How do you do the core?

[JMObi]

Mind if I ask some more questions, whipmakers? How does everyone make their core? I tried to roll some kip yesterday and ended up giving up. I now plan to plait a tiny little roohide whip, about 9mm thick at the thickest part, as a core for the first few feet of the whip. I find this core/belly 1 stage trickier than I thought it would be.

Also how do whipmakers prepare the end of the steel, at the transition? I am going to just use a steel rod sawn off square at the end, with the edges rounded over slightly with a file, and have the core loosely butt up against the steel, and then plait the first belly over it. I'm not going to use a wear leather. Is this OK or should I have the tip of the steel taper down, with a wear leather over the top of the steel? Any suggestions would be very helpful.

[Cracker]

I'll tell you what I do and by no means does this mean it's the best way. I use a heavy split veg tanned cowhide. 2mm thick. I grind the rod down so that the hide once tied around the ground down portion will equal the width of the rod. I wet the cowhide so it will roll around the ground portion of the rod and tie it on tight. While it's wet, I roll it. And when I say wet, I mean soaking so it is very pliable. It rolls into a nice taper (has to be cut into a taper). Then I bind the whole length of the core. The sinew holds the roll in place while it dries. It dries very stiff and straight.

[JMObi]

Thank you so much, Cracker. Already you have me thinking of how I could use cowhide here. I hadn't thought to do it that way but that sounds great. There must be multiple ways of doing this section of the whip.

Professionals, amateurs, I'm very interested to hear what people do, if you don't mind sharing the information.

[Canuck Digger]

Just wondering if you got my message about the core?
Cheers

[JMObi]

No, I haven't received anything. If you can give me some more tips I would be very grateful. I have temporarily shelved whipmaking activity until I think more on this core/transition design. A fairly critical point of construction in some ways.

Cheers,

Jon

[stealthboy]

I don't roll or twist my core. I use a kip hide that I cut in a triangle shape (long, skinny triangle) and then make a cut lengthwise so it turns into a double-core. This is attached with sinew to the handle spike which already has a piece of wear leather on it.

[bernie47]

http://www.em-brand-whips.com/bulltutorial.htm have a look at this,it should help you out.

[rjallen70]

I will second Bernie's tutorial...
It's aces.
Ron

[louiefoxx]

One thing I've learned about whipmaking is that pretty much everyone does the core a little bit differently. In my opinion you should try making the core using several different methods and see which you prefer.

I've made my cores a lot of different ways, and experimenting with little changes like paring the edges or not paring them...to bigger changes like using wear leather or not.

Experimenting has made me a better whipmaker because it helps me understand why I do the things that I do, instead of just doing them one way because someone told me to do it that way.

xoxo

Louie
http://bullwhips.org

[whippedguy]

Hello JMObi,

Here's a link to some pics of how I make my cores. This is what I use after some experimentation - For me, it seems to give me a consistent transition from spike to thong...

http://s205.photobucket.com/albums/bb30 ... ip%20core/

Thanks,
Whippedguy

[JMObi]

Thanks everybody! Your help is greatly appreciated. COW is brilliant with such kindly help from fellow members. I will let you all know how I get on...