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RiverMan

big topwaters

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Good point LaPala! The bait with the clearcoat will be larger thus displacing more water and requiring more weight to sink it........altho I would expect this to be a "slight" difference as you have suggested. I will let you know more as I am making a topwater bait now and trying to come up with a formula for being able to predict where the bait will sit in the water once it's complete. I am measuring the weight of the bait in grams before adding sealer, primer, and clear coat. I will then weigh again the bait once it is complete and try to use this number as a predictor.

thx.

jed

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I'm curious to know what the "slight" diff will be too Jed, a formula would be great. When u're at it sink the whole lure into water and measure how much water it displaces before & after. I would expect the "slight" to be not so slight :wink: as volume (of cylinder) is calculated as a square of radius just a 1/2mm increace in radius would add up pretty quickly too. Plus that glob of epoxy is already a bigger blob to start with compared to the same weight glob of a piece of lead. :)

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I wish I had an accurate way of measuring all this. It might turn into more "trial and error" though since the amount of clear coat, paint, primer, etc., is probably not the same from one bait to the next. I have only built one, very happy with the action but have no idea what's going to happen once I clear coat the beast. What I did was lighten it up quite a bit and hoping that once the clear goes on I will be about where I need to be. ??????????

jed

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Jed, I have added e-tex to a 8" Jake and was sure the bait was more buoyant after e-tex.It sounds crazy,and I am not really sure of this because it happened only once.I was thinking maybe it added more displacement than weight?Or sometimes e-tex will have some super fine air bubbles in it.Richoc mentioned that as well.Let us know what you find.I did test this once where I dripped mixed e-tex into a cup of water,and some drips would float on the surface for a while,and then slowly sink.

Tom

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Some other uncontrollable factors......

Water surface tension.

Air pressure

Top waters are hard to guess.

If they float with all hardware hanging you should be fine.

But trial and error are the real teaching tools.

You can get the wet weight of the clear coat before apply but at best it will be a guess as to how much will be appilied.

Weight the amount that you expect to apply, make a weight that size to try.

But this will be more inaccurate the longer that you test for it.

The bait will pick up water if not finished.

I have a few tricks for you if the the bait sinks.

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Thanks guys, funny this subject hasn't come up on TU before, at least not that I can remember. What I ultimately did was weight the surface bait so that it sits just about where I want it to. I then sealed and primered the beast and will be painting it tonight. Tomorrow it will get it's first coat of clear and I am hoping that it doesn't sink! I will know more in a couple days what happens and will report back to TU.

Rich,

I have kept accurate measurements of what the bait weighs in grams prior to the clearcoating. I then tried estimating the amount of weight that will added from the clear coat. If I add this amount to the bait in lead it sinks! I am hoping that the Archimedes law (thanks to Lapala reminding me) of water displacement will offset some of the weight of the clear coat. Some other things were also mentioned, air bubbles, etc., and maybe this is having some effect too, time will tell.

Corey,

Making a topwater walk the dog type bait. I am using redwood and it's light enough that I think at least some lead will be needed. :D

Jed

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I believe what you are going for is a bait with a specific gravity of about .99. LaPala was right what you have to do is weigh the water displaced by the bait then weigh the bait. If they are the same you have neutral bouyancy or a specific gravity of 1. Example if the weight of the water displaced is 300 grams and the weight of the bait is 250 grams, 50 grams of weight must be added to achieve neutral bouyancy. If it is a muskie bait you have to consider the weight of the metal leader and snap,

that extra weight has to be add to the bait. If you are a little off one way or the other it is not hard to tweek it a little.

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I believe what you are going for is a bait with a specific gravity of about .99. LaPala was right what you have to do is weigh the water displaced by the bait then weigh the bait. If they are the same you have neutral bouyancy or a specific gravity of 1. Example if the weight of the water displaced is 300 grams and the weight of the bait is 250 grams, 50 grams of weight must be added to achieve neutral bouyancy. If it is a muskie bait you have to consider the weight of the metal leader and snap,

that extra weight has to be add to the bait. If you are a little off one way or the other it is not hard to tweek it a little.

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First, if you are making a walk the dog bait I think you definitely will want to weight it, some were in the back third of the bait. I use a small bit of finesse weight right in the tail.

Second, I make light weight top water baits and was concerned about the top coat adding weight so I did a few experiments. I eyeballed what I thought was the amount of top coat I would put on a lure and poured it into a milk jug cap to harden into wafers. I did this with Devcon and E-tex. The Devcon wafer sank quickly so I deduced it would have a measurable impact on the buoyancy of the bait. The E-tex wafer did not float or suspend but did sink very slowly. It is my less than scientific opinion that E-Tex has very little impact on a lures buoyancy, less than adding a split ring. Just something to chew on.

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Well the verdict is in on the topwater. Again, I weighted the bait so that it would sit at the level I wanted it to when completed. I then added primer, paint, and two coats of Etex and will likely add another. I tossed the bait into the water and.......................it sits just where it did before clearcoating, can't tell that it dropped or raised in the least bit. It seems to me that the gain in water displacement is very close to compensating for the additional weight gained by the primer, paint, and clearcoat. Cool!! I will post a pic of the bait in the gallery later today for those interested.

Thx Guys.

Jed

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