swimbait

I paint my bait first. However, on my hinges I have just one set of eye screws (twisted wire) for each section. I cut my slots into the bait and run a wire up throught the eyes. I paint and clear before ever putting the bait together though. I learned my lesson the first time when I got epoxy on my hinges. Its also much easier to paint each section separate(especially when doing scale patterns). After clearing, I put the bait together (run my wire up through the eye screws) and put a dot of epoxy over the wire hole. It blends in pretty good and you don't have the risk of ruining a bait and wasting the several hours it takes to get to that stage. Thats my worth. Hope this helps.

I paint my lures assembled, because I want the scheme to be uniform from one section to another, and I'm not a good enough painter to do them apart.

After they're painted, I take them apart, coat the insides of the joints with D2T epoxy, and then reassemble them, put them on the drying wheel, and top coat them with Nu Lustre 55.