I'm no expert brush maker or anything. But, I used to tie a lot of flies for fly fishing. And, I think that if I could find a good pelt of badger, I'd like to try my hand at creating my own brush from scratch: handle, knot, and all. Anybody else tried this recently and have some words of wisdom before I drop the cash on the pelt to make the knot? Making a handle is a pretty straight forward process; making it look nice is more complicated. So, that isn't really a big deal. But, packing the hair right requires a bit more technical care. I assume that it would be a process of stripping the hair from the pelt, reverse stacking the hair with the tips of the hair down, tying it off, shaping the bottom of the stack, carefully restacking the hair right side up, securing it with galvanized wire, then drenching the whole butt in epoxy. Does this sound right? Any words of wisdom or advice?
Make your own knot
- Thread starter ampersand2006
- Start date
If you've got an idea maybe you could start trying to make a boar one out of paint brush bristles? It'd be cheap and you could see if your theory works?
If you try it please keep us posted, it'd be very neat to see a completely from scratch brush!
If you try it please keep us posted, it'd be very neat to see a completely from scratch brush!
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- Thread starter
- #3
That's a great idea. You got it, brosefus. 
Just in case you didn't know, boar bristles are called "China Bristles" when they are used on paintbrushes.
No comment on the knot but thumbs up for tying flies!!! THE ONLY WAY TO GO!
I believe they stack the hair tips down in a concave mold to get the bulb shape, tie the base, then trim it off. I think I saw a vid of it somewhere. But it might have been a dream.
You can find a video on YouTube from the Semogue factory, it might have something like that in there (been a while, so I don't remember).
