Leaderboard

I typically draw my own using paint. Once I get it the way I like I make a wooden pattern and add it to my box. I identify the pattern and keep a small journal to add thickness, wood species, weight, placement, etc.... when I build the bait until I get one dialed in. I routinely use a few "tools" when copying a bait.. .A bait in hand is usually where I begin and start the process. Destroying one is often needed but worth the effort in my opinion (unless $$$$ bait). I trace the bait and make adjustments to create my wood master template. I try to get everything laid out on the master for easy transfer of the pattern. I take some measurements and get the thickness of the material, depth of lip slot, etc... all worked out. Transfer to my board and cut out a set of blanks to make prototypes with and enter into my journal. At this point I end up taking some more measurements and get some contours worked out and transfer to another template. I will try to make notes and make some variances depending on the baits I have that work better. I will make one slightly smaller in the nose, lip angle slightly different, etc... and add these things to the journal. Often it doesn't make much difference but there are times that it ens up being very valuable information. I end up sealing the baits, weighting, and floating them in a small Tupperware bowl at my bench. I end up doing this to all baits and balance each one. I smash lead shot with a hammer into small wafers to add weight to fine tune after an initial "bulk" weight addition based on previous findings. Glue in my line ties, prep the baits, paint, glue in the bill and clear.

Many years ago I had carved my very first banana lure after a picture of a vintage timber "Lazy Ike" in a collectors book , ....only had the side view to work after , so I had to guess about how the lure would look when vieved from top or belly . Anyway , back then this particular lure spawned my fondness for banana lures , as it had produced a couple of overaverage sized pike within just a few sessions , ......and there were many more bananas to come to being under my carving knife ! Couple of months ago , ....I just could not help it , .......I had mailordered for a bigger used plastic "Lazy Ike" from US Ebay, was a good bargain , ...... ...obviously 20 years old or more , ........so now I could finally see , that my intial homemade version looked somewhat different to the original lure ! In a nutshell , .......you should not let such or similar concerns put you off , ......even if you might not be able to duplicate a bait in 1:1 scale this way , ....you might still create something entirely new and different , that still catches fish ! Cheers , diemai

Welcome to the tackleunderground , ......Ben had already told you , how to proceed , .....I'm gonna give you access to some templates you might probably be interested in , ...some of the sites are not in English , so you'd need to utilize a translator program , maybe ? http://wobblerbaujw.jimdo.com/schablonen#Schablonen Click on Terms like "Wobbler" , "Jerkbaits" and "Oberflächenköder" to access sketches , .....also by all means check out given links on bottom of page , some more interesting things to discover there . Here you can access templates for diving lips(Tauchschaufelschablonen) , ...on the right side there are fish templates for fotofinishes to download : http://www.mt-lures.de/download.html Some more templates for lureblanks and lips to be found in here : http://www.luremaking.com/catalogue/download_tips.htm You might also check out YouTube utilizing the search function with terms like "lurebuilding" or "luremaking" , .....you'd surely come across some fine instructional videos . happy carving , ...cheers , diemai