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R-Money

Need help identifying material (baitfish pattern)

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Kinda a serious question here, the synthetics must all be nylon, acrylic or polyester, is that correct?

If it is, then the question I have is; is there really a great difference between brands of any of these fibers? What I mean is; nylon vs nylon vs nylon, should I expect a noticeable difference in tying or fishability?

texture, thickness(stiffness), natural taper, sheen and length all greatly vary between the materials. So yes.

 

So in order to get the same texture, taper and sheen as the fly he wants to copy, he can't substitute some other material even if the color is exact and both materials are the same species of plastic?

Now I begin to understand the question better.

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Kinda a serious question here, the synthetics must all be nylon, acrylic or polyester, is that correct?

If it is, then the question I have is; is there really a great difference between brands of any of these fibers? What I mean is; nylon vs nylon vs nylon, should I expect a noticeable difference in tying or fishability?

texture, thickness(stiffness), natural taper, sheen and length all greatly vary between the materials. So yes.

So in order to get the same texture, taper and sheen as the fly he wants to copy, he can't substitute some other material even if the color is exact and both materials are the same species of plastic?

Now I begin to understand the question better.

You could get it close enough to not have it matter pretty easily imo, very few are actually so different from anything else you can't find a fairly close match. That being said if anyone has a cheap match to SF I'd like to know.

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a cheap match to SF

SF? soft fuzz? I did umpteen searches too....generic Synthetic Fiber? Half the time I have no idea what is being talked about. I the above posts there are several/many/a lot of SF this and SF that...

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SF is Steve Farrar’s line of products.

 

You can tie this fly with Congo Hair and not know the difference.

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You could get it close enough to not have it matter pretty easily imo, very few are actually so different from anything else you can't find a fairly close match. That being said if anyone has a cheap match to SF I'd like to know.

I mean, it wouldn't matter to you. But OP asked the question for their own reasons. I still think it looks like kanenkalon. Anyone else with experience with it care to chime in?

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Seal pup eyelashes?

I think you're spot on with this, if it was harvested shortly after an oil spill it explains why it appears to be synthetic.

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a cheap match to SF

SF? soft fuzz? I did umpteen searches too....generic Synthetic Fiber? Half the time I have no idea what is being talked about. I the above posts there are several/many/a lot of SF this and SF that...

This stuff http://www.jsflyfishing.com/success-flies-steve-farrar-sf-blend

 

Makes some really nice baitfish good texture nice amount of sparkle.

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It's not that difficult to create the SF Blend with other materials. Steve Farrar did a tying class for my saltwater club a few years ago, before the SF Blend came out and showed us how to flash blend materials. I've done it with Mirror Image and Unique Hair. For the Mirror Image which is a finer hair I used Angel Hair for the flash and Flashabou for the Unique Hair which is a coarser material. It takes about 10 to 15 minutes to get a good blend. All of it is alternating layers of the artificial hair and the flash material. Pull out small bunches of hair and lay them next to each other on a flat surface, then do the same with the flash material laying it on top of the hair. I usually do three layers of each. Roll the material into a bunch and repeat the process till you're satisfied the mix is well blended. I use a pack of hair and a pack of flash for my mix. If I remember correctly Steve Farrar used either two or three packs of flash for each bunch of hair. Here's a peanut bunker pattern tied with flash blended Mirror Image.

 

post-309-0-45510800-1525375515_thumb.jpg

 

 

You can also use the same process to create different colors. I've done it with the Senyo Laser Dub because a lot of it's colors are to fluorescent and I like to tone them down to more natural colors.

 

I took another look at the pattern in the original post. To me, it looks like the material may have been flash blended. Still don't know what the material is.

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I appreciate the feedback (at least the semi-serious ones). Still on the hunt for the material in question. I will have to look into the "kanenkalon" material. To be clear, this is basically fake wig material?

 

I have more synthetic materials than I care to admit, so part of my elimination was to go through what I have, some more obvious than others; hence the list of "NOT" materials in my original post. With all the fly tying nuts on here, I figured it would make sense why I'm obsessing over finding the exact match to the material I'm looking for.

 

I know there are a many suitable "substitutes", but I'm still searching.

 

Again, I appreciate the serious feedback and still open to any suggestions on what it might be!

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