Executive summary:
* Extremely attractive, low cost
* Cracks sufficiently, appears robust
* Extremely dry material
* Insufficiently weighted handle, poor balance
Photos:
Details:
I ordered the whip on Wednesday and it was shipped promptly, arriving Friday via UPS as promised. Included with the whip was a small container of Pecard's, and the whip was bound with a small strip of leather.
The cowhide of the whip was extremely thin and dry; I say this in comparison to my other leather whip (a beefy Western Stage Props 7.5' cowhide by Del Carpio) and whips of my friends (Grizzly, Andrew Conway and Darren Henry) which admittedly are all nice 'roo whips from a variety of notable manufacturers (Strain, Murphy, Del Carpio, etc). Any handling of the whip produced a "creaking" sound as the dry plaits and bellies rubbed against each other. You can get a sense of the dryness from the photos, looking for example at the inside of the wrist loop. After taking the photos, I immediately rubbed about half of the jar of Pecard's in, which it eagerly absorbed. The fall is very thick white cowhide - much thicker in every dimension than the replacement falls I've purchased from David Morgan. The popper is heavy nylon, with a robust knot.
The whip is extremely light, again in comparison to my beefy cowhide WSP/DC whip, but also my 7' nylon by Rhett Kelley and 9' by COW's Dangerman009. The handle, I hate to say it, feels like paper wrapped around styrofoam. It is quite rigid, but feels entirely insubstantial. I fully admit to using and favoring heavy whips, which biases my opinion. However, my friend Grizzly has an 8' 'roohide by (I believe) Joe Strain which has what feels like like a hollow fiberglass handle; while that whip has a totally different balance than I'm used to, the whip itself has some weight and heft so once you get used to the balance point being far past the handle it throws nicely. The Todd's continues the light feel down the while length of the whip, so it never feels like there's mass there to pick up the inertia you want to impart. Fortunately, the whip has a definite taper (both in diameter and mass), and is not particularly stiff, so it does roll out beautifully.
Which leads to throwing and cracking. It cracks acceptably with the basics: underhand flick, cattleman's crack, forward flick, left and right sideways flicks, overhead and reverse overhead cracks. However, apart from the forward flick, it requires more effort than a heavier whip. On a great whip, the whip does the work; on this whip, you're doing the work. Again, I'm somewhat biased - I'm used to my shorter whips. But in comparison to Andrew's 10' 'roo whips where a sideways flick (into a wrap) is effortless, you need to "mean it" with this whip. Combinations don't come naturally, since the whip doesn't "flow" from one movement to the next. (It is longer than any of my other whips, so YMMV.)
Visually, however, the whip is gorgeous. It's a natural hide, and has started to darken already. If you gently pry apart some of the plaits you can see the underlying material is still pink. The connection with the fall seems a bit over-done; I don't know if this is SA or due to the thinness of the material or thickness of the fall or what, but it makes the fall connection quite a lump in the overall taper of the whip compared with my other whips. No kinks in the whip, no obvious imperfections that I could discern. It coils nicely, and has a very slight natural curve. Loose, but not a limp noodle - it feels "broken in" already, but not "broken".
How would I improve the whip? Well, I'm not a whip maker. And this is a whip designed primarily for show as part of a costume, *not* heavy use, so it needs to strike the balance between cost, appearance, and functionality. All of my suggestions would increase the time or materials used in the whip, which are probably impractical given the market. Those caveats aside: far more use of "product" (soap/leather conditioner/grease) during construction (to add mass and bond the layers); heftier handle; more weight down the length of the thong. For the latter, I'd follow the tricks of the nylon whip-makers and include a braided metal core or chain of BBs. I would also be interested in trying it out with a thinner fall, to improve the taper profile of the whip. - the base of the fall is pretty thick. I completely understand the need for a thick fall is a must for a costume whip that's going to get beaten against the ground by novice crackers.
I purchased the whip to get a 10' in my collection and since the price was low enough to try it out and write this review. Am I satisfied? Well... honestly, I really should have saved my pennies for a 9' Del Carpio, but this reinforced the importance of getting the right tool for the job. I now have a 10' that can crack, but I probably won't be asking for volunteers to get wrapped with it since the effort required to get a good crack out of the whip will mean it's not a precision instrument. I hope to get together with Darren W Henry at some point soon and get his opinion as well, and A/B compare it with a DM or DC Raiders whip.
If I ever have the opportunity to get on stage to show or teach I will, however, definitely get this whip out to show how the roll propagates down the length of the whip. At this point, my arsenal is: 7' nylon Kelley for teaching, 7.5' cowhide WSP/DC for routines, 9' nylon Dangerman009 for soggy adventures, and now the 10' cowhide Todd's for physics lessons. If I was doing Indy cosplay, this is I'd put this whip on my belt; but if I "got served", it wouldn't be the tool I'd reach for.
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