Skeeter

Man, where do you come up with this stuff??????? Hookface is great!!!!!!!! Some folks have all of the imagination. I could never begin to come up with such ideas. I have to start putting the same mushrooms on my steak that you do!!!!!!! Really great looking baits. Really excellent skill in your work. Skeeter

Mylures, I think they are beautiful and very unique. The different colors of the laminates really add to it. Where do you find this laminated wood? What types of woods make up the laminate that you are using? It looks to be pretty dense stuff. How do you like the way they fish? Skeeter

This is a good, but tough question. Of all of the woods that I have tried, I would say that balsa is the most forgiving. It is so bouyant that you can really vary the weight in the bait and still have it work properly. I have had the same thing that you are talking about happen to baits that I have made out of hardwoods. So first I would recommend that you make the lure out of balsa. To make an "All Season" crankbait, I would take the water temperature in a test bucket down to about 60 deg. Drill a hole about 1/4 inch dia. in the belly of the lure. Just slide the lip in the slot of the bait. You don't have to glue it in....just sit it in there. Put a weight in the hole and set it in the water. You want the water line to sit at least half way up the bait. The tip of the lip has to be under the water line so that the bait will start to dig as soon as you start the retrieve. Push down on the bait and watch it rise. If it comes up fairly well then that will work. If it comes up slow then I would lessen the amout of weight. If you are going to throw that bait in 40 or 45 deg. water, then it may suspend or come close to it. You want a good medium steady rise. If it comes up real fast then add some weight. You can do this without the wood being painted or protected. What many people don't know is that balsa does not absorb water. It is used to line welding tanks for that reason. It does get alittle heavier due to the water getting in the pores of the wood, but it will not get wet to the core like other woods will. As you do this remember that you will be adding the weight of the clearcoat to the bait. So if the bait is real close, then the weight of the clearcoat will change the baits floating ability. Cold water is denser than hot. This is the reason for the change in the baits floating ability. Regardless of how you weight the bait while doing it in the colder water, the bait will rise very quickly when the water hits the 80 to 95 deg. mark. Ask all of the questions that you want. That is what we are all here for. Skeeter

If you are shooting lacquer paint then you can use epoxy as a sealer. Water based paint does not consistantly stick to epoxy. Sometimes it will work and sometimes it won't. Most of the time, it won't. I use polyurathane like Coley. Minwax make a thin quick drying polyurathane that has worked for me real well. It is not as thick as regular polyurathane and does not need to be stirred before using it. You can get it anywhere. It comes in a silver wrapped can. Skeeter

I use water based paints also. I use regular water based white latex house paint as an undercoat. I use a coat of polyurathane as a sealer. I use Devcon for my clear coat, so I do not worry about water getting to the paint. I use the polyurathane to just fill some of the pores of the wood so that my undercoat does not soak into the wood. Most of us have painted something and it looked covered. Then when you come back after it has dried you can see the wood grain through it. This is because the paint soaked into the wood. Some folks use sanding sealer for sealing their wood. However, it does not work with latex paint. The paint will peel off and/or blister. Lacquer is not hard to shoot. It is actually easier than createx. Usually 1 part thinner to 3 parts paint is a good way to mix. I use acetone as a thinner. You can control Lacquer much better than any water based paint that I have used. It dries very quickly and you can get alot of painting done in a short period of time. It covers well and it takes very little paint to do the job. The colors are really pretty also. I would just use white lacquer paint for the under coat and possibly sanding sealer to seal the wood. You can put the sanding sealer on with a brush and then sand the wood some. It will give you a very slick surface on balsa. You WILL need a respirator to shoot lacquer. If you don't you are a fool. If lacquer paint gets in your lungs it will not dissolve and pass out of the body. It is there to stay. And it can dammage you. I am going to invest in a respirator with a mask that has eye protection also. Folks may laugh, but when you are spraying thinner through your airbrush to clean it, it comes out in an extremely fine mist. It floats around everywhere. Your eyes need protection from this stuff also. I don't do alot of painting like Hughsey does. But I think alot of us would be suprised just how much of this stuff we expose ourselves to over a period of years. I still like the water based paints for the simple fact that if I make a mistake, I can wipe it off with a damp cloth and re-shoot. I know you didn't ask for all of this, but safety is one thing that we don't really discuss alot about. Sorry for the speech. Hope some of this helps. Skeeter

BlackJack, Man I here ya! I learned last year about getting too deep into making and selling baits with the time you have in a day. It was exhausting comming home from work and having to go to work in the shop to meet the needs of my customers. It can just kill ya. Now I just make baits when I feel like it and have the time. You just can't do good work when your ragged out. When I get enough baits made then I make some phone calls and tell the guys I have some ready if they want some. I still have some custom work that I do for some folks that use the baits to fish tournaments. But I have scaled way back on my output. I want this to be an enjoyment, not another burden in life. Skeeter

SeminoleFan has it right. Harbor Freight is the best place that I have found. They have alot of inexpensive bench size power tools. They have warranties with them and have held up fine for me. I bought a 7 speed drill press from them for $35.00. I have been using it for almost three years with absolutely no problems. Check their web site. They may have a store near you where you can see the items. Skeeter

