halibaitor

How about using the tall, skinny candle things that are made of glass. I've seen them in the $1 stores. The glass in them should be able to stand the heat from the melted plastic.

There is a timing issue here other than when the patent was issued. The patent coverage actually began when the patent procedure was STARTED. That can be several years prior to the patent actually being issued. This is why you will often see the phrase "patent pending" on a product. Proving anything is really tricky. That is because of lawyers and only benefits the lawyers. The patent office is VERY careful to NOT give any legal advice, as they don't want to be sued. This makes it difficult to get any information other than how to look something up. They can't even help you with the concept of "what something means." It's frustrating, but that's the way it is... Asking them legal questions is a waste of time. Terry

One solution you might try is to just repair a bait by melting the damaged areas and fusing them back together. Use a hot knife or cigarette lighter, whatever works best for you.

I'm kinda lazy, so I just add a chunk of an old white grub. Like the kind you get in a package of 10 for $2 at Wally World. That makes the milky opaque appearance, and costs almost nothing...

And that brings up an interesting question. Are we real sure that the whole 5 gallons of plastic was mixed well when the one gallon was taken out of it??? If it wasn't, it will be VERY difficult to get the right consistency from your pours... I know that's a nasty thought, but.....

I started on the same quest a year or so ago. The only way I could come close to what I wanted was to forget the coloring and just add a lot of plain silver glitter in the .008 size. Nothing else I tried could give me the flash I wanted... I'm using one tsp. glitter for 2 ounces of plastic.

I tried melting them down, I wouldn't recommend it. The potency is ONLY in the liquid absorbed in the material, and it evaporates too easily. What I have been doing with moderate success, is super-gluing plastic tails onto the gulp bodies. The gulp curly tails don't swim worth beans anyhow.

The whole idea of using the petroleum jelly (PJ)is that you want it to be thick. Thinning just makes it fall off in the water faster. The stickier the better. Carry a rag to wipe your fingers on. I mix it as follows: Take a small amount of PJ, 1/2 ounce or so, and start stirring in your scent, a few drops at a time. When it starts to get runny then mix just a little more PJ to stiffen it up again and you're done. I keep mine in an old 35mm film canister. It's easy enough and seems to work well. Terry

The chunks were very tiny and went through the cheesecloth, and I don't have a way to distill the oil so I gave up on adding that gunk to the plastic. The next paragraph tells you where I used it. I don't have water in the mix. I do mix whatever I like the smell of with unscented petroleum jelly to make my own version of "Smelly Jelly". That seems to work very well and doesn't cost a fortune like the commercial products. Using this method, I get an anchovy gel that actually smells like anchovies. This is probably what you want to do. BTW, the Pro Cure oils seem to work as well as what I made. I'm sure glad there are some saltwater fishermen here. mattlures: I'm with you. The scent in the plastic doesn't seem to be effective. Adding it to the outside of the lure is a little messy, but seems to work very well. I actually have some uni-butter, but haven't had a chance to use it yet. I got it for halibuts, however I suspect that it is only good for bass.

Closet?? It's taken over half of my kitchen... I've tried making my own "oils". It's a lot harder than you would think. It's too easy to just buy some. My biggest problem is the small chunks that are mixed in with the oil portion. They cause discoloration. The two oils I mentioned above don't have the chunks and seem to do the job nicely. I like the anchovy one the best. It's a small world, isn't it??? Actually I have been here for quite a while. I had to "start over" when the site went down a while back. Terry

Try these guys... http://www.pro-cure.com/oil.html The herring or anchovy oils might be what you are looking for.

Nice looking lure...I really like the BIG eyes.