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I use the LPO .092" stainless screw eyes or make my own screw eyes from stainless lock/safety wire from Malin or US Wire purchased on Amazon. If there will be 2 screw eyes or the bait is under 2 oz, I go will with .051" twist wire. If it will be a heavier bait with one twist screw eye, I go with .062" twist wire eye. https://www.lurepartsonline.com/-092-Magnum-Screw-Eyes On small baits if I am using the LPO screws, I use the .072" stainless screw eyes and the 1.5mm rods, .062" shaft wire, or cut section of a nail for the pins. Those 2 mm stainless rods are very hard. I use a hack saw and vice to cut them to length. I file the ends smooth before installing them in the bait. Using a Dremel on these can be very dangerous. Cut off disks have a tendency to explode on those rods.

I will often use scissors to cut my own pattern stencils out of lamination sheets. Not the most clean or user friendly but gets the job done in a pinch. My brother owns a laser engraver for leather work, so I picked up some mylar sheet to try laser cutting. I’m hoping this will allow me to make trout dot stencils customized and sized specifically for my baits.

I found some brass rods on Amazon I cut down for pins, but I make swimbaits. For smaller baits I use SS wire.

I was hoping the 'over-fill' method would work, so thanks for confirming that, as the weighing the correct amount would get very tedious in a hurry. I look forward to some pics of your methods. Dave

Hi Dave, Thanks for useful input! 1 - Yes, it is too thick to pour. My solution so far has been to overfill both sides of the mold and clamp it together whilst hot. Some times emerged in hot water, if I am too slow. That way I don't get bubbles or voids. The metal mold holds heat well so it helps. I then cut away the excess plastic after cooling. (it can be re-melted, so hardly any loss) 2 - I don't really need air pockets for this bait, a sinking bait is fine. But if I was I was thinking about attaching floating, hard foam beads to the wire. 3 - I agree, not a method suited for production, but that's not my goal. I guess you could mold 8-10 baits per hour with this method if you really tried. Possibly more. Not that I am going try

This is interesting stuff, I am tempted to buy a kilo just to keep around for any future projects. There are a few problems with our application: 1 - It is too thick to pour or inject, so that means weighing an exact amount and pressing into the mold halves and closing, avoiding any bubbles or voids. 2 - The density of 1.145g/ml makes it heavier than water, so a hollow center has to be included in the mold. This means molding two halves separately. 3 - Too slow for production, but fine for own use. A 3D printed mold might work well, the flexibility will help assembling the two halves. My post reads a bit negative, but this could be fun to work with. Problems can be solved. Dave

buy the wife a crikt. make all the stencils you'd ever need. win win

I've found texture and pattern sheet stencils on Ebay, Amazon, AliExpress, Spraygunner and Coast Airbrush. If you want to make your own for a specific bait, check out Dakota Lakes Tackle on Youtube. He shows how to make vacuum stencils pretty easy. I find the blank stencil material at Hobby Lobby. Cut an appropriate size piece of blank stencil, place over the bait on the vacuum bed, heat with a heat gun until softened and kind of melty, then turn on the vac and suck the softened stencil material down around the bait. Once cooled for 30 secs, remove the stencil from the bait and cut in your pattern or design. I will make extra stencil molds of a bait to cut up to make masks for certain parts of the bait. I cut out the face and gill plate, and also the pec fin. These cut out pieces are your masks. I place a small piece of doubled over painters tape on the inside of the mask to hold in place on the bait. Then place my scale netting over and spray. Heat set the paint and remove the stencils or masks. The mask keeps the scale pattern from appearing on the face, gills and pec fin. Then you can use the piece of stencil you cut the pec fin out of and use it to mask the rest of the bait when painting the pec fin and keep things looking clean. The mesh material can be found at Walmart, Hobby Lobby and your local fabric store. Fabric store will have the largest selection, search for "Tulle". I use the knitting or embroidery hoops to hold the mesh tight and place over the bait to spray thru. Make sure any stencil is as tight to the bait as possible to keep overspray and bleeding to a min. Lower spray pressures help also. Hope this helps...

I am using the Trokar Swimjig mold for my chatterbaits and just love it! I just ordered some bigger blades and want to try attach them to a 3/4 ounce football head for deep summer fishing, has anyone tried this on a football head mold to see if it will work?

The football head makes a good chatterbait or should I say "bladed jig" to keep the lawyers at bay...LOL!! I personally prefer the Trokar swim jig, but the football head is liked by those who want that knocking sound to be front and center. I've used it and what I can tell you is this, the swim jig head is nice and erratic and works being pulled though sparse sections of grass, the fooball head is erratic but a little less so, it takes more speed to get the same action as the swim jig. Where it shines is noise, you'll quickly notice how much contact the blade is making with the head as the ends of the football head will be chipped pretty well, and this is with the blade attached by split ring. If you are using a regular eye football head and attaching the blade direct to the hook eye I don't thing there would be enough blade movement for it to be worthwhile using but on a split ring it does make some noise.