The best blades for a scroll saw that I have found are the ones used for cutting PVC pipe. I think they have about 15 tpi. or something like that. I get them at Lowes. You can get about 12 of them for less than $5.00 It has been more than a year since I have had to buy any, so my memory is a little slow. The other thing that is real good about these blades is that they are thin both ways. They can turn corners easily because they are not real wide. Also they do not break as often or as severly as larger blades. As anyone knows that uses scroll saws alot, a broken blade while cutting acts like a sewing machine needle. YOU CAN put one through your hand. The blade will cut lexan and all woods very well. My saw is a single speed and cuts Lexan just fine. The secret to cutting lexan is to keep the paper on it when you cut it. This will keep the Lexan from melting together after you have made the cut. Skeeter

PurpleEagle, The best way I can suggest is to get one of your favorite lures and copy it. That way you have something that you know works. You have something physically in your hands that you can study and refer to as you make your own copy of it. Getting measurements for lips, line tie placement, and body size are right there in your hands. After you get the hang of how stuff works and how to build the baits then you can start to design your own and make them. It is alot of fun but it takes patience. You can get help from all of us on how to do certain things or better ways to improve things. There is a TON of tallent on this site. All you have to do is ask. You will get an answer here. What would you like to make? Let us know, we would be glad to help you. Skeeter

Really nice paint job Dave. Really nice. Skeeter

Heck Chirmy, If the shoe fits!!!!!!!!!! Glad your here. Skeeter

Coley, That's a real good question. Here are my conclusions. The coffin lip is the best for deflective purposes. Through my trials it is definitely the best anywhere you have stuff to bang the lure into. When I fish these lures I don't feel the bait alot untill it starts to dig and hit stuff. Once this happens you can really feel the bait. If you watch the line close enough you will see it dance. It is the best deflective lip there is. Round lips are use to baisically impart action on a crank. Wide crankbaits basically take wide lips to make them move. Also a round lip gives the most surface for the water to "press" on to allow the lure to achieve maximum depth quicker and easier. Flat lips are more or less used on fat shallow running cranks like the H&T crankbaits that Jeff and Tim make. They make the bait deflect different and probably give a little more depth to the lure than a round lip put in at the same angle. Hope this helps. Skeeter

Coley, Your assumptions are correct. It is just a preference. Nickel does add flash. All of Clunn's baits that I have seen have Nickel round bend trebbles on them. I like you, assume it is for the flash. I personally use Eagle Claw hooks. I have tried them all, and have spent all kinds of money trying different ones. My hookup ratio greatly improved with the Eagle Claws. I sharpen every hook by hand. Sharp hooks are the main thing. I use bronze most of the time because it is all that I can get locally. I have ordered nickel Eagle Claws and use them on some of my "show" baits. I can't say that I have done better with nickel baits over bronze. Color Me Fishin, All hooks will rust if put up wet. I have baits that are 3 yrs. old and have bronze hooks and there is not one bit of rust on any of them. Same with the nickel. When I am fishing and change baits, I just put the plug on the deck of the boat until it is dry before putting it in the box. Skeeter

Hughsey and Tim are great representatives of all that is good about making baits by hand. Their tallent and hard work have paid off. They have proved that you don't need factories and big bank rolls to be successful. Heart and desire to be the best is the most important factors for guys like all of us. I am happy for both of them and wish them great success. Skeeter

Coley, What do you want the lure to do? You said you were working on lip angle etc. Looks to me like a good candidate for a DB III style lip. Skeeter

Glad you found us again. I am here because it is done right. No one leaves you in the dark. Skeeter

I guess most baits have personalities of their own. Hand made cranks included. The DT series of baits I have not played with yet. However, there are certain things that I feel must exist for a bait to reach optimum performance. First, the body must be straight. Second, everything has to line up. If you take a bait and turn it upside down, the hookhangers and the shaft to the line tie should all be in a straight line. Also the weight needs to be centered on the belly. Not off to the right or left. The lip needs to be straight and square to the body. Many wooden baits are awful at this. If you hold the bait with the lip pointed toward the ceiling you will see that alot of times the lip is off to one side or the other. If you look at the bait from the front then you will see lips that tilt and are not square to the horizontal plane. Also alot of times bodies will be more round on one side or thicker than the other. All of this has an effect on the bait reaching maximum depth. You would not enter an archery tournament with crooked arrows. Therefore, you should try not to buy crankbaits that are crooked. This is really hard to do when they are packaged. If the bait is all crooked and misaligned, then fix it the best you can. Finally the bait needs to be tuned as tight as possible. We all know if the bait runs right then move the eye of the line tie to the left and visa versa. But one thing that has become practice for some is to twist the line tie instead of bending the whole thing right or left. If you twist the line tie then the bait will run at a slant. It is alot like riding behing a car that has the frame bent. The back end is over to one side. The car looks crooked even though it is running straight. Geeeeez I hope this makes sense. The line tie should be in line with the body and the whole thing should be moved right or left. If you tune the bait where it will run perfectly straight, then the bait will go back under the boat on the retrieve. When this happens then you will pretty much have it dialed in. The depth that the bait will obtain after this is about all you can get out of it. Hope this makes sense. Skeeter

