Tiderunner

This is the most awesome colored craw I have ever seen. I doubt you could get any more realistic if you were using live crawfish! I cannot make out what colorants you used. Any chance you'd care to share the recipe?

Welcome aboard new guy! After years of using laminate plates, I bought a dual injector as a Christmas gift to myself. My advice. Go with the best you can afford. Make sure your injectors have locking nozzles. I have the dual from Fat Guys Fishing. It takes a lot of pressure to inject my molds. If they weren't locking, I'm sure they'd shoot right off making a dangerous mess.

I'm wondering if there were a way we could have a network to help our international members get the supplies they need at a lower cost by having us order for them, and then mailing it to the members? It might help them save some money. Small orders wouldn't weigh too much, so shipping shouldn't be that bad, Nor would customs fees. Remember..This is just a thought.

yup, that would certainly work. The only advantage the the Plum dye and a drop of black would have over the Black Plum would be that you could control the amount of darkening made by black. The Black Plum advantage is it removes the guesswork.

I'm a little late to the dance here, but I not only remember these floating plastics I still have a couple of packs. There was a time when Power Worms came in a true floating variety. We used these to throw over lily pads and floating weed beds. Dang things were deadly in the summer. Then Berkley changed these to a suspending worm, even though they were still called floating. No bueno. The sunk in the weeds and with every cast you'd bring in about a half acre of salad back with you. Next up, Bass Pro had some sort of floating worms and lizards. Only around for a little bit. So what to do. Keep searching. We ended up buying these Air Worms The looked as though they were the spawn of Leggos. French Fry was my preferred. After a few casts, they would start to sink. Reel "em in and squeeze the water out and then good as new. Eventually the lack of finding floating anything is what led me to start pouring my own. Bought a couple of silicone molds from Barlows. Some floating plastics, some bubbles, and chartreuse coloring. And we were back in business. It has to be over 30 years since I used those Air Worms. Nowadays I still make my own floating worms and lizards. Although a much better quality. Only colors made were white. pink, and chartreuse. Weird but each color worked only on specific bodies of water. Learned by trial and error. This year I plan to add black to my selection with maybe some glow parts for night fishing Getting back to French Fry. I'd imagine they can be duplicated very easily. Just takes imagination. I like the bead chain idea. On the floating worms I made, I wanted one with a cupped head to act like a popper. Only had to put a backwards bullet sinker. Imagination.

The plum dye is close. But it might need a tiny bit of black. Like a pin head drop. The emerald green flake is spot on. If you want a bit more flash try a sparkle green flake along with the emerald green. Note that plum dye will will bleed into other colors as will most colorants with the word dye in the name.

The bass pro was Don Iovino.

Yup I have a pack on hand. 7" Power Worms. The worms I have seem to be a single color, Yet depending on what angle or lighting you see them in it may have a red highlight, then a green. While the bait remains clear with red and green flake. Not sure how old the oxblood pigment I have is. It's at least 6 years old. Definitely not 20. I bought it specifically to duplicate the camo color from the recipe page. And to make some oxblood colored worms from an old style worm that was pretty awesome at catching fish. The oxblood was perfect for that. Definitely not the Camo color I'm trying to make. That pic is a laminate. Maybe Berkley changed their recipe? Got the baits in hand. Just can't seem to get it to where I want. It's like 2 different highlight colors in one bait. I may try to take a photo of the actual bait but I doubt a photo will show the proper coloring.

Nope. Clear with small red and medium black. Somewhat cloudy probably from salt. When wet it takes on a pink cast. When it first came out we called it shrimp. Camo is definitely not a laminate at least in power worms. It is almost a transparent root beer? With green highlight? It changes color depending on how you look at it. The saltwater big stuff is definitely a laminate. Who knows maybe Berkeley changed the recipe and it’s now a laminate? The problem with the o blood is it’s not transparent at all so lightening it won’t help. It will just look like lighter mud. Man!I wish I could remember what bass pro made the lures I used made in o blood.

It does, but I'm only mixing at most two cups of plastic, maybe four if I'm making laminates. I'm also using a lot of salt and glass beads. The stickbaits are nice and soft and wiggly and cast a mile. I make mine at around 12grams I fish a lot of deep water.

I don't think it's a laminate. I think my problem is the oxblood colorant. The one I am using is an old Lurecraft colorant. It's more of a muddy color. I used this to make what was once called fat boys, though I can't remember the bass pros name attached to it. Heavy with salt, and deadly. I've still been researching and I see Lureworks has a translucent oxblood. That may be the difference. This damn camo color is one of the only two to ever beat me. The other is Yamamoto 197. A clear with medium black, and small red flake. With just a slight cloudiness to it. Most likely from salt. I can come almost close, but I'm trying to prefect it as that is one of my favorites. Also I had Yamamoto perch down, and they go and change it! Still the original catches fish. Until I can perfect 197, and camo I'll just buy a few packs every season.

Lure Parts Online is showing MF Supersoft. and Sinking Soft on their site. Their price is a bit more expensive than buying direct from MF.

That’s approximately 21oz per gal. Which seems like an awful lot. Keep in mind that’s is what I use for heavily salted plastic

I doubt if this will help as I’m a small potatoes bait maker . But when I’m making baits that I want super so Senkos in particular, I use 1oz softener to approximately 6 oz of salted plastic. This makes the baits super floppy and super soft. And I preftmy stickbaits and wacky worms super soft. Again not much help, but maybe with a whole lot of math it’s a starting point.

This. ^. I've been suing the same two pairs of sprue cutters from barlows not only for lead, but for my tin bismuth as well. I'm probably going on 20 years. Everything from 1/8oz up to 20oz. Although at times the bending back and forth with a pliers works pretty well too. When trimming lead with the Barlows cutters, the sprues just fall. When cutting tin, those suckers go flying! Usually one or two quick passes with a file, or a high grit sand paper should do the job. I pass the head over the sandpaper, or just pass an aggressive file over the jig or weight or whatever. One or two passes should not create dust. I think if you go nuts sanding and filing , then, yeah. You'll create dust.