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Strippnline786

Whip Finish

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Here's a good video demonstration.

You can get also do it by hand...

It's one of Orvis' one minute fly tying videos by Tim Flager. The series is a good general resource for beginners...

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Welcome to the site, Strippnline.

 

There are multitudes of whip finishing tutorials on YouTube. By hand and with Thompson and Matarelli tools.

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lost my only materelli whip at a tying session.boy do i miss it.had to retrain on another style. i have to use a tool as my hands are very rough and line catches on every twist.

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Your inability to whip finish is all mental. I found it helpful to call it what it is, a snell knot. Snell knots are easy to tie and any bait chucker can tie them. Now fly fishermen are a loftier bunch so we gave it a more Regal sounding name, the whip finish, created a tool for it, launched a campaign to confuse the bait chuckers and elevate the whip finish into something only the most well versed seasoned FF can accomplish. It's all mind games, it's a snell knot. once you get it you will wonder how you didn't get it and you too will never utter the words "snell knot" ever again, just like the rest of us.

 

Silver creek provided a picture that is worth a 1000 videos.

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Every diagram of a Snell knot I've seen, shows wrapping from front to back, and pulling the whole knot tight.

The whip finish must be wrapped back to front. Wrapping front to back will leave a single strand across the knot that actually holds everything tight.

 

The Snell and the whip finish are similar ... they are not the same knot.

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Your inability to whip finish is all mental. I found it helpful to call it what it is, a snell knot. Snell knots are easy to tie and any bait chucker can tie them. Now fly fishermen are a loftier bunch so we gave it a more Regal sounding name, the whip finish, created a tool for it, launched a campaign to confuse the bait chuckers and elevate the whip finish into something only the most well versed seasoned FF can accomplish. It's all mind games, it's a snell knot. once you get it you will wonder how you didn't get it and you too will never utter the words "snell knot" ever again, just like the rest of us.

 

Silver creek provided a picture that is worth a 1000 videos.

It's true. For me, Whip Finishing was like eating gourmet Olives (GAAAGH!), until I watched a YT video by Tim Flagler.

After that, the process became crystal clear.

 

 

Alan :)

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I was taught a real snell knot 50 years ago. Few people even know how to tie a proper snell knot. Silvercreeks picture is how I've been Snelling chunk rigs for years by spinning and twisting the line over itself with two fingers otherwise known as a hand whip finish. I don't hand whip finish tying tread because my hands fray the thread but I'm still good at Snelling 30 and 40 lb mono. Wether its tied front to back or back to front the finished product is still a snell knot. We've had this debate before but thats my story and I'm sticking to it.

 

Here is a video showing how it's done. Tell me this is not a whip finish. By the way it was difficult finding a video produced by someone who actually knows how to snell a hook. So many videos out there of people wrapping line around hook shanks.

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0_KYbmUfJa4

 

Come to think of it, my father was a life long fly fisherman, perhaps he taught me to hand whip finish and convinced me it was a snell knot. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.

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I learned to do it decades ago with two fingers. I practiced at work for HOURS on my lunch breaks. Eric Leiser drew it up in The Complete Book of Fly Tying that I about wore out from the local library but eventually bought a copy off a used book store.

 

I do use a whip finisher tool for smaller flies.

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