Begginers Vice, tools, cost

[mctwist 0]

I just received my stuff from Ebay, and it's a good kit. Lots of stuff to start with, defenitely worth the buy!

[Slacker 0]

Jeff,

 

Nice set up! I just started tying a few months ago and am looking for ideas. Thanks!

 

I have to admit I do not think I would like to part with my whip finisher if I was trying to cut costs. For the money I buy it to feel a little more confident that the heads will stay together.

 

Thanks for starting this thread. I enjoyed reading it!

 

Slack23

[billb 0]

I agree with the advice that good tools (they don't need to be the most expensive) will save a new tier lots of frustration.

 

After 40 years of on-and-off tying, nobody (especially my wife) has ever acccused me of having too small a stash of tying materials -- I've got a supply of deer hair, feathers, fur, and hooks that will long outlast me -- but I'd encourage beginning tiers to concentrate their supply purchases on the stuff they know they'll be using on the next patterns they tie. I can't follow my own advice, however; it's too much fun to pick up a well-priced large quantity of something that I figure I'll need one of these days!

 

-- Bill

 

[Don Stracener 0]

I think to get started, remember you don't know if you will like it, get an inexpensive kit.

 

The upgrades I would encourge would be;

 

A good bobbin, cause breaking thread all the time doesn't get it.

 

A matarelli sytle whipfinnisher, took about 3 min. to learn and works great. You hand knot folks have fun with that whip finish, but it drives me nuts.

 

If you like it you can be like Jeff, or a lot of us and find yourself tying flies surrounded by fur, feathers and who knows what else.

[fly~by~night 0]

Biggest pain in the A$$ for me was the vice,and bobbins.

 

Buy ceramic bobbins for thread tying!! i use the "flared" or "standerd" bobbins for floss/wire/ect. Learning thread control,holding materials is hard enough...breaking in the middle of doing both could cause severe headaches.

 

Next was the vise...i went CHEAP! Bad mistake I think my first vise was a "sunrise" bramd and was painful to work with.didnt hold a hook,was painful to lock a hook in,oh and fell apart on me.

 

I know for all practical purposes it "holds a hook", But a good vise like PEAK, or hmh,griffin ect ect, are money better spent.

 

I would deffintly agree with others posting here....buy the best you can afford, cheap tools and equip you will prolly find you outgrow within a few weeks.

 

For dryfly hackle....buy the best! You will see a massive differnce in the ease of use and outcome vs. effort or your flys. Everything eles I pretty much use mustad or tmc hooks. wapsi cheapo stuff for everything eles ( dubbing,strung hackle ect ect ), cause my local shop carries mostly tmc.mustad hooks and wapsi everything.

 

Hope this helps...tis mostly a repeat of others posting-jason

[Hywel 0]

"Those prices are estimates of what I saw at our local Sportsman's Warehouse a few days ago. So, a total of about $20-$40 to get the tools needed. With a beginner, none of this stuff needs to be "top quality." The point is to just get them started."

 

I've seen many a keen beginning tyer throw in the towel because of "Penny-wise, Pound-foolish" advise when buying tools to get started.

 

With a beginner, especially a beginner, tying tools *should* be top quality.

 

The $20 to $40 investment you're suggesting will only yield (IMO) a hundred-fold return in frustration.

 

Hywel

[Ben 0]

Maybe I've just been lucky? :dunno: I've never paid more than $25 for a vice, my bobbins have always been the cheapest ones on the shelf, and I've rarely had a problem. For that reason, I can't justify telling beginner they "need" to spend $80 - $100 bucks or more on just a vice. If they have the money to spend, then great, spend it. I can't, I don't, but I'm working on it.

 

Fly tying is just like anything else, if you want to do it bad enough you'll find a way to make it work. My closest fly shop was 200 miles away. I couldn't just go to the store and get new stuff or return stuff that didn't work the way it ought to. As far as mail order, my parents had credit cards, but only for emergencies; and me needing a new vice was not an emergency.

 

Examples of how I made things work:

I was twelve when I started tying. Broke the C-clamp of the vice that came with my kit, so I made a wood base for it.

Bought a new bobbin a few years later. The darn thing kept cutting my thread, so I used a lighter to heat up the tube and pounded it against the the back of a cast iron skillet to roll the lip smooth. Its still one of my favorite bobbins to use.

 

Bottom line is to do what ever your comfortable with, and just have fun! Its fly tying for goodness sake, not brain surgery.

[richla 0]

When I started this a few years ago, I had a junk vise from a starter set. (the whole set was junk..

I just didn't know it at the time)

 

I was on the edge of just packing it in, and buying the flies I needed.

 

I went and bought an HMH Spartan, and it changed everything for me: I wanted to tie more, no more

fussing with a lose vice, nicely finished, quality product, etc.

 

Suddenly, my flies started looking a LOT better!

 

IMO: if it isn't a passing whim, go out and buy some decent stuff. It's worth it.

[Greg Lumpkin 0]

Good morning all:

 

I'm just getting into fly tying and want to start out on the right foot. I don't want to buy junk, but I also have to consider the fact that I have two little ones in diapers.

