Leaderboard

I got the idea of using real fish skin from another member who did it on this site. I throw back 99% of the fish I catch, but when I do keep one or two, it is to eat them. I prefer to use as much of the animal as I can when I do. I don't think deer are captured and released just to shave there tails for a buck tail. I was taught if you kill it, you eat it. I prefer to use as much of the animal as I can when I do.

They are trying to ban all lead fishing lures, weights and so on. http://keepamericafishing.salsalabs.com/o/6394/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=4058

Never met him but think Dick is one of the good guys. You need to understand the situation. He sells custom formulated lure finish to us at a discount, as a favor to TU builders. His priority business is manufacturing spoons and selling finish at retail. So if he's slow to respond or doesn't have a slick order/payment process for these special orders, it may not be ideal but he's not being inconsiderate. Dick tends to save up TU orders and process them as a batch when he has the time to spare.

Hey Vic, My pleasure. CaptSully is the one who told me how to do it and I'm just passing it on. He said he finished a can of DN and took the lid off to have a look inside. Not one bit of it had gone bad. good luck, Ben

If you plan on "tapping the can" the best thing to do is never take the lid off. Just turn the can upside down and on the side at the top (which is now the bottom facing up) poke a small hole with an ice pick or other sharp object. Make your hole just big enough to get a sheet metal screw started and the screw will make whatever size hole it needs. I used the sheet metal screws like they use on metal roofing. They have a rubber gasket with a flange washer behind the gasket so it forms a water tight seal. While the can is upside down I also sprayed some Bloxygen into the can through the small hole I had just poked in the side. This leaves a blanket of Bloxygen on top of the DN inside the can. When doing the tapping process think of what an Igloo water cooler looks like. This is essentially what you'll be doing except that you'll have a screw for a "valve". Ben

I don't think there are a lot, but do a search here for threads about weights. I am no lure master builder, but I can copy anything, and do. Successful lures have already solved most of the problems, and I can do variations of the type of lure, once I've learned how to make that style. I typically take a lure that I like, and try to simulate it's floating characteristics by floating it in my bucket of water to see how it sits. I keep my ballast as low as possible, no matter what kind of lure I'm making. For me, there are several "rules of thumb" I follow: For topwater walking baits, I want the tail to sit lower in the water than the head. The smaller the lure, the lower it should hang. 2" poppers and 4" walking baits hang down at 75 degrees. Big baits, like 7" punker knockoffs, hang almost horizontal, with the top of the head out of the water, and the rear 2/3s barely awash. The deeper the tail sits, the harder it is to walk a bait. Small baits are easy to cast and fish, and need the extra weight to walk properly, so hanging down a lot is okay. Big baits walk fine with less hang down because they are already heavy. Too much hang down in them makes walking them a brutal exercise, instead of fun fishing, because you have to fight too much water resistence if they hang low. For cranks, I try to have them hang down head first at about a 20 degree angle+-. A lure with a bill (or lip) needs to get that bill digging into the water as quickly as possible, so it will dive to it's designed depth fast, and be more effective longer. I usually use a store bought crank that's similar, and copy how it sits. Rapala DT lures are a great model to follow. I always add the ballast weight between the front hook hanger and the lip, and as low as possible. For jointed swimbaits, I try to keep the ballast as far forward as possible. I add it first to the front section, and then in the second, if needed, but never in the tail. Having the tail buoyant is the key to getting a good, horizontal swimming action at low speed. How much ballast to add depends on how you want the lure to float, or sink. I shape the lure, add the hinges, hooks, and line tie, and float test it to see how much ballast I need in order to achieve the floating/sinking I want. I hang egg sinkers and split shots from the tines of the front treble to figure out how much ballast a lure needs, and then match that amount of weight with my 1/4" lead wire that I use for the actual ballast. This is just what works for me. There are lots of different methods that work great. But this should give you somewhere to start. Good luck.