mccuistion

How to make a Bullwhip: #5

My fourth whip showed me how to make a nice whip. My 5th bullwhip is going to be an 8-foot cow 24 plait bullwhip with fancy plaited handle.

I started with some leftover leather from whip 4 and a new piece I purchased

I used an 8-feet piece of thick lace from my third whip and a thinner piece from my 4th whip. Starting at 4 feet, I trimmed the 8 foot lace thinner and thinner. I soaked them and twisted them together.

I attached the core to the 1-foot metal rod handle with some 3-oz leather bolster, and tied it on with some inner strand paracord string. The Handle plus the Core are 7 feet 5 inches long.

I dyed one of the leather pieces black and made lace out of both pieces.

Lace used for the Inner Layer:

Black Lace

133"
120"
118"
99"
90"
50"

Tan Lace

123"
102"
101"
90"
65"
39"

Since I cut this lace thinner than the lace for Whip 4, I decided to do the inner layer as a 12-plait. I attached the lace and started checkerboard plaiting.

Continue inner layer; plaiting the handle and the body. Note that the pattern is not curving as much as the previous whip. I must be getter better!

Cut and attach the second bolster

Attach the 24 laces and start plaiting. I'm glad I had 4 previous whips to practice on, otherwise this would be an exercise in futility. The added bolster made the whip diameter 2.1 cms, which is not quite wide enough for 24 laces.

I wanted to add my initials to the handle of this 24-plait whip. So here's the drawing I used to design the handle.

All the little marks all over and inside the diagram are me trying to keep myself from getting completely confused as I plaited the laces.

Fancy plait the handle. Added my initials. Do not attempt this at home. Or anywhere else. Fancy plaiting is really difficult.

24 laces means 12 laces showing (since you double over each lace). That means each half of the whip will see 6 laces. That means you can effectively use 5 laces for lettering.
(I'm an Applied Math major from UC Berkeley, so I'm authorized to perform those calculations)

Continue plaiting the overlay

A close-up shot of the overlay plait

Attach the Transition knot and the Heel knot

Close-up of the Heel knot

The finished product: 8 foot Bullwhip, 24 plait

Close-up of the handle with plaited letters, Pineapple knot Type 3 4 pass (with just three of the four passes) for the Heel knot, and an 8x5 Turks knot doubled as the transition knot

This bullwhip really cracks nicely. The bolster, going almost 75% of the whip, makes it flow like butter. I need to figure out how to have the bolster cover the entire length of the whip. It probably involves skiving.

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