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EironBreaker

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Everything posted by EironBreaker

  1. That would be a custom deal for sure.
  2. The F style blade from Hagens is the size that matches the War Eagle I believe. Battlefield Wire used to make all of the buzz blades. They were about 5 miles from my house. I think Hagens bought all of the tooling for stamping out the blades, at least that's what I heard. I don't know if they bought the wire forming equipment also.
  3. Yes, you can pour directly into the lead. I've bought directly from Mason. I think it is a little cheaper but it is a big spool. Just depends on how much you need.
  4. I think the wire keepers work better for me over a molded in barb but they will tear up the plastic when catching fish. But usually plastics are pretty cheap. Not all but most. Screw-locks are the best but really can damage a bait if the bait is soft. As far as adding keepers, you can do it easily with thread and the wire keepers from Capt Hooks. Just wrap one on or if you really want it to hold, do two on opposite sides. Tie off the thread and coat with super glue or Hard as Nails. I've added keepers that way to buzzbaits to hold horny toads.
  5. Depends on how much you want to spend. I've made due with an old Thompson cam-lock vise for years. I got a rotating vise recently and love it for hair jigs but wish it have a locking arm instead of a screw knob to lock the jaws. It will hold but sometimes its hard to unscrew the knob to get the jig out. Fishingskirts.com has a rotating vise with a arm to lock the vise jaws for $40.
  6. A little plumbers putty can take care of flash on most molds. And it can be removed easily to go back to the regular hooks. Put a little in the eye cavity and the groove for the hook. Doesn't take much.
  7. I bought a small drill press from Harbor Freight many years ago and it has served its purpose time and time again. Fits on the bench nicely and is easy to work with. Steady hand and sharp/new bits help. Mark what you want to remove, go slow and refit often until it fits correctly.
  8. Can they match the price and selection? Or come close?
  9. Last time I looked, there were some refills of skirt colors that had been out of stock. Maybe it was just a couple that I was looking for.
  10. Take some plumbers putty and put it in the slot for the hook and the other slot for the wire. Just a little amount, this will hold your hook eye and wire form in the very center of the mold. Otherwise it can slip down in the mold. Put a hook/wire in there and close it. Trim out any excess that squeezes into the cavity. I've also heard of people using a small adhesive backed, thin magnet to hold the hook down by the bend but I'd think once the mold got hot the sticky would give up. Keep the eye in the center/biggest part of the mold, this applies to any mold with wire forms. I close the hook of the wire form around the eye of the hook. I can see that your lead is cooling too quickly before the pour is complete. Gaps and wrinkles are a sign of too cool of lead. A bottom pour isn't the answer for spinnerbaits or buzzbaits. You can't get the spout close enough to keep the lead from cooling before flowing properly into the cavity. Either get a small ladle like suggested above or I just use a Hot Pot (pours from top) for all of my pouring. Pour quickly and as close to the mold as possible. I never liked dealing with the problems of a bottom pour so it just sits on the shelve. Just have to add lead more often with a Hot Pot but it is quicker for me without additional problems. Flux your lead with wax to clean out as much impurities as you can. That helps pours also. Heat your mold before pouring if you don't already. Lay it on the top of your pot while it is heating up. By the time the lead is ready, your mold is hot and this makes pours much better. After the mold is hot, lay your hook and wire in there and give it about 30 seconds before pouring. This will warm the hook and wire a little which also helps sometimes with difficult molds. On your dud pours, use a propane torch to melt the lead back off over your pot. This will give you a clean hook and wire form. Good luck, it seems like every mold has certain characteristics that are unique to that mold and sometimes it takes pouring a good number of heads to figure out what/how works best. Have fun and ask any other question you have, someone here has likely had the same problem at one time or another and figured out a way around it!
  11. Barlows has the F blade which is the same as what is on a War Eagle buzzbait. Its the largest off-center blade.
  12. livingrubber.com has fine cut silicone skirts also.
  13. I'd be afraid that the mold would crack as hard as he's hitting it. That isn't a Do-It mold in the video, not that it would matter. I guess I'd rather take my chances with a dremel, drill bit or file instead of a hammer on a $40-$50 mold. I'm not that adventurous. And I've modified a lot of molds. Took a drill bit to a Shawn Collins mold I bought, his mold seemed much harder than the aluminum in a Do-It mold.
