A tip for the tying bench III

A tip for the tying bench III

Viking Lars | Saturday, 24 October 2020

Last month I mentioned the Dalby Fly Tools "Glue Foot" in a front page. The "Glue Foot" is a precision machined magnetic foot that fits Zapa-A-Gap glue bottle (and probably more brands with similarly shaped bottles). Precision machining gives a tight fit and the stainless steel foot and magnetic bottom goes a very long way to help prevent tipping over your glue bottles.

This was a nice improvement to my own crude solution, where I hot-glued a magnet to the Zap-A-Gap-bottle, although that works too. But that simple solution is dependant on a vise with a magnetic base. And sometimes I tie with vises with C-clamps. The stainless steel Dalby Fly Tools Glue Foot solves that problem.

But when it comes down to it, I really don't use very much super glue in my fly tying, and when I do, it's mostly just instead of a whip finish (put super glue on an inch of thread and form the fly's head and you're done). Even for finishing heads, I actually prefer varnish. It penetrates deeper, gives a deeper "gloss" (and requires more applications, I know, I know) and it comes in different colours. If you need to secure a wing, say a wing of squirrel tail, which is very slippery, during the tying I also prefer varnish, because it does'nt dry glass-hard as superglue and the cut ends of the squirrel won't cut your thread.

So I was quite pleased when Jakob Dalby contacted me and let me know he had a "Varnish Foot" in the pipeline. It's basically the same as the Glue Foot, but it features an o-ring at the mouth of the opening. This grabs the glue bottle securely and I suppose it also allowes for small variations in the diameter of the bottles. I've had a Bennecchi varish bottle in mine as well as this one from The Fly Co., and both fit perfectly.

Billede 24.10.2020 11.02.49

So now both my superglue and varnish is secured on the table.

Have a great weekend!

Lars

Disclaimer: While I did pay for my Glue Foot, Dalby Fly Tools offered me a varnish foot for free, assuming I'd like it based on what I had to say about the Glue Foot here. There were no expectations of a mention here. I really do simply like the product.