What to Do with Tartan Flashes?

**BEAS** · 21st March 09, 07:57 PM

" Steve McCroskey: Johnny, what can you make out of this?
[Hands him the weather briefing] or in this case flashes
Johnny: This? Why, I can make a hat or a brooch or a pterodactyl

one great scene from Airplane

**DWFII** · 21st March 09, 08:21 PM

I believe (haven't tried it) that you could make a bonnet flash for your TOS.

**Bugbear** · 21st March 09, 08:28 PM

Originally Posted by DWFII

I believe (haven't tried it) that you could make a bonnet flash for your TOS.

I'll have to look into that, thanks.

Today, I was givin a Zuni sterling silver bear paw done in their overlay style. It's not really big enough on it's own to make a cap badge, but placed on something else it might work out well.

Perhaps a piece of a flash. It is a one inch by half inch pin.

**Colonel MacNeal** · 21st March 09, 11:05 PM

Give them to the ladies as a memento.

**DWFII** · 22nd March 09, 05:40 AM

Originally Posted by Ted Crocker

I'll have to look into that, thanks.

Today, I was givin a Zuni sterling silver bear paw done in their overlay style. It's not really big enough on it's own to make a cap badge, but placed on something else it might work out well.

Perhaps a piece of a flash. It is a one inch by half inch pin.

Ted,

My WPG TOS has a bonnet flash made to the specs that I got from several sources, generous folks at XMTS among them...it is 2-1/2' x 2-3/4", single layer, and has a bit of fringe (1/8" ?) around all four sides. No complicated sewing involved, at all

The flashes that came with my kilt are made of tartan fabric roughly 4" wide, folded and seamed, and 6-1/2" long (not including the "points."

So theirs plenty of fabric to make a bonnet flash...in fact, if I'm figurin' it right, there's enough for 8 bonnet flashes in a pair of hose flashes.

I mounted my jump wings and a metal pin version of my old unit patch on the bonnet flash, and left one side of the flash (the side to the rear) a little open to accommodate a sprig...looks good to my eyes.

**Bugbear** · 22nd March 09, 05:54 AM

Thanks, DWFII. I will take down those measurements. It sounds like a good idea.

**DWFII** · 22nd March 09, 05:56 AM

PS...I've often wondered whether there might be enough fabric in a single flash to replace a kilt buckle strap. Or...if one was very lucky...match the underlying tartan if, and when, a feller needed to move a kilt buckle.

**Bugbear** · 22nd March 09, 06:08 AM

I think there might be... Although, that is a very good reason to ask that the kiltmaker send all the leftover scraps with the kilt. I had forgotten that some kiltmakers include a set of tartan flashes with the kilt.

Also, being that I do not wear a kilt often, I guess I could use a tartan flash and pin on a jacket lapel or even as a hat pin.

**ChattanCat** · 22nd March 09, 06:14 AM

You can always use the flash to cover a hole in yer kilt.

**Bugbear** · 22nd March 09, 06:21 AM

Originally Posted by ChattanCat

You can always use the flash to cover a hole in yer kilt.

True, and yet another reason for the kiltmaker to include the scraps.

Infact, I noticed a yarn on the fringed edge of my kilt that had not been completely removed during fringing, so I saved it. You never know when you might need to patch a small hole or something.