Ed Brabant

The only issue i see is what you said your problerm was. I was thinking was to drill 4 shallow holes in the bottom of the mold where the vent is on the stick bait. locating the holes on the center line of the bait. On the plate that would spin the mold drill a hole in the center line of the motor and put a dowel pin in the hole. Keeping the tollerances of the hole with in a few thousands of an inch. That way when the plate spins the pin spins concentric. Then its just move to the next hole and it should spin concentric. See I was a Tool maker for over 20 years. In all that time I really never needed to make anything for my self. Now i have moved into a position as a Designer. I have lost acess to a shop. But I need to make all kinds of little trinkets and tools for pouring. September is right around the coroner. Perhap i will take a night course so I can make all my stuff. I have been asking my buddy to do what I need now. But I hate to keep asking him. He won't take any money or anything.

Last night I was pouring multil colored swim baits and had some green and black left over. i decided to try and pour laminated stick baits. I took the 2 cups of plastic that I had. They are 1 cup pryex from wally world. i poured the 2 cups at the same time into the top of one of Del's 5 1/4 stick bait molds and i was plesantly surprised at the results. I had a 2 colored stick. now it was green and black but I did not see and color bleeding. I did try and pour the same amount and speed from each cup. After doing that and reading this post it made me think what if I was to turn the mold with a motor as I poured would I end up wiyh a swirl. I am almost out of plastic. I plan on oredering 5 gallons Wednesday. i am going to give it a try then.

To heat molds in the injection mold world above 212 F you can do it a few ways. You can electrily heat the mold. You can run steam or you can use oil. One place I worked at ran the molds @ 400 F. We used oil. It was called Paratherm. Very messy but held the heat for quite a long time.

The one that I made for my presto pt using motor 6142K45 from www.mcmastercarr.com worked great. i think the key was the paddle. It scrapes the bottom of the pot. It has staggered teeth on the bottom. One pass cleans up after the other. I have Friday off and I will take a few picture and post them. The only problem is the pot will only do one color at a time. i am picking a second micro wave off a lady at work tonight for $5.00. The last one was for free so I guess $5.00 won't break me. i also am picking up a double station hot palte. Brand new in the box for $20.00. thank you craigs list. I am hoping that with the plate I can keep the plastic hot but not burn for dipping tube stye swim baits. I am going to give that pre form for the swim bait a try tonight or Friday. Thanks.

I saw 3 or 4 on EBay for $20-30. That why I was asking. They did have the $200-500 ones as well.

Has anyone used the hot plates with stirrers? The ones like in a lab that heat and stir liquids?

I cut apart a Reaction Strike Fat Head Jr today and noticed that It is an injected molded part dipped into clear after the eyes and paint. The preform that creates the hollow center looks like a straight blade. It makes me wonder if one of the aluminum molds or one of the lure craft swim bait molds can have a straight peform as a side action in the mold. Something that can be pulled out while the bait is still warm. An ejector blade would work. What do you think? I think that Del would have a thought on this. Being an old Tool Maker I can visiualy see this in my mind. Well a 48 yeard old Tool Maker.

Pepsi can. Me and the wife ar drinking a red bull for the can. It actually dosn't taste that bad. I just took another sip and I changed my mind it's nasty. Reminds me of the stuff that cleans you out prior to an exam I had before.

I will take a few in the morning and post them.

Went out for bit tonight and threw one of the tube swimbait I made. The action was supurb. Caught 2 about 2 pounds a peice. Not a bad night short of not putting the plug in. As I was walking to the boat from parking the truck I realized that I did not put the plug in. I do this once a year so I guess I got that out of the way. The good thing is you can't sink a Ranger. And it was in the mid 80's so getting wet wasn't a problem.

The madness has started!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes he dose.

