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clamboni

swimbait in progress

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Been making lead baits and painting plugs for a while, decided to try carving some lures a while ago, but everything made its way to the scrap pile for one reason or another. This one made it to the water tonight. No idea what it weighs, but it sinks about 1' per second and nice and level. Swims pretty nicely, too. Little bit of head movement and lots of tail from what I could tell. It was pretty dark out when I was throwing it. Kept breaking off the screw eyes trying to get them through the lead in the body on the first joint, that's why the cutout is so wide on the bottom. Poplar, 8" to tail, body is 6-1/4" Just needs hooks, paint and eyes and ready to go.

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The body is about 6.5", total length with tail is 8". Yeah, Yeah, it's pretty close to a triple trout, but I used some things I saw in the TT because it's a very simple lure and has great action. As far as the tests, I just took it out to see if it would have any action. I didn't put any hooks on because I was trying to get to the little creek I was at before it got dark and took it out right after I put it together. When I was throwing it, I was using tape to hold in the pins. I wanted to be able to take it apart if I saw anything that I thought would help out.....It's actually in pieces right now. But thanks for the compliments.

I wasn't looking for any specific sinkrate. Probably a little faster than I would have preferred, but I was concentrating more on getting the bait to have some action. I'm actually somewhat disappointed that the action was good on the first shot because now I have no reason to change anything and learn from it.

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I actually took another pic today of the bottom of it so you could see the weight placement. I don't have a drill press right now so I used a cordless drill. 3/8" bit and tried to get close to drilling to the center of the bait. Poured lead directly in the holes to about 1/8" from full and filled in with Devcon 5min. I'm GUESSING about 2 oz of lead in it.

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I got to throw it with hooks on today and it swims fairly well. Unfortunately, because I wasn't thinking as I was making it, I had to put the rear hook on the last segment and I think it may have killed the action a little. Looks the way I thought it was the other night. Little bit of head movement, decent amount of tail movement. At high speeds, it rolls a little though. I think The weight placement is a little high in the bait. I'm thinking about sanding down the bottom of it to lower the center of gravity a little. Next bait won't be drilled as deep for the weights. A friend got some video of it, hopefully he'll email it to me tonight so I can post it up.

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Holy Triple Trout batman! I'm just busting your stones. I have seen many dicussions about people not showing thier custom baits because they feared ideas would be stolen or copied. I guess this shows it goes both ways. I say if you can make a Triple Trout for $10 instead of paying $100 plus, go for it.

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Clamboni. That's a good idea. But instead of filling it, tape the hole and test the fall rate with the air pocket. You can then tune the sink rate by adding more or less filler. Do you have digital scales. If not, you should definately get a set (0.1gm accuracy), that goes for everyone who builds lures.

You could add lead to the hole until the sink rate you want is achieved. The weight of lead will tell you how much filler to use.

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Clamboni,

I just noticed that the first set of pixs had a cardboard tail piece and in box 10 of this thread, it looked different. I realized that if you where testing it would have changed, what is the matterial in that photo, plastic? Looking forward to seeing the test video.

Vodkaman. Don't they make a heavy clay (putty) that wieghs the same as lead? I seem to remember reading something about it being use by jet engine mechs that were blending compressor blades to keep the rotating assembly balanced during the repair. It is removed before the engine is listed ready for service.

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The bait is identical in those two pics. Nothing changed. I think you just can't see the tail in the last pic because of the angle/lighting. The tail is a piece of lexan. I just sanded it so it's not clear. I was thinking about it and I may actually just end up making a cavity of some sort in the top of the bait. I'd have to risk drilling through my screw eyes to get to most of the lead and I don't want to do that. I may even just leave it alone and start on another one. It was only about an hour of actual shaping that I put into it so starting over won't be a big deal.

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The wire is just .041 stainless wire. Used a piece of the wire with some tape wrapped around it so it would fit in the chuck of my drill.

Riverman, moving the hook forward isn't an option. I tried to put it in the next section forward first, but the one weight is right there and the pilot hole wasn't quite big enough for the screw to go ointo the lead. The screw eye broke off while I was putting it in. I'm hesitant to put it right into the lead for two reasons....The screw breaking off again, as well as the hook being attached only to the lead, I'd be afraid of it coming out. Probably won't happen, but it concerns me.

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Over size the hole, and epoxy the screweye into the lead. If you oval the hole a little at the max. depth by twisting the drill bit gently, it will make the hole bigger at the end than at the entry hole, and the epoxy will not pull out. The epoxy around the screw threads is at least as strong as any wood, so the screweye won't pull out.

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Mark, that is pretty clever, just digging a fence post hole in a "bell" shape before cemment. I won't just fall out will it. Over sizing the hole, within limits, is a pretty common fix to broken screws/bolts. Once you get the old piece out, you can fill it, drill it, and give it another try. That might be how you could redesign the under side if you were a mind to.

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