 

That being said, what are your opinions on this fly tying station being sold on eBay:

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...A%3AIT&rd=1

 

Thanks,

Greg

[Hairstacker 0]

The vise on that thing looks very similar, if not identical, to the "Master"-style vise sold by Cabela's. The two I've encountered did not hold hooks well and you had to clamp the hooks with excessive force just to keep them from slipping. (In fact, when one of my boys was 10, he was unable to muster the force required to clamp a hook well in one of these vises. In turn, he was not strong enough to flip the lever and release the fly once it was tied -- that's a lot of force being applied to a hook!) A well-engineered, well-adjusted vise shouldn't require much physical effort on your part to hold or release a hook.

 

Also, the design of that vise mount will elevate the vise, which may be tiring and cause you to end up with a sore neck/back if you spend a lot of time at it, unless you tie on an unusually low table. You'll notice that vise mount will not allow you to adjust for height, which means if you ever buy a clamp-style vise with a longer stem, it will not adapt well to that particular mount.

 

In any case, I think you'd be much better off spending a little more for a decent vise and tools. You can get a brand new Danvise on eBay for $65 or a brand new HMH Silhouette vise for $85. I think you'd be MUCH happier with one of those. And if you want a tool stand to mount everything on, look into one of these for $35:

 

http://www.basspro.com/servlet/catalog.Sce...nkEnabled=false

 

You'll notice this tool stand places the vise out in front. By positioning the vise over the edge of a table, you can accomodate just about any length vise stem and adjust it to your ideal height for the table surface you're tying on. I have one and love it.

 

-- Mike

[Jeff Ward 0]

I would have to agree with the statements above, get a nicer vice def and then spend a lil time looking at tool sets, I think Dr. SLick has one for $40 but you could look around.

-Jeff

[maddog48 0]

Check out the Dyna-King Kingfisher set-up. For a little over $200 you get a Kingfisher vise, a half dozen Dr Slick tools, an instructional CD-Rom and book, and a decent amount of materials including some Daiichi hooks. Just Google the Kingfisher FlyTying Kit.

 

 

Mike

[Greg Lumpkin 0]

That kit looks good. Amazon.com has it for $199.00 in either C-clamp or pedestal mount. I'm leaning toward pedestal so I can move it around on the table top.

 

I have a computer I want to sell that should fetch me at least $250.00 so that will help. I'm going to try and talk the wife into letting me get this kit before I sell the PC system. I'm a little on the impatient side...

 

I'm mostly going to concentrate on poppers and flies for bass and panfish since that is what I fish for.

 

Thanks for the tip Mike. Anyone else have suggestions or opinions on this kit or other equipment?

 

Thanks again all,

Greg

[flyfishingtaz 0]

VISE VISE VISE. I cant stress that one vital tool enough. I got into tying when I was around 15. (and yes Im still at that tying level lol) When i started my parents bought me a fairly nice tying kit. Had everything I needed, vise, bobbin, hackle pliers, etc etc etc. The whole works. Well, the vise was stationary. No big deal, so what. I mean it's nice but not a necessity. Kind of like power steering. We love it, but can live without it. Well needless to say, it would only hold about a size 10 at the smallest hook. It wasnt a tight fit, and didnt rotate at all.

So it didnt rotate, had very shotty claws, and only had a c-clamp attachment. would you believe I gave up? A few years later I was in my local fly shop fussing about prices, when the guy behind the counter asked if I ever tried tying flies. I told him my situation. He not only laughed, but proceeded to give me about a 2hr demo on most the vises in the shop. I GOT HOOKED AGAIN.

The point is simple. In every job you do, whether recreation or employment, if you dont have the proper tool for the job, you wont succeed. And if you do, you will be very exhausted, and frusterated. Spend the money on a great vise. Ask around. Get advise. bodkins....phooey! use a thick sewing needle. bobbins. like the vise go quality. get one with the ceramic inserts. scissors, fine tipped at the crafts store. short of a vise and bobbin, you can go to a craft shop for 20$. If you like it in a few months, then go from there.

BUT GET A QUALITY VISE. Trust me, I lost 10yrs of a great hobby due to piss poor quality which kept me away from my most favorite, and rewarding hobby. Hope my rambling helps someone out.

[nemoblackdog 0]

Even as a relative newbie to tying, it's easy to recognize the value of a good, solid vise.

 

That said, there's more than one way to skin this cat. For a vise to be considered "good", it must hold a wide range of hooks very securely.

 

I know of a guy who's been tying for many years with - get this - a pair of smooth-jaw needle nose pliers clamped into a small bench vise (the kind you have in a workshop, not a fly tying vise). Grab the hook in the pliers (mash the barb while he's at it) clamp the plier handles into the jaws of the bench vise. It is absolutely rock solid - no slippage on the #28s he ties from time to time, and holds the big streamer hooks with equal security. Of course, there's no rotary action, isn't particularly portable, but it is efficient and ultra reliable. Sure, you can call him cheap, but it does the job with complete aplomb, and has the added benefit of the tools also being usable for other purposes (this guy has lots of other hobbies besides tying). As an enginer, I appreciate the ingenuity here.