GonefishingAZ

I just heard back from Doug at Upper Hand Scents. He said that their Anise based scents seem to be absorbed by soft plastic faster than any of their other scents. I don't mind it, as long as the bait retains the scent and flavor.

I'm not using any salt in my baits and I am using laminated bags from DELW. I am just trying to keep the bait looking good in the bag. I was adding worm oil to the bag, but a lot of the TU members said they only used scent and worm oil in the bag wasn't necessary.

This may have been discussed before, but I figured I'd ask. I'm using Upper Hand Scent in my soft plastic prior to pouring. I then add scent to the completed worms once in the bag. In 2-3 days all the scent in the bag appears to be absorbed by the worms. Has anyone experienced this? Do I need to continually add scent to the bag until used?

I just freehanded a mold using sculpting tools from the craft store. I thought about using the dremel, but was a little afraid of cutting to deep. I just poured a 1.5 -1.75 inch pop block, drew my design on it and slowly started carving it. Turned out pretty good for my first try. Mind you it is only a 7" ribbon tail worm but I'm sure if you took your time you could carve a Liz.

Here is an exaple of the worm I was talking about earlier. Westy Worms : Lobina Lures!, Discover the Secrets of Professional Bass Anglers

The only other option would be to insert the hooks after the bait was poured. In Arizona a lot of people fish with finesse worm that has double hooks. Westy made them and a company called Press-ur-bite lures made them for a while before being bought out by Lucky strike. They were originally made by placing the worm on a light jig head and then threading a strait shank hook with a piece of 12 lb mono throught the tail and attaching the line to the hook on the jig head. The newer versions of the westy apears to be poured around the second hook with the leader embedded in the worm body. As for the jig head, I think that could be done away with and a regular or standard wide gap hook could be used for the front hook. You may want to look these types of worms up, maybe it will help with your design idea.

I just thought of another strange one for me. We were fishing a little urban lake as kids, we'd caught several gills and had them on a stringer. One of our group dropped the entire string into the lake before securing it, losing all our fish. About 10 mins later i get bit, only to find that one of the fish still on the stringer was still hungry or greedy enough to bite my bait even with the nylon stringer running through it mouth and gill. All the fish were still attached.

Up to this point I've only tried making molds from PoP. I

Will do, thanks Nova.

Actually Vodkaman, I got the other mold to pour with only a couple small chips. So, I decided I’d mix up a little PoP and try to fill the chips and then sand it to match the mold. Little did I know, as soon as the wet PoP touched the cold mold it would set instantly. I waited a few hours and then tried to take some of the PoP off with a dremel. Rookie mistake, I gouged the mold pretty bad so I trashed it. The wax idea worked well, but was more work than it was worth. Had it been a more elaborate design I would be much more upset. In this case it was just a basic paddle tail worm. Oh yeah, I also used double sided take instead of super glue on this one and it made separation much easier.

I finally got one right. I took the advice of TU members and was able to produce a usable mold, I HOPE!!! I still need to dry it completely and seal it. Then I get to pour some plastic. I was about to call it quits on the PoP molds and just buy some molds from DELS, which I will probably still do. Not baking the Sculpey was the best thing I could have done, could have saved me a lot of frustration on the previous 3 tries. Oh well, now I

The best I've done is a Bull Frog on a Sluggo. Last year my brother caught a 20+ Lb. soft shell turtle in Fla. on a 7" Power Worm. Hooked it through the foot.

Ok, I added more wax and repoured it. I also made a couple new designs with Sculpey and I didn't bake them this time. I'm going to let them sit over night and see how they turn out after work tomorrow.

I waited 12 hours to remove this mold. I will not be baking Sculpey anymore when making one piece molds. Oh well, It was worth trying. At least is was a very simple design.

I tried using some wax around the bottom of my master that was glued in place as VODKAMAN suggested. Couldn

I do have some beeswax so I will give that a try. Thanks again Vodkaman. I'm glad I didn't chuck the thing in the trash.

Thanks for the advise Vodkaman. I hadn't thought about using wax. Is there a particular type that I should look for?

The POP poured perfect only a couple small bubbles and perfectly smooth. However, I destroyed the mold. Looks like i didn't sand the flat side of the baked Sculpey worms enough and the plaster slightly wrapped around the masters. To top it off I used too much super glue and the worm masters are stuck to my mold tray.

Thanks for the advice Nova, I'm so new to this and I don't want to mess it up. That being said, I'm sure the only way to get good is to make some mistakes and learn from them. I'm just glad to have TU to make the learning curve a little less steep. You mentioned that you seal your mold reservoirs with epoxy and I believe I read in another post that you thin it with alcohol?

I was hoping it would give it a smoother finish and maybe keep it from sticking when used in a PoP mold.

Can baked Sculpey be sealed with Krylon gloss clear coat?

What is the best product to seal plaster molds? I

Well, It sounds like I might be better off using my own design to avoid and copy right or patent issues.