diemai

@ Nessmuk Oak and maple are somewhat too dense and heavy even for larger crankbaits , I guess, ......also hardwoods are a pain in the butt to work on , ......probably someone else might chime in to advise you better than I can , as our propably most popular crankbait-making timber here in Europe seems to be barely available in the US , ......at least I had figured out in a TU thread about such abachewood a good while ago , ...also I might not use that abachewood for oversized musky lures , as it might get a little too buoyant for larger lures ,...at least if their shape would be quite voluminous . Years ago I had made some 6" to 7" lipped lures out of teakwood kitchen boards , got those very cheap from fleamarkets , but often these boards are wharped and require planing over prior to cutting out a blank , ....quite durable and water-resistant timber , but a tad too heavy for my liking as well , .....at least for crankbaits , since weighting options are a bit limited , ........but just perfect for sinking glidebaits . Greetz , Dieter

@ Nessmuk As said before ,being located in Europe I'm not familiar to musky ,...but a good and simple lure model for you to start out with might be the good old "GrandMa"(templates available in one of my links above) . The lure has a good reputation and is of a simple , flat shape , ......it's casting performance is quite poor , as the anti-aerodynamic shape with the flat sides and protruding bill take their toll , but for trolling it should be just fine . As far as wood choice , ...the timber material should be picked after the size of the lure , .....the bigger a lure , the lest buoyant the material , ...f. e. making an 8" bait out of balsa would require heaps of ballast to the lure , possibly killing most of it's action(unless a certain share of ballast is placed in the back) , ..vice versa a small 4" lure made of heavy hardwood like maple or beech might sink like a brick due to it's hardware alone , no room for added ballast anymore . But IMO the weighting is not the hardest part , but the sealing is , .....in particular for pike and musky lures ! Good luck , diemai PS : If you'd have to look after your budget , you might as well check out Ebay for used lures , especially on American Ebay there are heaps and heaps of all kinds of lures listed , and especially when not hunting for the "latest craze" lures , ....or lures , that grew reputations through the decades , you might be in for some good bargains,......homemade lures are not neccessarely cheaper , ...at least not , if you're staring from zero and need to purchase all materials and tool gear required .

......and if I may add to Mark's coloration suggestions , ......natural colors are a must , there should always be a natural perch, AND a shad design accessible over here , depending on the pike freeding habits in particular waters , as perch and/or roach are the most common species , so do make up for the biggest share of pike's prey , ...but most likely one of these would always be more productive than the other in different swims . But if you've got stocked trout like in many of our heavily pressured fishing club ponds and lakes , sucha pattern is worthwile giving a go as well , ...but it's not easy to fool a pike in these waters , as the fish there have already seen so many lures . As due to environmental influences many of our waters over here have become clearer through past years , lurefishing has just not become easier ,......I often trust on rather unflashy color designs like copper or different brown shades , in particular in sunny weather . But if I should find after some time , that all of the previously described colors do not produce any pike on a given day , I would put my bet on vibrant colored lures like a firetiger or fireperch design(yellow belly , red/orange flanks and back plus dark perch stripes) , ...even in clearer water , .......this has often saved my day on various occassions , ......pike may not be hungry or generally feel reluctant to chase after prey for some reason , or even are suspicious about artificial baits , ....but lures in such bright , really unnatural color designs passing them by obviously do pinch their eye and they just can't help it to have their built-in bite reflex triggered by such "annoying" colors , ......they're not hungry , but still they just have to get rid of this nasty looking thing in their vicinity ! Greetz , Dieter

