Those are great ideas ! Would a round hollow plastic coffee stirrer do the job? Lots of those around !!! Doyle
----- Original Message ----- From: "Wes Wada" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, February 15, 2003 7:50 PM Subject: Re: [VFB] Handling plastic eyes > Greetings from Oregon, > > I have just finished adding plastic eyes to all my body fur minnows for > Brad Robinson's upcoming Minnow Swap. Gathering up all the suggestions > from this thread: Tony, DonO, Richard Z, Tom P, Jerry G, Joel, Chris > R, Thomas, KRDancingfish, and John R ---thank you all-- I tried what > turned out to be a really successful solution to my problem. > > Here it is: I am attempting to glue solid half-dome plastic eyes (that > have a worthless stick-on backing) onto a pattern that uses trimmed > Saap Body Fur for the body and head of the fly. > > I purchased some low-tack adhesive putty from the office supply store. > It was $1.39 for about a 20-year supply. *g* I also had on hand some > plastic tubes similar in diameter to a plastic Q-Tip tube, except about > twice as long. The extra length comes in handy. > > Roll a BB-sized ball of adhesive putty around in your fingers until it > is warm, sticky, and ball-shaped. The more you use the putty, the > better it works. Stick the ball of putty onto the end of the plastic > tube. > > Grab a plastic eye off the adhesive backing, and holding it by the > edges, press and lightly twist the face of the eye into the putty on > the tube. > > At this point, if you would rather use super glue gel as Tony Spezio > and Don Ordes like, go for it. I had a glue gun on hand and wanted to > try working with that tool. Turns out, it worked beautifully. > > You want to lightly squeeze out a bead of glue from the gun, then wipe > the nozzle clean. A very small pinpoint of glue will appear in the > nozzle opening. Just dab that onto the flat side of the plastic eye > until the back is covered, then quickly move the glue gun away from the > eye. Sometimes a small thread of glue will string out from the eye to > the glue gun. Because of its small diameter, it solidifies almost > immediately, and you can just pop it free from the plastic eye. > > You then have about 30 seconds to place the eye onto your fly. These > is where it's really neat. You hold the plastic tube like a pencil > with the glued eye on the business end, and literally 'stamp' the eye > onto the fly. Because the tube is narrow and you can see the eye > fully, it's easy to be very accurate with the placement. When you get > the eye where you want it, just twist the tube, and the eye breaks away > cleanly from the putty. > > Once I got going, I was able to glue an eye about every minute and a > half. The glue sets quickly and solidly and there is no need for > clamps. Best of all, the glue from the glue gun just doesn't get on > your fingers. I put eyes on 20 flies, and not one had a haze on the eye > surfaces that resulted from glue. > > Your suggestions pointed to something that worked for me. Thanks again. > > Wes Wada > > "out of my mind, back in five minutes" > >
