Jmarsh

Nathan, Thanks for rekindling this thread. I like the idea of a topless frog. Did you weight the body at all? if so how did you go about doing that without affecting the action when "upside down". Great idea though, I will have to give this a go!

Thanks for the response Mark. I tested it in the tub like I said and it still sat how I wanted to with the small amount of weight. Slightly tail down with just the head sticking out. I think I am going to have to try your swinging hook idea for sure. Looks like I see a lot of frogs in my near future. Wish it was spring break so I had access to my workshop, unfortunately here at school all I have are small coping saws, carving knives, and some sand paper.

I agree with mark, keep the weight on the bottom side. I am currently trying to work through the same problem. The frog that I posted previous doesn't seem to have a preference towards a side when I drop it into the tub. I am trying to figure out a weight scheme that will help keep it belly down when casted. However I am not sure if me dropping the bait from 3 ft above a tub in different orientations will simulate what is happening when casted. What are your guys' thoughts? Go ahead and add some weight which seems to add some success in the tub, or wait until I throw it out on a pond for real? This is the scheme that I am looking at. I have been using sticky tack to "add weight" where I am wanting it. It will only be about .5g per spot. Surprisingly adding that little bit of weight towards the front helped it flip the correct manner for the most part. I sometimes think that the bait is to wide and keeps it from flipping onto its belly, and wonder if a slimmer body would help keeping the correct orientation.

Mark would you need to recess that in to the channel a little bit? I would be afraid that with full compression the spring still wouldn't allow clearance for the hooks because the spring still takes up space upon being fully compressed. Maybe this is what you had in mind and I just didn't fully understand. Unfortunately I may not have the chance to build anything any time soon, I have to write a paper and give a presentation over the reconstruction of a decellularized mouse heart in a few weeks, which means not much free time.

These hard frog designs just keep getting better. I am going to have to try and whip myself one of those up. Oh and Mark, I really enjoyed the magnet idea to keep the bait weedless. You mentioned using a spring, how exactly are you planning on implementing that?

Interesting article Frog. That seems to be exactly what Nathan was leading towards. Funny that it has already been done, and none of us had never seen it before. Guess I have to carve another frog body and try this new design out.

His material he is using seems to be a whole lot thinner than the lexan I have used for lips. How thick can you get away with and still stamp it like that? Also how sharp would you have to make your punch, I feel like anything to dull and you would just end up cracking a lot of lexan?

Nathan, I like your texas rigged idea. Maybe on my next bait I will try using two single hooks on either side and texas rig it rather than the using the frog hooks that I am currently working with. On this one it may just come down to leaving it as is for this first one. Being as though it is a proto anyways its meant to get poked and prodded and changed.

I have been thinking about it, but not exactly sure how to execute it with this setup. I would say some kind I wire that is either fixed into the wood or bent with the hook, but I'm not sure what strength of wire is strong enough to keep out weeds but week enough to bend when a fish hits it.