Tony is dead-on with the Gel-thing here. I buy SG Gel in the Wal-MArt 3 paks in the squeeze dispensers. Neat and tidy.
One more little note about application. If you have worked with 'Awesome Hair' from Line's End, you have noticed that many petroleum-based cements dissolve the fibers during the time the glue is wet. As the glue or Sally Hansen's dries, the fibers dry and bind themselves back together, creating a fairly durable head. Others synthetic fibers may or may not react the same way, depending on what you're using. I haven't seen 'Super Hair' react with anything yet, so it's very stable. OK, what I'm getting at. When I have the head of a streamer fly finished, the SG Gel is going to to more than just hold the eyes on for me. Whether furs, feathers, McFlyfoam, hair, or synthetic fibers, I use the SG Gel as a 'head binder' along with eye-holder. I use a much larger dollop of glue than is necessary. I do both sides at one time. Then I take my picking needle, which is just a giant chromed sewing needle with a wine-bottle cork handle, and I jab the SG Gel into the fibers, trying to fully saturate the fibers that will be between the eyes with gel. Then I place both eyes, adding more gel if necessary, being careful for angle and symmetry. Then I take 'modified' wing burners and clamp the fly by only the eyes in the burners towards the center. Different bends on different burners lets me do different size flies and apply different pressures. With the fly firmly gripped by the eyes, I poke the tips in a block of styrofoam and let it dry. I'm currently making more custom eye-holders out of clothes-hangers. This also keeps me from having to hold the fly as it dries and getting glue all over my fingers. What this now does is bind the eyes to each other by binding all of the fibers between them. On large or hair heads, it binds the eyes to a deeper layer of material. This little step of saturating the fibers between and under the eyes creates a truly bullet-proof fly, as least as far as losing the eyes goes. With strong-jawed and toothy fish, it will really save your flies. It is really fast and eaasy to do, and gives you an easy method to dry your flies. I did some Martinek-style Awesome Hair streamers with only the Sally Hansen's as the head binder. They may hold up for stripers that way, but the Dorado simply smashed and crushed the flies in their jaws, popping off the eyes and demolishing the shape of the head. (They don't have viscious teeth, but you don't want to jaw-grab them like a bass, either.) The next year I went back to my method and didn't lose an even eye on any gel-bound fly. I also coat the head-threads with thinned & glittered vinyl cement as a finishing touch. I also have a fly left over from a Florida trip that is a testiment to both Sierra Mackeral teeth and Superglue Gel. The fly was a pretty little deceiver pattern with Super hair and cryatal hair and flashabou accents. I say 'was'. When the Sierras were done with it, 3/4 of the materials had been chewed off, the head tie-down threads were all cut and gone (clear nylon bound with vinyl cement), and the epoxy eyes were very scratched up. The only thing holding the fly together was the eyes and the area between them, bound with the Superglue Gel. It also taught me that fish will hit a sparsely tied fly if it had eyes to key in on. (The 4" of leader is also what saved that fly.) Just make sure your area is well ventilated as you work with these amounts of Super-glue. 'nuff of my ramblings. DonO PS I never use epoxy on any flies. Weight and hardness are too much of a liability. Vinyl will do anything epoxy will do, and is much softer and lighter. OK, now I'm really done. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tony Spezio" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, February 15, 2003 7:44 AM Subject: Re: [VFB] Handling plastic eyes > Wes, > The Super Gel I use is made by Lock Tite. > It comes in a in a hard plastic container that has a squeeze lever on each > side. > You can really control the amount of glue you want to dispense from a pin > point drop to a long stream. The gel does not run and make a mess like > regular Super Glue. Another thing about the Lock Tite container. You get > to use all the glue and not have it harden overnight in the tube. > Just general info, I think if you try it you will change your mind about > super glues. I never use regular Super Glue anymore. > Tony [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Wes Wada wrote: > > > I did really like the suggestion of using the gel type super glue, but > > have to build up my courage to use super glue, as I have had pretty > > miserable experiences with the stuff. Never have used the gel type, > > however. I still like the glue that comes from a glue gun as it is > > easy to control, fastens dependably, and is dirt cheap. You can squirt > > o > >
