scoop10

actually, I know a good friend of Jerry's and just talked to him about a number of things he does. He is not doing any foam molds. He is using some foam-type material and is cutting it with a router just like the wood baits. I know that he has been making these baits for about three years because I talked to Jerry about it at the Raleigh winter fishing show three Decembers ago, and bought one from him. He said then he was doing it to have something different, and at that time was pushing them. He has also begun cutting Lexan with a press, rather than having someone make him some injection molded lips. I haven't seen any of the baits with the lexan lips, but he has actually sent some of the lips my way.

you can get about the same compressor at Wal-Mart for about the same money. THink your link on the airbrush is incorrect. Same link as compressor. If its the 9.99 deal with a minimum 1/4 line, you will have trouble with detail, but for that price it should be a fun starter gun.

Well, I will tell you that the thing that really got me to making baits was: _ I had been bass fishing for years. _ I saw the site of a "custom" baitmaker (many of the posters here make far, far better baits) and thought, I can do that. _ I bought a Dremel for another project. _ I got to playing around with a Dremel and a piece of wood. Today, I own a band saw, a belt sander and a drill press. But I could do all the same things I do with those with the Dremel, it would just take longer.

and did you see this link there? http://www.tacklemaking.com/tacklemakers/default.php?content=autopsy good stuff

I don't know what they have for $25, but you may outgrow it fairly quick. I would invest in a legitimate double-action airbrush - a Pasche, Badger or Awata - that you can find at a local hobby shop. You'll also need a compressor, but the 2-gallon types they sell at Wal-Mart are cheaper and probably better than those hobby types (even if they are louder.) createx is a good paint, although there are many others.

oh yeah, you will probably want the .063 thickness, although the .094 might be OK.

go to mcmaster-carr at mcmaster.com, put in "polycarbonate" into the search and choose the size sheets you want and number. I bought 6 sheets of 24" x 24" for $66 ($11 per). That's 24 square feet, which is less than the 4' x 8' sheet, but a lot easier to initially handle.

BTW Skeeter, you ever thought of trying to have Lexington declared the crankbait capital of the world. I may be heading that way sometime soon to hang out with another lure maker.

Spence is a good guy to deal with. Many of the Z-4s and Z-3s definitely have crooked bills. I have still caught fish on them. For whatever reason, they are fish-catching machines. My own theory is that the lexan lips, combined with a fairly small profile bait, give it a little bit more action that fish like. I made a bait pretty close to the Z-4, but lost it on Harris a few weeks ago on only my second trip throwing it. Now I am working on a batch of about 20 of them. Won't be having that problem next time.

water base is better, but it's harder to find. The problem you will run into with the oil or shellac based primers is that they come out thick when it is cold. Then again, I work in an unheated work shed.

you were sick before you started staring at that white crankbait, admit it.

thanks for the info guys. So Tuff-Tackle, how much did the press itself cost, and how is it powered?

Anyone have any experience cutting polycarbonate lips with any kind of a stamp press? Will it actually cut with such a press? A buddy says he can get me a hand press that will produce 500 lbs of pressure, but I'd have to get a machine shop to create the dies. I don't really know anything about these kinds of presses, so any advice would be appreciated.

kellure and sporilla here do customluresunlimited.com. Not sure what you are looking for, or what you want to pay, but most custom lure painters charge $10 or more for lures because it is time-consuming work. If you are talking really intricate detail, you are probably looking at some combination of paint and decal.

squigster, you make a round bait by tracing out the profile on one side of the block of wood, and then the other dimension of the bait (looked at from top or bottom) on the top (or bottom) of the block of wood. Cut out the profile, and as others here have told me, the lip slot. Then use some masking tape to retape the pieces of the block of wood back together. Then do your other cut, and you've got a 3-D cut bait. I use a Dremel to sand it down from there, but recently bought a belt sander (works great for lips), so I may see how that works. On more tip: I've got this tool, not sure what it is called, but it is for carpenters to trace out odd shapes. It is roughly 40 or 50 metal pins run through a piece of solid plastic. The pins move independent of each other, sliding through the plastic, as you apply pressure, allowing you to push it against a 3-D object (like a round lure) and create a single curved line which you can trace.