@ DaleSW Can't tell about musky baits, as we don't have'em over here in Europe , but our average bigger hardbaits for pike range in about 6" to 8"(15cms to 20cms) , though there are a few bigger ones around still , ........but average anglers barely throw these , there are even only few rods available to handle them . But anyway , ....if you want to resemble a perch as main prey in mentioned waters , I'd also suggest to make the entire lure shape like a perch , .....check out this one as a sample : http://www.ebay.de/itm/Balzer-Colonel-Gold-Natural-Power-Wobbler-Monsterbarsch-110-g-/161219858013?hash=item258973ce5d:g:lh8AAOxy4dNS9SzR This lure is 18cms(7") in length and weights 110 grams , runs at about 13feet ,........put out by the German tackle company "Balzer" , but discontinued by now , ..there also was a deep runner version with a bigger lip going down to 30 feet . Not 100% sure , but I think , that I have one shallow running "Monster Perch" laying around somewhere , ....if so , I could provide some pics and accurate measurements , if you wish ,......as from Monday on , since I'm working weekend shifts right now . Other European pike lures holding an excellent reputation are the "Rapala Super Shad Rap" and the "Turus Ukko" ,...both Finnish made . The "Super Shad Rap" is 14cms in length , whereas the "Turus Ukko" was available in lengths of up to 40cms(16"). http://www.ebay.de/itm/Rapala-Wobbler-Super-Shad-Rap-14cm-SSR-14-P-Perch-neu-/251996858651?hash=item3aac2ee91b:m:mc6nxb7MfyeM0ppvnLcbcRA http://www.ebay.de/itm/orig-TURUS-UKKO-8-Stuck-aus-der-1-finnischen-Serie-von-1993-bis-2003-/181939232466?hash=item2a5c6c5ed2:g:2l0AAOSwo6lWKjR0 There are templates of both lures to be found in here : http://wobblerbaujw.jimdo.com/schablonen/wobbler/#Wobbler I remember to have seen bigger , US custom-made versions of the "Super Shad Rap" , but I just can't remember the site , ..these were at least 8" in length ,..maybe even quite a bit larger ? If you should have further questions , just call back in , .......greetings , Dieter PS : I am in no way involved into these Ebay listings , solely using them as picture samples for the mentioned lure models .

@ Vodkaman Dave , absolutely the same over here,.......we also have that religious "harvest festival" held during church events and services , it's called "Erntedankfest" . But most likely only people, that are frequent church visitors anyway , are aware of that event ,...... otherwise it is rather unregarded by the wider population ,......on the other hand the best protection against commercializing ! And otherwise I could absolutely second to your post , ...I reckon , that one could switch "UK" in your post for names of a few other European countries without making any differences in the text's contents and sense . Greetings , Dieter

Just came across , ......and if I may chime in from across the Great Pond ,......not until last Wednesday or Thursday I had ever heard of Black Friday , ..but then there was an article on a local news site saying as much that sales are expected to increase for so and so many percent on Black Friday , ....off course refering to Germany !!! I mean , ....we do not celebrate Thanksgiving over here , as it is a genuine and pure American tradition , .....every country and every people have their own traditions , bank holidays and celebrations , and that's absolutely fine by me , ....but why the heck do we need a Black Friday over here as well ? And in fact,....it accidentally happened to be , that the missus felt like strolling a Hamburg shopping mall with me(she's never heard of Black Friday before as well) that particular Friday,...and as my eye was sharpened by the news site article , indeed I saw some advert signs there pointing out Black Friday sales ! It's just about pulling extra bucks out of our wallets , not more and not less ! Maybe in future local politicians stuck to the payrolls of commerce and economony would work on establishing Thanksgiving over here as well , as they had already managed to do with Halloween , also a genuine and pure American tradition(as far as I know , established by Irish immigrants). Just 25 years ago , not many people over here were familiar to Halloween , nowadays by early October every local supermaket does sell Halloween accessories of any kind , and also countless other local businesses and branches are jumping on that wagon ! I aggree to Bob's initial post , .......such national traditions should be kept well in terms of their REAL purpose and not fall victim to commerce entirely ,......and , ...in my own opinion , ....not taken to places , where they don't belong to ,.......just for business !!! Just my ,.....couldn't help it , .......best greetings , Dieter

