30 years of tieing flys and I finally forced myself to sit down and hand whip finish.
Took about 30 minutes of watching Youtube and practice, and I can do it!
I was stoked. No more whip finish tool…The time I will save now! Wow!
Wait, I have to put my scissors down to whip finish! Thats gonna eat the time I saved learning to not pick up and use the whip finisher. Gotta be something wrong.
Checked youtube. All the videos are whipping without scissors in their hands.
If I try hard, bet I can whip with scissors in my hand. Do I wanna learn? Nah, maybe in another 30 years.
Whats cool? I can look cool hand whipping when I have NuB’s around. LOL
At one point I actually believed that you had to be able to whip finish by hand to consider yourself an accomplished fly tyer, so I learned how to do that…
I also actually believed that you had to be able to tie without putting down your scissors to be an accomplished fly tyer…so I learned to do that, and even to whip finish by hand with the scissors in my hand…
Now, I keep my scissors on the bench where they don’t get in the way or stab anything unless I want them to. I can pick them up quickly enough, and I often need ALL my fingers to control materials, sometimes two or three of them, as I apply them to the fly with the vise.
I whip finish with a tool. I can place the wraps more accurately and turn it faster. I’ve timed it. I’m WAY faster with the tool, even putting down the scissors and picking up the tool, and I was pretty quick by hand…
I wrap ‘backwards’ when I tie, too. Since I use a rotary vice, I like to rotate the vise like a reel handle with my left hand…so that means wrapping ‘backwards’ for the small amount of wrapping I do by hand. Feels more natural to me anyway.
And I’m faster and the flies come out better.
So now I finally realize that what makes you an accomplished fly tyer is doing the job the way that works best for you.
Nice to learn new techniques…but you have to decide whether or not you really want to use them.
There is no wrong or right way to tie a fly if it pleases you. (and maybe the fish, but they’re pretty dumb and I wouldn’t take their endorsement as any kind of a quality statement).
The late Al Campbell and I had a little ‘feud’ going over my not using the whip finish tools…so I did a column on how to do it by hand. It is still here: http://www.flyanglersonline.com/articles/ldy/ldy110298.php
I’m not sure Al could do it by hand! So there.
I made up my mind to learn to whip finish by hand. I did it. Not all that impressed with it, but I can officially do it. Looks neat to some. Now that I did it, I will stick with my Materilli (sp?)
What a never ending debate this one is. I’m a lousy tier & use a tool & always felt a little “lesser” for doing so. Then I bought the book “Charlie Craven’s Basic Fly Tying”, & Charlie uses the tool. He maintains it is far more efficient.
I guess it boils down to “to each their own”.
Mike
I’ve always felt a bit under trained because I could never figure the tool out all that well. I mean, I can make it work, but it never seems very natural to me while doing it by hand seems pretty straight forward.
I forced myself to learn all methods (matarelli, thompson, manual) as soon as I knew that it could be done in those ways. In a very certain, specific set of circumstances, I will use each one, but 97% of the time, I use my Matarelli. If the finish location is extremely crowded (not a crowded head, but like…a parachute if you dont finish about the post), I’ll use the Thompson. On the rare occasion I use a conehead, I’ll whip by hand. If the whip isn’t laying as it should, I can get more careful placement by hand. If I need to finish near the bend of the hook and I can’t use my extended Matarelli for whatever reason, I’ll do it by hand.
It’s not a technique that I couldn’t live without, but it’s nice to know I can do it if I need/want to.
That being said, the Wasatch whip finishers are too pretty (and work too well) not to want to use them.
I hand whi finish becasue I do that better than I do with a tool.
Since it works for me I have not worked with a tool for a long time.
Also I tend to nmake much smaller heads than most people do.
Were it not for the Dr Slick whip finisher, with the large handle, I’d be lost.
If you’d like to see someone hand whip finish, watch Jiggin (AKA Kim) hand finish flies. He is probably the smoothest, most beautiful hand finisher I’ve ever seen.
I used to finish flies by hand. I thought I was “hand whip-finishing”, but I’ve come to learn that really I was half-hitching. My fly heads were ugly, and would unravel with use (sometimes even WITH head cement!).
So, I bought the Matarelli, love it, pretty much NEVER have problems with threads unraveling on my flies anymore, have almost given up using head cement except for patterns with eyes attached…and now the only excuse I have for ugly fly heads is my own shabby technique. I think learning to whip finish by hand would be a good thing…but I’m happy just using the tool. It looks impressive to non-fly tyers!
Even when doing a whip finish by hand, you are using a tool. Your hand. Like any other job, using the right tool for the job is the key. If that tool is your hand or a bent piece on metal you bought at a fly shop, the RIGHT tool is the one that works best for a particular application. With as many different styles of flies and heads, or lack thereof sometimes, saying any one tool or technique is the best for everything is quite narrow minded I would think (No I’m calling anyone that, just saying). Many of us can finish a particular pattern or fly style faster using one or the other, that’s just our individual tying style and preference.
As Bamboozle pointed out, a problem with doing it by hand is that your skin comes into way too much contact with the thread. If you have anything less than than smooth skin on your hands and fingers you’ll get frustrated doing it by hand.
I myself can do a hand whip finish (not as fast and efficient as others I’m sure) sometimes I do it by hand and other times I use 2 different size Materelli type tools just depends on the situation and fly.
I have both the Thompson and the Materelli tools but I also know how to do it by hand. Sometimes it can be tough using a whip tool on a jig so I do it by hand. Both ways have there times for use, and if you ever teach a class or show someone then they can pick which is easier for them.
I couldn’t figure out how to use that tool for anything. Whip finishing by hand was great. Not that long ago I learned how to use the tool, but I prefer to use my hands, still.
