Waterproof markers

[falcon53]

Who makes waterproof markers. I tied some flies with a craft fur tail and marked them with both Sharpies and a Artwin marker. Marker marks by both these makers washed out. I see tying videos where Sharpies are used .... but they don't seem to work and wash away under water.

Thanks
Ken

 

[karstopo]

I’ve experienced the same thing with markers and craft fur. I will take the faded out flies and just mark them again or just fish them unmarked.

 

[falcon53]

I tested the flies by putting them under the sink faucet. They washed out almost instantly so they will wash out on the first cast. Maybe its the compatibility with the synthetic craft fur that is the problem. Are markers explicitly labeled waterproof as I have ordinary Sharpies (no mention of waterproof)? Do Pantone markers work better? The patterns call for marker striping. There has to be a solution.

Thanks

 

[karstopo]

Craft fur borski sliders with black and a couple of different chartreuse shades, marked as I tied them. .

For example, the fly below I fished for some time and it caught several fish. The sharpie , just a regular sharpie, marks are somewhat faded, but still evident.

Above is a pile of heavily fished borski sliders. The marks are all but faded away, but so has a lot of the deer hair been cut by fish. I ended up rehabbing most of these well worn flies and putting fresh marks on them. They still are mostly being fished.

The above is a well fished Steve Farrar Blend crack fly. The marks are all but gone.

I have used sharpies, crayola (not crayons), magic, and some other brand I can’t remember, but none have washed out instantly. I do let them dry for a period of time, often hours or days, before immersion into water. What happens is that the marks on the tails tend to fade after many casts into the water and contact with fish. I’ve never gone from tying a fly, marking a tail, then almost immediately putting the fly into water. Maybe you might let the color set for longer, then test under water.

I’m using these markers on craft fur like Rainy’s, Hareline, and craft store type. All those takes color better and holds the color longer than Steve Farrar Blend fiber. I’m usually use black colored markers, but have also used chartreuse, metallic bronze, gold and silver.

 

[falcon53]

Thanks Karstopo... your flies are nice! The flies I tied dried about a day or two. I started looking at the two brands of craft fur I have been using. The Hareline washed out instantly under the faucet. The Wapsi brand was relatively better. The Wapsi craft fur is not as long as the Hareline (at least the package I have) so I may not be able to tie longer flies. I could go to natural fur (Coyote etc) however I like the translucency of craft fur.

 

[flytire]

not so permanent are those so called permanent markers

 

[photoguy]

Interesting to read this as I just ran into a similar situation 2 days ago. I wanted to tie up some smelt streamers for use on the salmon that have bubbled over into the Swift. Sat down the night before and realized that I didn't have any gray craft fur for tops of the streamer I tie, so I grabbed a silver sharpie and went at coloring the top of an otherwise white streamer. Fished it yesterday and while it did fade over time, it was still showing some gray color at the end of the day.

 

[bill_s]

Different materials will better accept an ink based "sharpie"; it will adhere better to a more porous material such as PP or PE (or animal fur) compared to a nonporous material such as acrylic.

There are oil based "sharpies" which I believe would be more permanent on a nonporous material such as acrylic. I have not tried these, but they should be more permanent on a nonporous material such as acrylic.

Oil Based Paint | Sharpie

Many dyes and pigments are not color stable when exposed to light. They can fade within less then a few hundred hours of exposure. Both sunlight and indoor light can fade a dye or pigment (sunlight much quicker, but artificial light can also cause fading).

You might not believe your fly is exposed to a few hundred hours of light, but consider that a fly placed in a clear box is being exposed even while not being fished. So, those flies sitting in a clear box on your desk for a few months, can lose much of the color chroma or hue. Exposure to light should not change adherence, but will fade the color thus making it appear to be less permanent.

Red and yellow colors are most easily faded by light exposure.

Any color containing a fluorescent dye or pigment, will lose chroma and hue after less then 100 hours of exposure to sunlight or artificial light.

Try the oil based "sharpies" and let us know if they are an improvement.

Cheers

 

[falcon53]

There are oil based "sharpies" which I believe would be more permanent on a nonporous material such as acrylic. I have not tried these, but they should be more permanent on a nonporous material such as acrylic.

Yesterday I purchased 2 oil based markers in both brown and black. 3.99 each

Bill, I just marked a piece of tan craft fur with black or brown markers. I used oil based Sharpie (3.99 each), Prisma Color (5.99 each not cheap come in many colors and shades), regular Sharpie (9.99 for 12 marker kit) and a Artwin marker. I washed the craft fur under a faucet. All except the Artwin marker held up good. The oil based Sharpie retained color just a little better than the regular Sharpie and the Prisma Color marker. The oil based markings may hold up longer ... time will tell. My original problem was most likely caused by use of a old Sharpie and the Artwin marker or that particular piece of Craft Fur had something on it ... don't really know. The Artwin marker is not very good for this task.

I consulted Drew Chicone's book "Feather Brain" 2013 and he uses regular Sharpies and Pantone markers to mark his flies. The Pantone markers come in many colors and shades of colors (ex four shades of grey). He uses these when he wants a certain color not offered with a Sharpie.

 

[JDR]

You might want to look at waterproof paint markers. Uline makes 5 different paint markers for different applications and they cost about the same as regular markers.

 

[dennyk]

I have not had good results with Sharpies both standard and the Neon with Hairline craft fur at all. The same problem with wash out. Every non synthetic material, they do a good job.

Denny

 

[wthorpe]

Three thoughts on this:
1. as i read the thread a paint product was occurring to me as well as to the preceding poster. Dunno how it might look and act when applied -- might be a bit thick and cakey?
2. "Permanent" as used by Sharpie and competitors likely means something like the following: If you get this on your new white/light blue dress shirt, it will never, never come out. If you use it on something you throw in the water a thousand times +/- ....AND allow toothy critters to chew on it, well fuhgedaboutit.
3. I have used Sharpies to mark up flies for one reason or another, and the marking seems to usually outlast the fly. But then i mostly tie smallish trout flies and dont tie them all that well either. I do keep a few basic colors handy to fly tying stuff and to the fishing pack.