Fly Tying Shopping List?

[Not2Day]

Help a noob out
What all do I need to get started tying flies? Tools? Vise? Materials? Litterature?
What's your preference on vises? Rotary or fixed? How about brand? There are a lot of choices out there and I want to start out with a decent vise and tools so that I don't feel the need to upgrade everything in two weeks.
Where do you buy your supplies?

[Peter E.]

question is how much are you looking to spend?

[vakayakangler]

I am a noob myself, but the only thing I can tell you for certain, is rotary. Yup, get you a quality rotary or you will be buying another vise the first time you tie on someone else's rotary after tying on your fixed un....

[Not2Day]

question is how much are you looking to spend?

The wife is already mad at me so I guess the sky is the limit
Just kidding.

I guess I can set my initial budget at around $300 as long as a the wife unit doesn't get wind of it.

I am a noob myself, but the only thing I can tell you for certain, is rotary. Yup, get you a quality rotary or you will be buying another vise the first time you tie on someone else's rotary after tying on your fixed un....

That's what I was thinking.

[flyfisher]

The key things to spend your money on are the vice and scissors.

I used a book by skip morris called fly tying made easy that taught me al lteh basics. THe nice part about the book is that it teaches you flies and techniques that you build on with each fly. Most of the flies are related to trout but the concepts are the same for other types of flies as well.

http://www.amazon.com/Fly-Tying-Made-Clear-Simple/dp/1878175130

Another good book is production Fly tying. This book takes a different approach as it basically breaks down flies into three main parts, tail body and head/hackle area. This book is very good because it shows you how to tie flies in a more production environment meaning how you can tie multiple flies in one sitting. I know for me personally i trie and tie at least a half dozen of a given pattern in one sitting.

http://www.amazon.com/Production-Fly-Tying-Collection-Variations/dp/0871087928/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1336500631&sr=1-1

I will also echo that a rotary vice is the way to go. It makes it alot easier to tie patterns like a clouser or other patterns that have a distinct top and bottom to the fly.

Good luck and be sure to post up any questions as there are alot of great tyers on this site that can help out.

[Not2Day]

Any recommendations on a good rotary vice?

[vakayakangler]

Tina reallly loved her Atlas Rotary Vise. She had the Renzetti and a couple of the other top names, but the Atlas was the one she always used.

The thing I like about the rotary is that you can turn your flies and check different angles.

[FishyboY]

get a renzetti traveler, and it will last you a long time, i have used mine for 4+ years and tied commercially on it for 2 years. Have tied flies as small as 26 and as big as 10/0 on the regular jaws, the vice rocks for the money, there are definentally better vices, but for your price range this one fits the bill.

[Not2Day]

Thanks for everyones help thus far. I now have a new Vise and a used book on order.

What's next? Tools? Materials?

Should I go with a tool kit or buy individual tools?

I know I need some good scissors, but what else?

Any recommendations on materials to start out or should I just try to find what I need as I start tyiing?

[knobcreekman]

A tool kit is a good way to make sure you get everything. Most people start out with a kit and upgrade the components later. The first things most people upgrade are the scissors and the bobbin because the two of those account for 90% of your time at the vise. FWIW I'm still using the tools that came with my original kit... but i'm cheap

For materials, the best thing I can suggest is to find a few patterns that you want to tie in a few colors and then take those recipes and make a shopping list. I wouldn't go out and buy a bunch of stuff without knowing what you want to tie first. The main reason I would wait is because of quantity. Some fly tying supplies seem to last forever and others go way too fast (ARRGH! I just bought white hackle!?)