  14. I've had pretty good luck with the 60 degree 4/0 heavy hooks as far as quality control. No so much with the light wire sickles in small sizes, like for crappie jigs. I don't have a source for the 2/0 size though.
  15. A hand tied brown living rubber skirt with about 6 strands of green tinsel in the belly is a standard jig at Lake of the Ozarks. Works really well. I don't know for sure if Bill Davenport came up with it but he is well known for fishing it at LOZ.
  16. I just use a gallon zip-lock bag. Takes a fair amount of powder but there is plenty of space to powder coat SBs and Buzzers. Roll down the bag, it takes about 6 oz of paint or so to do. Fluff the powder and swish through sideways. I also use a propane flame to heat the head properly, swish through and then give the wire frame or the hook a flick with my finger to knock off any extra. Give the hook a wipe between your fingers if there seems to be a dusting of paint on it but most comes right off. Run through the flame again to make sure the paint is set and hang it for baking. Works good and gives clean heads.
  17. Why not just use a straight shank worm hook instead of a spinnerbait hook? If you aren't looking to buy a large number of hooks, just grab a pack of hooks off the shelf and give them a try. They have smaller eyes then a SB hook.
  18. Bob, to get a clean wire form and hook from a bad pour I use a propane torch to melt the lead off. I hold it over my lead pot so it drips into the rest of the lead. I like to do it as soon as I have a bad pour so the residual heat helps to melt it quicker and the hook/wire doesn't get hotter than necessary by reheating. Dipping to melt doesn't work, slag will attach to the wire and hook but you likely know that already.
  19. A small triangle file will put a nice slot in the mold to accept the wires. Pretty easy to do, lay a wire in the location you want it. Either use a sharpie to mark the location or close the mold on the wire and make a little mark to follow. After you've done a few wire grooves, its a pretty simple process. Just do a little at a time and close mold to see if it fits.
  20. There is some variability with the fishingskirts.com guards. Sometimes you get a batch that slips right in and sometimes the fused end is a little to big. Usually if one is too big, the entire batch is too big. I use a Xacto knife to trim off a bit of the fused end and then they slip in easily. I use SuperGlue gel.
  21. Great comments Mark. Totally agree, safety is priority.
  22. JLS, not the correct info. I can build and posses as many as I want as long as I'm not selling them. I sell chatter-type baits but the blade connection is with a split ring on a cross-eye hook. Totally legal. Just can't connect the blade directly to the wire and sell them. I think both styles give a vibration unique to each. Zeiner's is another good place to get molds and mold supplies. There are two herring head insert sizes. I used the larger size.
  23. I found an old Sparkie weedless mold in a flea market a few months ago. Got it cheap. I thought it would be good for making chatterbaits with, I like a chatterbait with a weed guard. I happened to have some of the herring head underspin inserts laying on the bench and thought "well those look like they will fit just right." Sure do, used a long shank SB hook and the L bend of the insert hooks the hook eye just right so there is a strong connection after pouring. So no need to add a split ring, just slip on the blade and bend the wire shut. A 4/0 long shank hook worked for the 3/8, 1/2 and 5/8 sizes. A 3/0 regular length SB hook worked for 1/4 oz. Of course these are just for my personal use, I don't need a cease and desist letter. But if anyone wants to make your own chatterbaits like the original, the herring head inserts can serve dual purpose instead of buying the figure 8 loops also.
  24. I have this mold also but I pour with a hot pot II which is just like using a ladle. I close the loop of the wire form on the hook eye, that seems to help some. After laying the wire/hook in the mold in the position wanted, I close the mold and use my thumb to hold the wire end in the centered position while pouring with my other hand. Just a little down pressure on the upper end of the wire form holds it in place. I pour with my left hand, hold the mold with my right. The hook centers itself since the mold is held upright to pour. Works for me.
  25. Depending on the head, you can use a collared band and slip it over the place you wire tied the skirt on. Or place the skirt inside the rattle band, slip it on like a conventional jig and then wire tie the skirt with the rattle. Some of the jig molds I have there is a place to slip a rattle band in behind the skirt that I've wire tied. On a banana head, you can slip the rattle band on first and then add the skirt behind it before wire tying the skirt. And that's just options for rattles on a band. There are a few different rattle options out there. Depends on what you are using.
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