[mark poulson]

diemai,
That lure looks great. Can't wait to see it finished, and hear about how it works.
I have to say, you must be a saint with the patience of Job to wait two weeks before finishing your lures!
I am so impatient, I cut them out and shape them in one day, finish the joints and install the hook hangers and line tie and seal them the next.
The third day, I weight them, install the ballast, and prime them. And the fourth day I paint them and top coat them.
I'm so impatient I went to D2T epoxy instead of Envirotex Lite, which I love, because I can topcoat the lures in the evening, and fish them the next morning.
I don't make lures all the time, but, when I do, I'm driven to finish NOW!

[jamie]

diemai, I love your new bait and cant wait to see the final finished product. I was thinking about your banana lure the other day and thought of making one myself. Ive seen jointed flatfish baits and thought about doing that maybe in a hinge joint what do you think?

[mark poulson]

Jamie,
The original Kwikfish lure came in a jointed version, so I don't see why it wouldn't work.

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

I take weeks and months of time , from cutting out until rigging hooks . First because of this mentioned preservation method on abachewood , second reason is , that I always make a batch of lures at one time , say between 6 and 20 wood blanks , before I start out painting them .

I much prefer carving different lureshapes rather than painting them(you can see this on my only average paint designs) , so I easily end up with so many blanks for painting , before I notice , that it is now high time to commence with it !

Also I only have a small , dusty basement workshop , before painting I must clear and brush it up a bit prior to painting , and I don't always feel like cleaning up !


@ jamie

Just give it a go , you can only win , either lots of fish caught or some experience about what went wrong !

Just joking , but I haven't yet made a jointed model , though I have a jointed "Flatfish" of plastic somewhere . This lure is about little more than 4" , maybe even 5" in length , and very , very light , doesn't look too sturdy to me !
I have also considered making a jointed version for a long period of time , but so far no satisfying idea came up to me .
I am just a bit concerned about the added weight on the tail of such lure , provided by the hardware of the joining hinge , since I strictly believe , that a buoyant rear section is essential for such a lure-type .
(which must not neccessarely be absolutely true !)

And a homemade wood lure can't be made as light as the commercial one of plastic that I have , at least not , if I want it to be sturdy and reliable !

But I am very sure , that somehow it must be possible , maybe making the front section of a more rigid , still buoyant kinda wood(so that the thin diving bill won't break) and the rear of balsawood , the lightest possible sort of wood(yet then it has to be wired through and carefully plated with epoxy to gain a hard surface) !

Just an idea in brief..............!
Good Luck , Dieter

[diemai]

Hi , everybody
Whilst my "SuperBug" version and my swimbait are still drying from their wood preservation treatment , I found some time today to proceed with my new "Banana" models .

I glued in the tow eyes and hookhanger screw eyes onto some of them .

You may know from my post in the hardbait gallery "line tie construction" , that the tow eye consists of a roughly "M"-shaped wire form , that is fit into a slot and groove into the thin lip of those lures and glued in with a 5 min. two-component glue .

Made some pics of that process whilst working on it today , once you get a hold on it , it's quite simple .

First glue in ONLY the shanks of the wire form , don't let glue flow through the eyelet slot at this stage , this is only for a first bond(check pic) .

After the glue has started to set , mask the slot at underside of lip with some tape , I use cable insulation tape , since it doesn't bind with the glue (textile or paper masking tape probably would !) .

Don't press the tape snugly into the groove , but try leaving a small "hump" over it , so that the glue would probably fill up the entire slot better .

Now fill some glue into the eyelet slot from the top of lip , push it in with a toothpick or a wire piece , in the best case it would then flow down to fill up the entire slot on the underside , a drop of glue should remain around the tow eye to be certain about total coverage of the glue(check pic) .

Avoid air bubbles !

When the glue has set a bit(about 10 min.) , the tape may be removed to check , wether the slot has been filled up with glue entirely , but most likely this would not be the case , so a third mixture of glue has to be prepared and the slot finally covered with it(check pic for the final looks of the two sides of the lip) .

After at least 24 hrs. curing time I would remove the excess glue with my "Dremel" , small files , sandpaper and a carpet knife to be flush with the lures outer contoures , full strength of it is achieved after 72 hrs.

As you might notice , I find it very handy to utilize an egg container box for this work operation , since I can press the lureblanks into the gaps of it to achieve a permanent horizontal position of the planes , where I apply the glue .
This way the glue won't flow away sideward , but cure to a nice drop , that provides best coverage of eyelet and slot .

Also through the years I have gathered all the mixing bins of that glue , so I am able to just always take a new one for another mixing process , this saves a lot of time , instead of always cleaning up the one presently used .
Dried glue can easily be scraped away from these bins and their mixing sticks with a knife !

