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need some help setting wings

2K views 8 replies 7 participants last post by  flytyer 
#1 ·
so i am trying my first married wings (using goose shoulder)
I think my close wing is doing OK... but its the far that messes up
(i know the flies aren't perfect, just looking at the wing)

looks OK from here


but you can see the issues with the far side



#2 was more of the same


looking at the black... maybe i build the wings upside down?
on the near, i do 2 gathering wraps and then pull tight... everything looks good (i think). Then on then far side it doesn't want to work right.

Feedback?
thoughts?
 
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#2 ·
Wish i could give you some advice but my wings are doing the same thing, married or not. I got so aggregated that I've gone back to hairwings for awhile.

I love where these flies are going. Especially the blue/white one. They're nice and slim too so they'll get down.
 
#4 ·
rocky

i am trying to do tented
while not perfect... i have been able to do bronze mallard that I am happy with, but these first 2 goose are not what i had hoped for. I realize that the blue and white almost has the look of a Dee (something that i was not intending to do)


thanks
 
#5 ·
your issue is very common and i believe comes from the fact that you are using a method to set an upright wing on a tented style tie. in an upright wing the fibers are compressed down on themselves vertically. the method you describe- two loose turns then tighten, is more for upright wings IMO. in a tented wing the fibers are compressed vertically somewhat and also compressed against the hook in a more horizontal fashion. when tying tented wings i always do them one at a time starting with the far side. when doing an upright wing it is tied in with both sides together.

this is hard to explain but the difference is critical. the tented style is more difficult to set than a flat Dee wing or an upright wing, i feel, it involves compression in two directions. doing each wing separately with any tented, Dee or BM wing is the way to go for me.

commence with the other six thousand methods...:chuckle:
 
#6 ·
BF

thanks... makes sense
i have trouble applying the pressure around the hook rather than the vertical... the goose wants to come apart (a problem that is sovled with bronze mallard by leaving on the stem... like with your purple schlappen SBS)
I know its all practice and feel
I also noticed that i was mounting the wing onto the hook rather than onto material... this gives me less surface area and caused the wing to wrap past the center of the eye... but this also may have to do with my overall fly, rather than my winging tech
 
#8 ·
I stay away from trying to tent wing with goose or turkey. Especially if you are looking for the tented wings to meet in the middle and maintain a centerline over the top of the fly.

To me it's like using schlappen for dry fly hackle. Materials will only do so much and they don't always work how we would like them to. After a while it becomes an exercise in frustration and it sucks after you realize how much good material you've gone through.

With the wing materials used for the flies in your photos (which are well tied by the way) I would stick with upright wings like strip wing/married wing or tie them dee style..vertical or flat.

Frank
 
#9 ·
As Black Francis already said, you are trying to tie tentedd wings with a verticle wing mounting method. This will almost certainly always produce the results you have been getting. Tying tented wings requires that the base of each wing side is a off from the center of the hook while the top of the wing side is in the center of the hook. This is not easy to do because you are doing 2 things that seem to be in opposition to each other (compressing vertically and a bit horizontally) and takes practice, afterwhich it becomes easy. It is also not easy to describe how to do it. Black Francis's description is a good one for one method of doing a tented quill wing.

Here is another.

1) Place the far wing onto the hook with the bottom of the wing spaded out a bit from the center of the hook , but don't tie it in.

2) Place the near wing onto the hook with the bottom spaced out a bit from the center of the hook, making sure that the top of each wing is right in the center of the hook.

3) Hold the wings in place with your thumb and forefinger and make a single loop of thread between your finger and thumb.

4) Wrap the thread completely around the hook and up over it to start a second wrap, but stop when you get to the far side (i.e. only go over the top on the second wrap, in effect, you are making a quarter wrap of thread), while holding on to the wing with your left thumb and forefinger.

5) Pull the thread wrap tight by pulling it directly away from you with the bobbin tube end pointing directly at your body (DON'T TAKE YOUR THUMB AND FOREFINGER OFF THE WING AS YOU DO THIS).

6) While continuing to hold on to the wings with your left thumb and forefinger, use your right thumbnail and forefingernail to move/adjust the wing right at the tie-in point so that it stays tented and the top is perfectly centered over the hook. (AGAIN, DON'T TAKE YOUR THUMB AND FOREFINGER OFF THE WING AS YOU DO THIS, or the wing will distort).

7) Repeat steps 3-6.

8) Repeat steps 3-6 another time.

9) Make sure the wing is sitting properly and then take 3 or 4 tight turns of thread forward tight against each other toward the hook eye. (KEEP YOUR THUMB AND FOREFINGER HOLDING THE WING AS YOU DO THIS). The wing butts will be spread out a bit toward the sides of the eye, this is needed to keep them tented.

10) HOLD ONTO THE WING WITH YOUR THUMB AND FOREFINGER and carefully in stages cut the wing butts off close to the tie-in thread without cutting the thread.

11) Continue holding the wings with your thumb and forefinger after the wing butts are cut off, put a drop of head cement on the wing butts, and wrap flattened thread over the end of the butts.

12) The wings are finished and you can whip finish the fly.
 
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