@Vodkaman I'm kinda fascinated about their shape , too , .....don't now why , is it the streamlined shape or the beauty of simplicity ? But in my opinions bare of any certain knowledge in physics I have to disagree to your stated cause , why such lures sporting a deflector plane on their diving vane have a more pronounced action . I believe , that the reason for more wobbling action is , that with a deflector plane the tow eye can be placed further upward the diving plane , thus more leverage around the tow eye is generated . As I've stated in my post above , a lure with a line tie placed higher , would normally tend to overturn and blow out , .........BUT this deflector plane counterworks , because as the lure starts to roll over , the respectively upward pointing sharp corners of the diving plane transisting into the deflector plane are increasingly shouldering into the oncoming water current forcing the lure to roll back towards vertical swimming level(and then roll over to the opposite side and repeat vice versa to make up for the wobble) . This is my own explanation about the purpose of such deflecting planes , .....in a nutshell ,.......they simply allow for a higher placement of the tow eye to get a bigger(longer) lip plane ahead of the tow eye without blow-out ! Picked some pictures and videos to display such lure models mentioned in this post : http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/2655-curiosity/ Here the lower lure : http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/2654-curiosity/ A video displaying a typical so-called "Bottlehead Plug" , in some short sequences the typical diving plane can be seen : And finally a picture of a diving lure sporting a "Pikie" or "Z"-lip ,.....note the long , forward pointing lower lip portion providing a fairly strong wiggle and a 10 feet dive , ...lure is trimmed to rise at a tad more than 1 foot per second . Same thing about "Pikie" or also called "Z" lips , ...these also have this deflector plane allowing for a fairly long and even forward pointing lower lip portion up to just a few degrees off the lure'scenter axis . Greetings , Dieter

Hi , Dave and David , Blanks are still warm from sanding , .....here are the pics , that I had promised , ...two "Rush Tango" knock-offs made after the measurements(or better said , measurement relations)taken from genuine vintage "Rush Tangos" ,.......my versions are 130mm and 143mm in over all length respectively. Made detail shots of the line tie wire form and their fittings , made by drilling three holes 1,5mm dia. in line and then extended to a slot with a 1,5mm dia. router bit . Certainly it is not neccessary to drill the holes , that hold the wire form's backward bent tag ends , all the way back through the lip , .....I was just careless to break through , ...but also it does not matter at all , as all is going to be covered in 5min epoxy glue later and glue remainders worked flush again , once the blanks would have been sealed with propionate . In opposition to a screw eye line tie(which would be difficult to assemble through the narrow and sharply angled diving lip) , these wire forms even reinforce the lip, as they pass almost all the way over it's bottom to connect the single woodgrain fibres , ..........BTW , .....it is very important to cut the lip plane in a way , that line tie wire form and belly screw eyes would ALWAYS pass CROSSWISE to the woodgrain , .....this provides greatest possible strength , both of diving vane and screw eye fittings . Not quite sure , whether sufficiently visible , but I've made and placed the wire forms in a way , that the upward bend of the attachement eye would come to sit at the level of the lengthwise center axis of the rear main part of the lurebody , .........I'm pretty much sure , that it would work out this way to make up for a nice , stable swimming action and a dive of 8-10 feet ,...... I did not dare to place the tow eye further upward the lip plane not to have the lures to swim on their sides or even blow out . The lures might dive a tad deeper with tow eyes placed further upward , but also are pretty much likely to turn over , might get to swim unstable to the extend of blow-out ,.......with a lower tow eye(placed towards the tip of the lip) they would swim stable , though , ......but not dive as deep and also won't wiggle as pronounced and at a lower frequency . Any belly ballast(to render an unstable lure to swim straight and true) on such lures sporting integrated diving vanes turned out to be counterproductive , since it slows down the wiggle significantly ,.......such integrated lips simply do not protrude downward over the lurebody that much compared to added plastic or metal diving lips , so in result not so much leverage around the tow eye can be generated by the oncoming water pressure ,.......these integrated vanes simply don't produce enough force to swing any added belly ballast around compared to lures having added diving lips hanging down below their noses . It's always a little gamble to determine about the best location of the line tie , ......the spot , where it does make up for the best possible wiggle and deepest possible dive(famous US angler Joe Bucher refers to this particular best line tie location as the "sweet spot" in his book "Crankbait Secrets") ,...and these "Rush Tango" type lures do have the disadvantage, that hardly any tweaking on the tow eye would be possible , apart from bending the tow eye left or right to tune the lure , .......or , ......change a screw eye line tie entirely by disassembling , closing the old hole with an epoxied in toothpick and drill a new pilot hole on a different location ,....possibly with all over new painting and topcoating involved ! Regarding different timbers for lures , ........as a rule of thumb, .....the lest buoyant a given timber species is , the less pronounced it's swimming action would be , more buoyant woods vice versa . It is of advantage to select the timber material accordingly to the type and size of lure , one intends to make ,....also one would have to consider about added working efforts on certain timbers , namely hardwoods . The bigger and more voluminous a lure , the lest buoyant the timber material should be ,..f.e. it won't make any sense , to make a fatter 6"+ minnow diver out of balsa , as it requires to be overloaded with lead ballast to achieve a reasonable diving depth(and too much belly ballast spoils the wiggle , about 30% of the neccessary ballast would have to be placed in the back portion in this case , ..been there , done that , ....it's a pain in the butt to balance such lure !) On the other hand , ...making a small 2 1/2" floating deep diver out of a dense and heavy hardwood would most likely lead into a reject ,as alone the weight of lip and hardware would render such lure into a sinker,..not to talk of possibly neccessary ballast . Guess , that I said it before somewhere recently , ......there are so endlessly many options and variables about luremaking , .......it's a constant learning curve , and thus never gets boring ! Guess, that I would not complete these two teakwood "Tango" lures that fast now , though , ...still have some other , different in process as well ,...won't be able to fish them this year anymore , anyway , as we have a lurefishing closing time as from January 1st on around here ,...season opens again May 1st , ....always using this winter break for intense lure making year after year ! Thanks a lot , .....best greetings , Dieter PS : maybe not quite clear in the pictures , .....the longer tag end of the wire form sits in the rear of the diving lip , the shorter end in front , ...naturally !

