Large tube lure dipping

[bojon]

I will be dipping a large tube, 8 inch long X 1 inch Dia.It will be a rainbow trout,which means I will have to make four dips.Body,belly,back,then clear overcoat.There will be cooling between dips.This will work on a smaller scale,but this is much larger.

Back in the 70's I used to put multiple pour lures in the oven to get the pours to adhere to each other.NOW THE PROBLEM ! I forgot the temp,and duration of the process.Help needed.

[jrav]

Dip horizontally on an L- shaped mandrel, it'll save alot of plastic on a tube THAT BIG...what a hoss!

A few thoughts...

Rotational mandrel? A strip of thin brass/steel/aluminum say 1/2" wide by 10" long with a hole drilled through the end for the dipping handle. As an (cheap) example, an 8" setion of epoxy coated broom handle for the actual tube body. Drill a hole in one end to fit a bolt or screw, run that screw through the aforementioned steel strip and connect the section of broom handle to the strip. This will give you an "L" shaped mandrel with the verticle being the strip and the horizontal part of the "L" being the broom handle. Point of the screw is to give you something to turn the hot tube body with a screw driver from the tail end and allow for the belly/back features to be made.

You'll want it loose enought to turn easily in between dips, but tight enough to stay in place. Play with some washers and tension here, it'll be an experiment of sorts. I say screw for any type of paddle handle to rotate the body seems like it would gather too much plastic and drip funny. Not to mention 8" + turning handle would make an already big dip require an even larger tub. Never did this, just assuming the screwdriver would poke in easily, find it's home and rotate the mandrel body. Probably other ideas and variations possible if you go horizontally.

I have no idea how you want to set inbetween dips, that's alot of plastic to be acted upon by gravity. My mini-horizontals gain head size pretty quick when dipped and hung verically head down (for thin tentacles). An quad-dipped eight incher seems like it could develop one heck of a bulky head, may want to split the difference on which direction it sets inbetween dips.

Ex, intital body dip..insert and let hang head down.

2nd/back dip...let cool horizontally/back down for a bit, then head down.

3rd/belly...same as back, but with belly down.

4th/overcoat...same as intial coat, head down and allowing gravity to pull plastic down for thinner tentacles.

I find an adaquate height piece of wood with holes drilled in for a rack works nicely to hang and cool. Obviously, if you use a strip for a handle, you want an appropriate size groove/cut into the wood to accept the handle. Reckon a stack of books with a few books on top of the inserted handle would suffice in a pinch as well.

Like I said, never did one this big or the bi-colors and I'm just shootin' from the hip on ideas. Good luck and keep us posted, sounds like an interesting endeavor. BIG bass do like them 'bows don't they:).

[bojon]

Thanks for the reply jrav.Some good things to think about.I always dip as you said,but cut the tail end with a razor so I can turn it on the rod.It works well enough on the 4 in X 1/2 in dia.,and they came out well.But the size is doubled and my concern is that the plastic won't adhere to the previous dip.I have had this happen before,but used it to my advantage and had a two color tail.The lamination's came apart,but the tube looked good and worked.These were the smaller tubes.There was a way to heat treat the lures so they would fuse.I did it a lot on tri-colored grubs but forgot the time and duration in the oven.I'd hate to mess up the large tubes(a lot of plastic at stake).I might be worrying for nothing.Ether way I will post my results.

My dipping rods are already made and I have a bread loaf pan set up with,a wooden handle, to dip in.The rods are of copper pipe.The rod handles are of clothes hanger wire double back in a "U" shape.This will fit in between a spacer made between two plastic,(pvc) fence pcs.E-mail me and I will send a picture.

These tubes will be used for lake trout,and tiger muskies.I will add a strip of sucker meat to the trailer for the lake trout.