jrodell

The toe nail clippers and back end near the pivot point of the scissors are great ideas, never really thought of either of those myself. I bought a few cheap pairs of hand tools for Harbor Freight and the garage and just repurposed one of the more cheaper non-useful ones for the garage for my fly bench. This size is small enough to be out of the way and it's cut fly wire acceptably. Maybe not as close to the shank as OP's device but just another alternative to throw into the hat. https://www.harborfreight.com/4-12-in-diagonal-cutters-63814.html?_br_psugg_q=diagonal+cutters

@cphubert Awesome carousel - I like how you put a cover over the thread side, one of the big reasons I stopped using an exposed thread organizing system was I noticed several colors had been faded compared to newer spools I had. I really like the multi-use aspect of it with the hook & fly dry wire rack side as well. Very cool stuff!

SilverCreek - that's an awesome collection, definitely got them all, lol. That J. Stockard has great info, not sure I've read that. I agree that some of these sized skeins could be overkill for your basic person tying schuck and leg purposes for patterns but I was hoping to find that type of material for some custom dubbing blends (for better or worse). I actually have a handful of spooled antron but didn't want to use it all up for dubbing. When I started the rabbit hole of research into this I started to read about that old rug yarn stuff. I think the OP's post was about some yarn they thought was cool to use as a chenille wrap and I sort of took this in a different direction. My bad OP! Thanks to the rest for sharing your experience and tips, much appreciated.

Thank you very much for the offer. I will save you the effort in sending any samples as I'm fairly certain this is essentially the material I'm after it's just a matter of my stubborness to try and find an alternative on the market or succumb and purchase this stuff from thrift stores or on E-Bay. I was hoping to somehow find maybe a modern equivalent but it's looking more and more like a needle in a haystack situation. I've already been chopping up various acrylic yarns for fine dubbing and they just don't have that trilobal sheen the antron or this rug yarn seems to have. I've been hesitant to just make the purchases on E-bay or Etsy but I do have a handful of skeins of this same stuff in a few colors saved from E-Bay vendors in case I wanted to order it. The more I think about it the more I'm leaning towards just saving myself the hassle and ponying up on E-Bay and calling it a day. It seems these skeins are "lifetime" supplies and I'm seeing these range from $4.99 to $8.99 a skein. Thanks again for your input on this.

Thanks for the tip - I've been on the hunt for craft store antron like material and this is promising. It's listed as a Hobby Lobby house brand (Yarn Bee) and the materials are 100% Nylon - rather 100% acrylic which most synthetic yarns are listed as with no more detail. I am going to check this out next time I'm near a Hobby Lobby and see how the material looks in person. I wonder if it can be cut down and used as dubbing with the coffee grinder method. It almost looks like a shoelace style cord in the image which wouldn't be conducive to that. I can't tell if it's braided strands or what.

One time I considered this when I was (am still learning) to tie new patterns. I ended up taking a razor to one and ended up basically cutting it at the head where I was able to unravel in reverse wraps most of the fly's thread wraps. I think I ended up figuring it was roughly 7" - 9" worth of thread at that point? I usually snip an inch or so off and probably ended up missing some or cutting into some thread where I first cut into the fly to scrap it, so in my mind I think I just settled on the range of to 10" - 15" of 70D thread per fly as a rough guess. Obviously various patterns require different amount of wraps. I think I was doing nymphs like Pheasant Tails. 100 meters is roughly 3,973 inches so at the mean of 12.5" of that 10" to 15" range, I'm seeing the number of 317 flies per 100M spool? That seems like a lot...not sure my math is right...lol

Your #1 cape should have smaller sized feathers for tying nymph collars and such. I've been using grizzly hen hackle feathers to tie dark wings on dry fly adams as well. I'm sure there's going to plenty of uses for these over time.

Found this stuff for $2.49 a bag (guessing roughly an ounce of material) at my craft store called "tinsel trim". It's clearly some older inventory and not sure if it's even made anymore. I picked up what was left that was in the "sale bin" thinking it might work it might not and was worth a shot for $2.50. Upon further inspection it ends up being almost identical stuff to ripple ice fiber. Now I wish they had more bags and other colors, lol. Ripple Ice Fiber seems to be blended with some sort of yarn or fur type of material but this crinkled trim flash material seems to be what's also blended into it. The Ripple Ice Fiber might also be just a shy thinner in width but it's pretty darn close. This stuff was in the basket of other holiday decorations. I am going back next year to see if I can find a few more colors if they carry it again. I assume these fibers would also work for salt patterns. The material is medium stiffness, maybe on the medium light limp scale. It definitely "flows" but not as limp as flashabou material is - a bit more rigid than that. If you have some Ripple Ice fiber, the tinsel found in that stuff is about the same, as mentioned. I'm going to try to blend this up eventually to see how it turns out. I haven't measured the length of the fibers quite yet. Also, Angel Hair can be found at craft stores in the felting sections. I found a pretty large sized bag in just a basic pearl/opal for about $6 which is probably just a touch more than I would have gotten with Larva Lace at the same price, so not much of a gain there. I think I'll just end up finding more on Ebay/Etsy under Angelina Fiber. Just thought I'd mention it as there are probably other sources/makers that might be worth it or have more selections.

Wow @SBPatt - outstanding!!! 😲

I have been using a prince nymph brown cape and it's pretty good. enough feathers of different sizes and I haven't had any problems plucking ones that fit the prince nymph collars I've been using them for.