Club Obi Wan

Hi guys!
How it looks like when is your whip break already? :
Thanks
Darth

Are you asking about "breaking in" a whip, as in getting it to move easily and roll out like an ocean wave when you crack it, or are you asking about damaging your whip?

No worries about your English. Your English is better than my German, Russian, Czech, or any other language spoken in Slovakia!

Let us know which you mean, and I'm sure SOMEONE here will have a great answer for you.

-Dan

Oh yeah,I mean breaking in whip,thanks for your correction Dan.

A good way to tell if a whip is well broken in is to hold it by the handle with the thong pointing straight at the ground and and wiggle your hand from side to side. A broken-in whip will have a considerable amount of play down toward the fall, and will move around alot with only a minimal amount of movement from your hand.

When a whip is first made, it us usually very stiff, and will not coil up tightly. When I first got my Strain, it was like a big leather hula hoop, and would coil no smaller than that. It was also not as easy to crack, (anything but a circus crack was difficult.) But just doing good circus cracks, and not overpowering them will break in a whip fairly quickly. Which leads me to my next point:

The ONLY effective way to get a whip to break in without actually damaging the whip is to crack it. Do not try to stretch it, coil it tighter than it wants to go, or use any solvents or oils on the whip, (other than a leather conditioner like Fiebing or Pecards.) Doing this MAY make the whip seem like it is breaking in well, and doing what you want it to do, but you're damaging the whip. Doing this will shorten the life of the whip.

A way that I have found to get a whip to loosen up quickly when it's VERY new is by doing volley cracks, (the "windshield wiper" crack that our friends Canasta and Adam Winrich used to break to world record for most number of cracks in one minute.)

I DO NOT recommend doing thisexcessively, however, as volleys tend to break down the stiffness in the transitition point above the handle. I think most whip makers and crackers will tell you to avoid this. I should point out that I don't do this very often.

Another good test for if your whip is breaking in WELL, (and also to demonstrate that the whipmaker is really good,) is to coil the whip into two or three loose coils, (two will do for a 6 foot whip,) hold it up in the air with the knot at the end of the handle pointing straight up, and the coils away from you. Let go of the coils and watch how it unrolls. If it's straight and smooth, and gets faster as it rolls out, then two things:

#1 The whip is breaking in as it should

#2 You've got a great whip!

This is a trick I learned from Paul "Midwestwhips" Nolan, and something I try on every whip I pick up anymore, (incidentally Paul, that 8 footer you made for Peter Kramer? It's AWESOME! Barbara loves it!)

Hope that actually answered your questions Darth.

All the best!

-Dan

Thank you for yours great answer Dan!
Darth