Hi , David , Being into this older thread again , I felt like doing another "Rush Tango" version yesterday , stricly after the original measurements shown in the other thread . Still had a short 2" dia teakwood dowel laying around the shop , so I did one 130mm long lure blank yesterday , .....guess that I will make another one tonite , since that dowel is 50mm in diameter but the greatest lure blank diameter is 44mm at the lip's tip , I can increase the lure size for 10% to get a max. dia. of 48,4mm and a length of 143mm ,........all other measurements would be increased by 10%(or multiplied by factor 1,1) as well . On these steeply forward pointing diving planes of the accurate "Tango" knock-offs I do not employ screw eyes as line-ties , because for my taste the lip's thickness is too thin for sufficiently sized screwe eyes ,...and also it's always a pain in the butt to mount screw eyes under greater angles , often requires larger countersunks to accommodate the line tie eye to become clogged up with paint and topcoat ,etc. Some of the old original lures had some kinda small eye bolt passing through the lip fixed with a small nut on the underside of the lip , but I came up with such solution for line ties on such such narrow integrated diving vanes : ........also some tips about furnishing crosswise rattle holes containing ! Here also is a link to my gallery displaying such a line tie , in this case a double line tie ,....there are three pictures alltogether , I've just linked one , since the other two are neighbors : http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/2752-line-tie-construction-in-progress/ I will do these wire form line ties on my present "Tango" versions as well and put up pictures in here , ...could take a day or two, though . Hope you're enjoying your trip out on the lake today , hopefully your new lures would score , .......I'm a bit reluctant to go fishing these days , ....weather has turned quite miserable , we've already had a little snow and frost , but worse are those chilly , strong winds ,.......I'm not quite the youngest of a guy anymore and nowadays my sore bones are always responding to such unpleasant , wet and cold weather immediately ! Greetings , Dieter