Greetz , Dieter

[rofish]

Diemai,
I simply do not understand why you have to go through such a complicated way of gluing the wire to the wooden lip.
I see the reason why you have to put first a little glue on the wire, to keep it in place, and then continuing the gluing process. But to speed up things, I would simply use some superglue to make the wire stay in place. Superglue dries instantly, so it saves time for you.
Then, the problem with the tape. On one hand, you say that bubbles in the glue must be avoided. On the other hand, you say that if you press the glue from above, using a toothpick, it is most likely that the slot is not entirely filled up with glue. I think this is quite a logical result, since the air is trapped between the tape and wood, and since you press the glue from above, with a toothpick, and through the slots in the wood, I assume, the air has little chance to escape through the unique way out - the small slots, made for the 2 peaks of the "M" shaped wire to go through the wood.
I think there is a simpler way to glue the wire. After the wire is glued with a little glue in place (either superglue or your 2 component glue), you find a method to block out the 2 slots, so the glue would not be able to go through because of gravity (you put there small pieces of wood, or use a little of your 2 component glue the moment it starts to harden).
Then, you glue the wire in 2 steps, once from above, and then from the other side. If you glue the wire this way, you can avoid air bubbles, which have a natural tendancy to go upwards, through the glue.
Another method would be that you use a very soft wire, which you can form directly on the lip, and in this case you do not make slots, but just holes, a little biger than the wire, and so the glue could not go through the holes.
I have to try your idea with your egg box. Very clever one.
Recently I have used a similar squeeze tube glue, similar to yours, to glue in lips. It is a 10 min. epoxy, 2 components, transparent not clear, as I presume yours is. Don't know if it would be suitable to glue the twisted wires in. After cure, unlike most epoxies, it is still soft.

[diemai]

@ rofish

I can understand your concerns , but (to me) the glueing process is not as difficult and time-consuming , as it may seem to be !

It only takes about half-an-hour for four lures to be completed as shown on third picture(excluding screweyes) , since my glue starts to set quite fast , and you may already proceed with the next step , when its surface is still a little sticky , at this stage it won't flow anymore and stay in place !

For instance , when twisting in screweyes with that glue (I use pliers to hold them) , you won't do more than four at a time , rather more even three only .
For the fourth one the mixture would already have turned "jelly-like" , and you still need some time inbetween to wipe off excess around the eyes !

Sometimes I do fix the wire form in place with superglue before , but only if the slot and groove turned out to be too big , and the wire has too much loose play in it .
This way I avoid the toweye to possibly move into an improper position whilst the glue is curing .
But usually I don't like doing this too much , since the wire form never comes to sit snugly everywhere in the groove and into the bores at ends of groove , so this way described previously I can be sure , that the entire wire and groove are properly covered and filled with glue !

Superglue won't fill up every place as good as this glue shown , and if the wireform was fixed with superglue at first , the two-component glue would certainly not flow underneath it anymore to fill up every gap in the groove and bores !

Concerning airbubbles , these are not such a great problem , they even tend to occur more , when poking that wire piece or toothpick inside the slot for better pass of glue .
It's not like airbubbles sometimes occuring on clearcoats of lures , its rather more one single bigger bubble , that can be pinched open , when the glue is still fluid enough !

If the slot , where the eyelet passes through , is still big enough(most likely on larger lures) and has not been partly blocked with glue from the first step bonding the wire ends into the groove , the gravity of the fluid glue is often enough to fill up the entire slot , therefore I leave this "hump" on the tape , when masking the slot .
Poking in a toothpick only supports this flow .

And if not , I don't mind , its only a matter of minutes to apply a third mixture of glue to close the slot on the bellyside of lip .

But this way I am sure for myself , that I have created the most rigid bond possible , and since I make lures for my own pleasure and not to earn money with it , I really don't care about slower or faster proccessing that much , main thing is , that I am satisfied with what I am doing .

I don't quite understand , how you want to block the slots with pieces of wood , whilst applying glue ?
The glue would also bind this wood ! My plastic tape doesn't !

This glue , that I use , also does not cure to a rock-hard condition , but it has great strength .
But I lately found on a lure , made about 8 years ago , that it would turn yellowish after a long time !

Glad , that you like this "egg box rack" , I've been utilizing it for many years now .
Since there are different ones around , make sure to look for a box , that has extra deep cuppings on the underside between the single egg's compartments , these also hold many lureshapes in an upright position(f. e. for glueing in diving bills or screw eyes) !

Greetz , Dieter

[mark poulson]

Deimai,
Forgive an ignorant question. Obviously you've perfected you method, so it works for you.
But I can't help wondering why you wouldn't tack glue the wire in place, mask the line tie side, and glue from the back in one shot. From my uninformed point of view, this looks like it would be a heck of a lot simpler. Of course, I've never made a lure like yours, so I don't know all that's involved.

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

Off course I have considered to do it this way as well , maybe I have even already done it before , don't remember , though .

But I am simply scared , that after having fixed the shanks inside the bellyside groove with this two-component glue , masking the eyelet side might move the eyelet from its fit accidentally , when tape is pressed too hard sideward against wire eyelet , since I don't always wait too long for the glue to cure properly before making the next step .

And you can read in my previous reply to rofish , why I don't like using superglue for tacking the wireform too much .

This two-component glue only reaches a fraction of its full strength after , lets say 60 min. , and I already proceed after about 10 min. , than it just turned from a "jelly-like" to a firm , but yet sticky condition .
And I guess , I can't put any force on the bond at this stage .

The final strenght of that glue is achieved after 72 hrs. , after about 24 hrs. it has well over half of its strength .

I have already considered about trying a faster-setting glue , but than the processing time to achieve any fittings would surely be too short .

I hope , that I could make my reasons understandable , though surely not agreeable to everyone , but each one of us has his own preferred methods , but which neccessarely might not be the most practical ones to others !
Call this the freedom of the arts !

Greetz , Dieter

[mark poulson]

Diemai,
I figured you'd probably tried everything, and had good reasons for you method.
Different materials and designs require different methods, and it looks like you've found the method that works best for you lures.
I was just being nosey.