, 3 shades of tan to brown and 5 shades of green (light olive to dark olive brown). Each color about 8 inches before fading into the next. I cut it by color, sorted it and bundled each color of about 25 pieces. Thinking if one can buy 9 colors of earth tones for a couple bucks, what else is out there? So now I check out the full size yarn skeins whenever possible and found a variegated chenille with many possible colors.