@ DaleSW ..........you've got a PM containing a PDF-file ! Greetz , Dieter

@ Jordanlures Surely makes me feel happy to hear that your first prototypes turned out to your full satisfaction , David , ......and I'm glad , that I was obviously able to help a fellow lure carver out a bit . I haven't put a rattle into one of my versions so far , I guess that I was concerned about achieving reasonable paralellity of the lip's plane and the crosswise bore to accommodate a rattle ,......... I was thinking , if getting off too much in worst case , the lure might turn out to swim lopsided , and on such lures not too many alterations can be done except bending the tow eye to the left or to the right for the lure to track true . But otherwise I do not see any problems about a rattle , naturally I would place it right in center of the fattest part of the body or maybe just a tad ahead towards the lip(that would be the lengthwise center of gravity) . ...and here is something , to make your mouth more watery about these old "Rush Tango" versions , ...here a genuine lure , though , ..please check out 5th pic from top: http://www.retiredlures.com/Still-Catching-Fish.html .......and here's one of my own(as from 2:12 on) , ......a little jack , though, .....but I've already caught bigger ones on it : Will check out the gallery frequently , ....good luck furthermore , ...greetz , Dieter

@ DaleSW There are far more crankbait dynamics than just lip size and angle and tow eye position ,......some more are body profile(both in sideview and cross section) , body length and width , buoyancy of body material being used , weight of lip material , lip shape , amount and location of ballast , ...and maybe even some more . Altering just one of these would change the swimming action and/or diving depth compared to an anotherwise same bait , ...often significantly , sometimes only subtle . F. e. I had once made two almost accurately alike 6 1/2" slender minnow baits with a downward pointing , shallow diving lexan lip , line tie slighly below the nose tip ,.......one out of abachewood(quite buoyant) and one out of beechwood(less buoyant) . Both had lead sheet ballast in their belly slots to render both of them just floating , both at about same level . The abachewood lure swam very well , I could fish it with long sweeps and also rapid jerks of the rod tip , ...off course also retrieve constantly to a depth of about two feet , .....it would always woble nicely and remain stable at any pace . The beechwood minnow could only be retrieved slowly to perform a similar wobble to it's abache twin , though the wobble was more exaggerated sideward and came at a little slower frequency . Jerking or sweeping the beechwood lure was impossible , it would turn over and blow out instantly . Why this ? -beechwood is heavier , less buoyant and more dense than abachewood , thus takes less ballast for a comparable swim level at rest . But belly ballast in a lure works like the keel of a sailing boat , ..it tends to pull the lure(or boat) to upright level , .....if there is less ballast , there is less of such tendency . -Not only less ballast in the belly of the beechwood lure , but also less general buoyancy of the lurebody material , ......meaning....... as the lure gets pushed sideward by the force of the water pressure on the lip pivoting the lure around the tow eye to kinda capsize , .......the less buoyant beechwood , namely the back portion of the lure , ..... would dig in deeper and easier , as it won't pull back upright as well as a more buoyant material would do . Both of these differences in lure dynamics cause the beechwood lure to blow out , whereas the Abache lure of same outer dimensions , same line tie and lip configuration and same swim level at rest does perform well . This is just ONE example , .......to me such diversities make up for never getting bored with luremaking , .....even after more than 25 years I'm still discovering new things about lure dynamics ! Regarding your lip causing the lure to lay on it's side , ...this is because the lip plane ahead of the tow eye is too large , thus generating too much leverage around the tow eye under the water pressure . To counterwork this , you must either place more belly ballast(to work like the keel of a sailing boat), or , .....if your lurebody is not buoyant enough to carry more ballast , you must reduce the lip's plane , .......or move the tow eye forward to gain less lip plane ahead of the tow eye to achieve less leverage around the tow eye . Regarding lip planes , .......during the past two or three years I've increasingly gotten into slender oval or pointed lips , ........these can be kept quite long(even with the tow eye at the nose(if not exaggerating the lip's length , though) , still maintaining good diving depth , .......but actionwise such lips do povide rather tight wiggle patterns compared to the typical halfround diving bills , which are fairly wider towards their tips to generate more leverage around the tow eye(but therefore also easier subject to blow-out) , thus letting a lure swim with a wider wobble . You see , ..only a few examples within the wide world of lure dynamics ,......but it surely is great fun , ....right now I'm into experiments to achive possible best casting performances, .....without any weight shifting system , off course , ...I'm already over that one , I guess ! Good luck , Dieter