No offense meant cullin8s. I've seen your stuff, and the paint jobs are spectacular. But I see lure-making, just like weaving or boat building, as craft, not art. That's not to take anything away from great craftsmen, which have been much more important to civilization than artists, since their products have a utilitarian purpose. Now, back to patents. Rockhopper, I'm not surprised there have been many patent infringement case involving fishing lures. What I would wonder about is how many have been successful, and I am talking a successful suit, not lawyer intimidation here. Certainly if Skeeter sued Ranger, the outcome must not have been very successful. Same for Slug Go, since there must be two dozen soft jerkbaits on the market today. Also, wasn't there a landmark patent case involving Heddon lures, in which it successfully defended itself against patent infringement? My understanding of patent law is that any improvement to an existing product can be patented. And that for any patent to be issued it has to have a new or novel idea. When there is nothing new or novel about a chunk of wood with a diving lip attached to it, and as long as what you are producing is slightly different than anything else on the market, I have a hard time seeing how you could be successfully sued. Obviously, a lot of the stuff you make involves new ideas, so I can see how they could easily be infringed upon. I am no attorney, but it would seem that infringing on 95 percent of the hard baits out there would be pretty difficult without actually creating an exact template of them.

First of all, lure makers aren't artists. I don't care how good your stuff is, your lures do not inspire people to think beyond themselves, make a political statement or make you believe in something greater than yourself. If you are good, you are a craftsman. Second, if any of this patent stuff matters, Gary Yamamoto should be one rich guy. He should be able to sue every Senko knockoff out there. Yet, I see more and more of them on the shelves every day. How is that? How about all the Cenitpede knockoffs? What about the Poe's knockoffs, like the Z-4? But then again, wasn't Poe's a knock off of the Mann's and the Rebel deep divers? And how about the Rat-L-Trap? Wasn't that a knockoff of the Cordell Spot? And wasn't the Pop-R a knockoff of the Abrogast popper? Sorry, no matter what the law says, it is obvious how the law is being interpreted: If you make any slight modification to an existing lure design, you obviously can get away with a knockoff. And as for being "morally" wrong, I guess we'll just have to live with that, along GM, Dodge, Skeeter, OMC, Zoom and Lucky Craft.

skeeter, don't mean to hijack the thread, but since you mentioned this ...curious why you and many custom bait makers install the lip after painting. The downside, to me, would seem to be getting uneven epoxy on the paint and then having to try to get it off without hurting your paint job. On the other hand, putting the lip in before painting, you have deal with primer and paint on the lip. The baits I've done to date (just a few), I've put the lips in before painting. Right now I've got about five jerkbaits, five Bagley's type alphabets and two Poes type lures sanded and sealed, and ready to paint and put the lips in, so I'm curious about whether I should change my process.

On the Poe's 400, Z-4 and Rapala DTs, all the lips are formed so that they follow the contour of the bait as they enter the bait. (essentially cut with sort of an hourglass figure, with none of the lip protrouding from side of the bait.) On the lip patterns I've seen to cut Lexan, if you cut the typical lip for a deep-diving crankbait, you will have some lip sticking out from the sides around the nose of bait. Are there any disadvantages to having some of this overhang around the nose? How will the action vary between having the straight taper or cutting the lip so that it follows the contour of the bait?

Instead of Windex, try window washer fluid (like goes in your car). Essentially same stuff and cheaper. Guy I bought my airbrush from suggested this, and I have been using it ever since.

TRChad, unless the baits are really pocked or cracked, don't pull the old finish off of them. As suggested, just rough them up with some fine sand paper (180 or 220 grit). This is the best way to ensure an even finish. First baits I ever painted, I stripped down to the wood. Big mistake.

Bought some .051 wire from Janns. Stuff seems too big for making hook hangers and lips. Looking for suggestions on what size wire to use for these jobs and where to find it.

I have a Badger hobby compressor, maximum 28 lbs psi. Wondering whether the psi is too low to do quality lure painting. Stuff I've done so far isn't bad, but a far cry from what I see on here. Seem to have a hard time getting soft, blended edges. If psi too low, looking for compressor suggestions.

Do the guys using this stuff say that its consistency allows for dipping?

First one: Any thoughts on making the lip cut on a round bait. Should I be doing this before I do the other cuts? Problem, I think, is if I do this, I won't be able to keep the bait together to make all four of the other cuts. But if I do it after rough cutting the bait on the band saw, how can I make sure I make a uniform, straight cut all the time? Second one: Any thoughts on putting a small screw eye in a lip rather than using a wire tie. This would seem a lot easier, though I suppose it could come out, especially with thinner Lexan.