One of the biggest things you need to remember when fishing any top water baits is to have paitents. Most of the time when you miss a fish on a frog, rat or other topwater baits is you end up pulling the bait out of the fishes mouth. What I taught my son was when working a buzz style frog is count to 3 1-2-3 and set the hook. When you are in the slop hold the rod at 11:00 face your bait as you work the bait over pads , hydrilla, coon tail or what ever the cover is and when the fish hits lower the rod so it is pointing at the fish as you reel the slack in then set the hook. It is about the 1 2 3 count. I use a flipping stick with 65 pound braid when I fish through and around heavy cover. If you use braid that is that strong make sure you loosen your drag a bit. Braid will not strech. I have blown up 2 flipping sticks and my son 4 because the line won't strech. All the shock goes into the rod. And remember paitence. I would stick to the texas rig. If you are in open water you can put the eye of a trebble hook on your hook before you bury it in the body. That will act as a stingger hook. Good luck and remember paitence paitence paitence.

I just ordered a bunch of stuff from Del and they had Avacado I ordered 4oz of it. That was 2 weeks ago.

Now that I have the swim bait dip and the pouring into a lure craft 5x885 mold down some what, what type of eyes should I use? The tube style looks like it is a 2D eye where as the lure craft bait looks like it would take a 3D eye. Thanks.

I managed to make 4 "good" baits last night. It is technique technique technique. It only took 25 or so trys to get the 4. They were pretty much the last 4 I did . I am going to try the popcicle preforms like senkosam had posted about. If all else fails butter knives are pretty cheap.

Reheating isn't a problem? Do you use a microwave of pot?

I am sure someone has solved this problem and with post what they dip in. I just checked Craigslist and found a local Science teacher who is retire and has a bunch of lab stuff. Perhaps our answer lie there. I will keep you posted.

I am going to try the dipping of tube style swim baits again after reading all the tips that I could find on the site. The only problem I am seeing and having is the amount of plastic that I need to make a full dip on the preform. What I mean is the containers I have are 1 and 2 cup containers. That big forces me to fill up the cups to dip the entire lenght of the bait. Is anyone using something smaller in diamater but taller? So I can dip the full lenght with out having to fill a cup or more of plastic. I am not that good at it yet and I don't want to waste the plastic.

Put me down for a pound or two.

I am going to see about the clean up tonight. I left the last of my last pour in the pot. With the paddle mixing everything up so well I am hoping it will just peal out like Pryex containers. If not I guess I will have to reheat and wipe it out as I always do.

From what Del posted you don't want to be more that 60 rpm. I saw today mbroggi1 is selling them. Just do a search for presto pot and scroll down and there it is. Before I put the stirrer on the pot it was a royal pain stirring the plastic to prevent the glitter and salt from sinking. With the paddle that is not a problem. Also find that I get better flow from the plastic out the valve. For the swim baits I just poured the plastic into a Pyrex glass and poured the swim baits from that. Madness I tell you it's Maddness.

I finished the stirrer for my presto pot. No more stirring!!! I made the bottom similar to a saw tooth. I have 2 paddles and the tooth stagger from one blade scrapes what the other leaves. NO salt settels on the bottom. NO glitter settels on the bottom. Now I plan on making 2 more. And I bought 2 swim bait molds from lure craft. Now I am pouring swim baits. Poured 35 from old plastic. Finally got the procss down. And short of the color "looks like the land mines that the dog leaves in the yard." They look and react really good. What's next?????

I will give that a try tonight.

Tried dipping my preform last night. After 4 or so tries I would say the bait was a 3 out of 10 getting better. The problem I kept seeing was when I pulled the bait of the preform it would get messed up to say the least. Kind of when you pull the skin off the neck of a steamed clam. I tried doing it when it was warm and cold with the same results each time. I have a good finish on the pre form. I polished it with a 500 grit edm stone and all the tool marks are going with the direction that I want the bait to release. I am going to keep plugging away with it. And one other thing a presto pot is not the best to use for this. I will hit the yard sales this weekend and try and pick up a cheap microwave.