@JRammit I hope , you mean that while it's still wet , it washes off ? If not , you might get into trouble when applying your topcoats , ........but after my experiences acrylic paints are usually not as vulnerable compared to solvent based paints . Greetz , Dieter

@ JRammit Now , that one turned out nicely , ...I like the way , those stripes and back kinda blend into the gold underneath , not having turned out that solid . You're on the right path for sure , .......greetings , Dieter

@ Jordanlures Dunno , whether this thread is , what you've come across , David , ..... or just general info about the "Rush Tango Minnow" on collector's sites , .......but here is the six years old TU thread , where I had made some posts along with some sketch copies showing two genuine , but repainted "Tangos" together with accurate millimetre measurements taken from those original vintage lures : .http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/17724-my-latest-lure-test-video/?hl=rush%20tango Looking forward to see your first "Tango" versions , .....best greetings , Dieter PS : Just saw , that the thread was already linked somewhere upward in this thread , ....so you must have already seen it !

@ Jordanlures Looks like we've got a few things in common , David , Good luck with your lathe-turning , ......greetings from northern Germany , Dieter

@ JRammit Yeah ,....metallic colors could be a pain in the butt at times , ....when using them as a solid base color , one would have to put on one or two extra layers to achieve full coverage compared to other colors . Here is something , that I've found in the web to possibly come in handy for those, that do not want to buy too many single colors , but mix their own tones out of a few existing colors : http://trycolors.com/ I've actually never done such , as I'm quite lazy about painting , .....but I remember to have learned about it back in my school's art lessons . Greetz , Dieter

@ JRammit Hhm ,...I must admit , that I am clueless about your problem , ......maybe has to do with diluting your paints , which I had never done . I do not bother about visible brush strokes , even sometimes utilizing them to make up for a pattern , applying 3-4 different colors together in a wet-in-wet technique , which obviously is the fastest way to brush paint . If you want shading coming close to sprayed lures , you need to have each layer dry prior to putting on the next one ,...and ,....very important , ...you need to use and almost dry hard-bristled brush to be able to apply only very , very little paint at a time, .....you'd virtually rub the paint over the previous color layer , leaving it to still show through the newly applied color , .......all in all a time-consuming method , yet providing better looks . Also you would have to sand your primer coats perfectly smooth , so they'd be bare of any prominent woodgrain or primer brush strokes , because when rubbing on paint with that almost dry brush , the paint would set onto the prominent parts first and leave the lower parts uncovered , this way a "stroke" pattern will show. Would also happen , when spraying , though , ..depending on the spray angle and amount of paint sprayed on . I do not bother about this brush stroke thingi ,.....once dry , my paintjobs feel as rough as oil paintings ,...but finally three epoxy coats would even out the lure's surface again . But if you'd check out the gallery for user "littleriver's" lures , you'd find his own paint techniques to be entirely different to mine ,.......I'm just too lazy for proper sanding smooth prior to painting ,....my interest in luremaking points towards technical aspects rather than elaborate paintjobs , anyway. Sadly "littleriver" hasn't been here for quite a while now , but I own a few of his lures , ...he is using visible brush strokes to be be a part of his patterns , namely to make up for a darker back portion of his lures most likely painted in a bright base color , ......he even went into experiments painting his lures with pastel chalks . As Mark stated , try to find your own painting techniques by trying on paper or cardboard , ......you will soon generate some ideas to try on your lures as well . Also there are YouTube videos about acrylic painting , ...naturally dealing on big paintings , but maybe you could adapt something displayed in there for lures as well . Don't set your goals too high for the start ,..believe me , you could achive a catching pattern with just three or four different colors , ..even without any shading , mixing or blending , ....f.e. a white lure with a solid red head and black specks over the white , dotted on with a crumbled piece of paper . There is not much to do wrong about brush painting ,...it's just about developping your own style ! Good luck , Dieter