JRG

I love mine and I hardly use the rotary feature. It's more of the system you can create with the vice that I enjoy coupled with the automatic bobbin. The way the post set up and bobbin work with the vise is what attracted me to it and it can do everything. Tube flies, small flies, large flies and everything is true in line. Norm has been great whenever I need to order stuff too.

I personally like the Nor Bobbin better but I prefer it's smaller size. It is nice and center balanced as well as I like to use a split thread technique when dubbing etc... The ekich is bulky and feels so awkward and you have to hold it a certain way where the Nor bobbin it doesn't matter which way it's facing. Having to reset the ekich in the middle of tying is sometimes very inconvenient as well. I don't mind loading thread either and sometimes loading certain spools on the Ekich takes awhile especially if it's a little tight fitting as it pushes the o-ring out of the groove and it won't retract worth beans then. But if you prefer a big bulky un-balanced bobbin go for it.

Is this swap closed yet? I'll get in on it if not. Jeff

I've been using the tack free lately for tying big airheads. I don't want it to set up really hard to it works great for that application. Both products work well. Even mixing them gave good results actually.

Ummmm, is the feature where you could add your patterns or recent uploads gone?? Anyways, here's the link to one of them I did and you should see the other ones there. I have Steve's book and tied these exactly as described. I know in his newer book he updated the pattern a little as they tended to flip upside down the way he built the weight up. I think the revised one fixed it a little as he built the weight up slightly differently. http://www.flytyingforum.com/pattern3099.html

I posted some up awhile back (few years ago). Those colors worked fine. Tan I think. Jeff

Not sure where I saw them at, I'm sure it wasn't ebay, but there's a few guys out there that take pictures of all the capes they have and have separate pricing for all of them. Some are real dogs some are pretty decent. You do need to be careful because I've ordered a couple in the past and both came from the same supplier so I really should've just ordered them both from the same place. I'd definitely ask for pictures of the cape you are getting though so you can see the color and how many splits it has. Jeff edit-featherside flies is the one with all the pics but their inventory is looking pretty low as well

I can bend plenty of hooks with my fingers.... is that's what wrong with TMC 206bls?? I poked myself once or so I thought, turned out my skin was ok but the hook point totally went sideways... I should've known better after I had one open up on a nice steelie. Flytire, ur right, i totally missed that it's upside down too.... but look at it, it's even got the right taper in the segments too.... smaller to large.

What's wrong with it...??? It's got a point and an eye and it's almost straight.... pre bent for a nymph and you can easily tell where each of you body segments can begin and end.....

I wasn't implying you need a norvise. You can just wrap the dubbing or use any rotary to do so while you hold the dubbing. Having a nor vise just makes it that much easier/faster. I was just showing how Norm does it and you can see he uses Loon cement.

This might help...

I thought it was a biot personally, but found this link. You can click on the picture of the fly box to enlarge. http://www.wayupstream.com/2007/09/hoppicator.html Not sure if any of those are the particular fly, but most look like they're just wrapped with a dark contrasting wire.

Love the spot pattern in that 3rd pic.

PETE! What's going on. I'm just got my 3rd Nor-bobbin a few months ago.... Ties airheads beautifully

I dunno, IE8 I think. I've viewed it before but it's not working now for me. I'll check into it I guess.

I just tried some for the first time. I take it outside after I cure it with the light to really hit it good with some real UV. I then leave the fly alone for a day and it's nice and dry. There is usually a little stickiness though after the intial drying. Adhesion is a little weak with the CCG though. Tied up this big ol airhead and had a hard time anchoring it to the bend of the hook. Epoxy would've held it pretty solid no problems. Fly looked pretty good in the water though, I'll give it that.

Is the Freedman vid not working? I don't see anything but I guess I can ask him about it since he's my cousin. I got to see him tie them in person back in March, pretty fun stuff.

Haven't been tying much for the last two years so I've just been lurking. I will get some pics up of some of the flies I've been developing tho and people have requested some step by steps etc...

I like my nor vise, but I've heard a lot of good things about the jvice as well.

I would try micro tubing or small tubing. You could even rib it with wire or something. See if I can find a pic of one I do.

For a dry fly do you think it'll float with what looks like a synthetic wing? If it's just for swinging around on top I think it would work great and I could be wrong about the wing as well but in my experience I wouldn't count on it staying high and dry in any type of current but still water might be great.

I gotta agree with others maddog.... it's not their inheritance, it's your money. I don't expect anything from my parents, least of all my grandparents. I would only hope they buy whatever they want at this point in their lives and be happy and not worry about what we think of it. They earned it so why should we care how they spend it. They provided the means to a good education etc... that's what matters.

Harold, one of those rotary paper cutters work great too.

There's a youtube vidoe where he shows the fly, I think it's Mikey showing off the hoppicator system.

I've developed a great pattern but I'm not sure if I'm willing to share at this point as I'm thinking about maybe trying to commercialize it but it works great on the swing. There's a lot of effective pupa patterns out there though.