Whip Basics. The Forum

Sorry I took so long to get pictures of this whip up. I've been running around like a chicken with its head cut off, six I wasn't really able to take them until now. Anyway, this is an 8 foot, two belly bullwhip finished in red, silver, and red camo. It has a double diamond plait handle, and standard Herringbone thong. The knots are a 4 pass 4x5 turks head on the heel, a 3 pass 4l3b turks head, some grapevine hitching, and ending in a 2 pass 3l4b turks head. I thought the black knots helped to set off the black that's found in the camo cord. Let me know what you think.

One of the things I wanted to do was to make this unique in the whips I've made. I talked to Tyler about using the grapevine hitching to accomplish that. I wanted to make sure he wouldn't be insulted by my using this on a whip, as it's part of the signature appearance of his whips. Luckily he said it wasn't a problem. I love the look it lends to his whips, and with this going to the actual firefighter who I helped raise money for, I wanted to add a little extra.

Nice whip Jesse. It looks very beefy.

It's not all that beefy actually. It looks very stocky because of the short handle. It's no thicker than any of my other whips.

How short is the handle?
Do you think the gaps in the French grapevine will widen with use?
The black sets off the red and white well.

I think he's going to love it because it's special just for him.

Ron

Nice job Jesse! The grapevine looks nice, though I do wonder about the gapping too XD nevertheless, the black contrasts very well against the white and red

Ron, it's actually an 8 inch handle but I did the middle turks head further down and ran the grapevine From there. I'm actually not sure what the grapevine will do. It pretty solid between the top two knots. The individual strands may actually relax a little bit. So, we'll see what happens.

Jesse that's super good if you to build this for the firefighter. It's a nice whip, it looks sharp! He's going to be pleased. Well done!

Thanks Rachel. I kind of designed this to mirror the colors of his station's trucks.

Nice looking whip Jesse, and from one fan of the grapevine to another, great job finishing it with the second TH

Thanks Matt. I actually used the end of the grapevine to tie that one.

this thing is neat. nice build, man! one of my favorite patterns, & where I would usually have my 4-plait in a quarters- pattern, it has a very classic red & white barber's pole which I like a lot. very appealing.
good work!

Thanks Jorden. I'm assuming you are speaking of the handle, yes? I do my handles as 16 plait, moving two strands at a time. I'm thinking of trying a couple other handle plaits. I ordered "How to Make Whips" which has some different patterns to learn. When it comes in, I may experiment with some of them around a mandrel.

no, I was actually referring to the the tip where the 4 plait & the barber's pole pattern is. I'm partial to barber's pole. I usually tend to avoid it & stick to the quartered pattern. but it looks really good with the red & white, like an actual barber's pole. I dig it.

Ah. That was totally unintentional.

That is really cool with the grapevine. I need to try it someday. The black definitely works well as a contrasting accent.

Thanks Craig. There's very small amounts of black in the camo cord I used, and it really helped to pull that in. I'm pretty happy with how this one came out.