bonepile

well, I just finished that batch, and they now look great. rather than attempting to "clean" them, I gave them a coat of my aerosol clear, U-POL Clear 1. it has stuck to everything I have tried it on, so I knew it would cover any possible contaminates that may have been the problem. just gave the batch a second coat this morning, and they are looking very fine right now. i'm still not positive on what was the issue to begin with, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't due to mixing. the e-tex hardened as it should have, and that would have been affected, I would think, by poor mixture. I still haven't tried to test the e-tex over that varnish again, i'll do that to rule that out.

luhr-jensen made a lighted lure. I have one. the j-plug. it has a screw-bolt that goes through the lure where the eyes are. somehow, when water contacts that metal, the blinking light inside the lure activates.

i just got here myself, but, welcome back. my brother went through something similar......twice. thankfully, I learn from other's misfortunes, and have avoided this myself. everything in life is sometimes cheaper to "rent".

Taking all precautions now, what is THE best thing to use for wiping lures clean prior to clear-coating? I dont want to go through adding a second coat and risk it doing the same.

I think the yellow looks more natural. maybe spray the eye location with a shot of black, then the yellow eye on top of that. that little bit of black background around the yellow might make it pop nicely.

on closer inspection of my previous batch of lures, a couple of them were quite poorly coated as well. so that might rule out the Vallejo gloss, as I hadn't used it before. so it may be back to thinking that I didn't mix the etex thoroughly enough. but it looks more like the etex reacted with the lure, like say the lure was handled too much and contaminated with oily hands. even though I was very careful, doubly-so with the last group. something clearly touched them I would say. more attention to cleaned lures prior to coating in future sessions. yes, the Vallejo gloss was definitely cured, a couple days sitting I think. I wasn't sure about the etex with foil, so I used a spray instead. I will try the etex next time, over the foil. I used to just do one coat of etex, but a fairly generous one. that always seemed to work well. but then I was having the occasional lure that would have a messed up action. I learned that my thick layer of etex was changing it. my lures have a cup-face for their action. so I then switched to two thinner coats on the lures, and leaving the cup-face with only one thin coat, so the action wouldn't be affected.

I may have found a culprit. I went out to the paint-desk last night and painted another lure. between colours, waiting for paint to dry, I looked at everything and broke down my previous painting session. I was sure everything was the same as usual, but you never know. then, yup, I spotted something. recently, I have done some foil lures, and a couple using metal flake. my plan wasn't to use the etex on these anyway, assuming it wouldn't adhere well. but I had bought a Vallejo gloss varnish recently, planning to use it on the metal flake to seal it before hitting it with a spray clear that I sometimes use. after that last batch of lures were good and dry, for some reason, I then used that varnish on them as well. i'm guessing I decided to try it since the previous batch of lures had some issues. but I think that previous batch was maybe more due to glitter, I will have to closer inspect. but the last batch were glitter-free, removing that from the equation. then they really had a repelling issue, like never before. it HAD to be from that new gloss varnish. so last night I coated a test board that I test paints on. I will now try etex over it and see what happens. pretty sure it will be the problem. the lures actually looked pretty good with just that gloss varnish on them. nothing like an etex layer, but not bad. but I doubt it's a strong clear that is designed to hold up to fishing rigors. live and learn. that's what it's all about. trying new things is how we find what is best and what is not. I do really want to try the KBS, but it's not really available up here in canadaland, from what I have been able to find anyway. I tracked down a company in alberta who brings it in though, so I may try to see if they can ship over to bc. but I will probably always use etex for some lures. when it works right it is so awesome. just frustrating when it's always performed well, then suddenly things just don't go right. and when one looks closely, they'll probably usually find it was a mistake on their part. in fact, just writing this, I now have realized I also used a stir-stick that was used previously. now that probably wouldn't/shouldn't have contaminated it, but, not a good idea. I have a package of new, clean ones and should have never used an old one.

I used to draw, but that really turned into photography years and years ago. 4-wheeling, i'm always out off-roading, and quading too. and hunting is right at the top of the list. just being outdoors in general. oh, and drinking beer of course.

I fish trout mostly. so, 1. rooster tail spinner in froggy colour. for creeks and small lakes. 2. little cleo spoon. for trolling and casting. shiny watermelon colour has caught me every fish around, but the yellow with flo. red spots is great for bull trout and also good for pike. 3. green/silver apex. for trolling for big trout, lakers, rainbow, bull, and dollies. 4. olive green muddler minnow fly. slays the rainbows. 5. one of my own plugs, colour would be tough to choose from, but probably colour combo of pearl white, black, and silver.

I fish when the water is wet. whatever the moon is doing, it's doing. but one sure thing is, you definitely won't catch fish if your rod isn't out.

hmmm? what's the reason to not use a wood mixing stick? i'm the same, I use a flat, wooden stick to mix mine, has never been an issue. I like how the flat edge scrapes the sides of the cup really well. I have read that a round mixing tool is better though, as it won't create bubbles as much when mixing. haven't heard about wood being bad before though. I just ran into issues on my last two batches of lures. have never had problems before, except the odd pinhole where a specific type of glitter repels the etex, and a second coat always fixed that. but, now suddenly, my last two sessions of coating, the etex has completely tried to repel it seems. not simple pinholes, but more areas not covered than covered. and I have done nothing at all different than any other time. this batch of lures last night, I was extremely careful to not touch them at all. so i'm pretty sure it's not an oily finger issue at all. my paints haven't changed. I have never heard of etex going bad, and this batch is maybe a year old. starting to wonder if it was in my mixing, like was mentioned earlier in this thread, but I did it the same as always. i'm really hesitant to add a second coat, especially if it's going to do the same. will probably just leave them as they are and fish them like that. I know the fish don't care, and i'm not trying to sell them anyway. still bothered by what the issue could be lately though.

red looks better to me, but, probably more important is what will the fish prefer. unless of course, it's buyer's you are trying to catch. I don't know, I like my eyes to contrast with the lure, personally. I always try all my different styles on each lure to see which goes best, and I usually lean towards lighter on a darker lure and vice-versa.