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Thanks for pointing that out. Makes sense. May even make the blade start quicker.

They look nice. I am not sure if I am seeing the swivel correctly in your pics. You may want to put the swivel the other way especially if you will do any bottom hopping with those baits. I usually put the rotating end of the swivel towards the back to reduce the dirt and lake snot the can get into the swivel and shorten its life span. The non-rotating fixed end of the swivel will be in the front and they is no way particles can get into that side.

I prime with Rustoleum Self Etching Primer, and don't have an adhesion problems.

Building your prototype out of waterproof material like PVC decking speeds up the testing process, because you don't have to worry about water intrusion every time you make a change. Once you have a lure that works, you can duplicate it in whatever building material you like, so only have to fine tune it before you paint and finish it.

I don’t think there is a practical way to design lips without iterative testing and modification. Lips don’t work by themselves. They are attached to a bait and the whole assembly, its shape, weight, and balance determines how it will swim and how deep. The shortcut I use is to copy a commercial bait i like exactly, and then customize the copies one after another to get different and perhaps better performance characteristics. Going through that process will teach you a lot about bait design.