Excellent work Coley. What a great idea with the tasseled hooks. Real nice paint too. Skeeter

Attitude, You are correct with this deep diving crank thing. However, if you will notice, most of these plugs are plastic. My feeling is that hollow plastic cranks are just too bouyant. It is like trying to crank a bobber down to 20ft. The lips on these plugs look like frying pans. In my opinion wooden crankbaits can be made to reach that mark easier. I can make one modification to a DB III and it will consistantly hit 19ft. easy on 12lb. line. A good custom crankbait maker can make a lure that will hit the 20ft. mark with ease. I have two lures right now that will hit 24ft. consistantly. The lip is 1/2 the size of a 30+. In fact the lip is smaller than a DB III. These baits are perfectly designed, ballanced and tuned. The problem is that when folks see the $20.00 price tag, they grab their chest. Your equipment has to be able to deliver also. I have seen folks that claim they are making a 100 ft. cast, but really aren't. Distance in the cast is a definite factor. But I am sure that Al definitely knows what he is doing. Skeeter

Greg, You are correct. If the weight is increased and the action of the lure changes to where it is no longer acceptable, then changing the design of the lip and placement of the line tie further back can put the action back into the crankbait. Also, increasing the angle of the lip downward can increase the action if the other two changes don't work well enough. On large lips, moving the line tie back too far can cause the bait to skip or loose action momentarily. This can also happen if the lip is too wide for the bait. I like heavily weighted baits because they will throw straight in the wind, and as you put it, "don't blow out" I started this whole thing because of the large amount of email that I receive about weighting crankbaits. Many are concerned that they will kill the action of their lures by adding too much weight. At one time I thought this to be true also. But through time I learned that heavier weights can be offset by proper lip design. Now don't get me wrong, there is a point where you can have too much weight. But as a standard rule, as long as the lip is under the water and ready to start digging as soon as you turn the reel handle, then you are headed in the right direction. Skeeter

Captbob, The lure is made of balsa.

Hughesy is right. I have always agreed with the opinions of Jeff Coble on the handling of tournaments and sponsorships. But as in other things, greed and the almighty dollar is trashing a beautiful thing. Anyone that really follows the sport knows this crankbait fisherman and what happened to him. The FLW should be renamed "Future Salesmen of America" I my opinion, anyone should be allowed at any time to wear the H&T logo. Skeeter

A crank that hunts will jump either left or right and then jump back to center as it is being retrieved. The amount of times that a bait does it during the retrieve is just a characteristic of that particular bait. If a bait does a "twitch" during a retrieve and corrects itself without loosing its action, then I believe this can aid in a reaction strike from shallow fish. This twitch is not a real severe thing such as the bait striking an object. It is just a slight shift either right or left as the bait is running. However, the bait still returns to center as it runs. A bait that is not tuned properly heads either right or left and never goes back to running straight. It just runs off of the road and keeps on going. A perfectly tuned bait runs straight. Even ones that hunt come back to center. Skeeter

In the an article on the FLW website, readers were led to believe that his catches came on his own handmade crankbaits. QUOTE: "Sappington, who has made his own crankbaits for years, believes that every crankbait has a personality of its own. When he tuned that particular bait before the championship, he knew its wobble was perfect; consequently, he saved it specifically for the final rounds of the big tournament." After Tim let it known on the other site that it was a bait that Jeff Thompson had carved and he had painted, Sappington made the statement that the lure he used was made by Tim Hughes. This is a perfect example of the fact that pros want to keep their secrets to themselves. Skeeter

Ever since Rick Clunn said something about "Crankbaits that hunt" folks have been busting their chops and their wallets trying to get their hands on one of these baits. Check out the auctions on ebay for older Bagleys bII and bIII crankbaits with brass wire and you will see some of these baits go for tremendous amounts of money. Tons of discussions have gone on and many articles have been written about what it takes to get a crankbait to hunt. Well, now I am going to add my 2 cents on this. What makes a crankbait hunt is the action. I know....... DUH Skeet, that is just a brilliant statement. It is not the wire, it is not through wire construction, and it is not hyper-tuning. If you notice, MOST of the crankbaits that hunt are fat, shallow running crankbaits. What causes certain ones to hunt is the swing and momentum that the bait obtains as it is running. Baits that have a CONSISTANT and WIDE wobble to them have the potential to hunt. Hunting is caused from the bait swinging hard enough to intermittenly throw itself out of sync and off center as it runs. It is MOMENTUM that causes a bait to hunt. The reason the majority of these baits is wood is another clue. Wooden baits, weither made by machine or by hand are not consistantly the same. This is why some will and some won't hunt. Hunting is not something that can be controlled. It is a luck of the draw when the bait is made. Now your probably thinking........ OK Skeet, what made you the (&^*% expert on this. The answer is, I did. I have made cranks from spring steel, brass, welding, and silver wire and have had some to hunt from each. So that counts out the brass wire theory. I have made deep running crankbaits that hunt with the line tie in the lip. So that counts out the through-wire theory. Of the baits that I have made that do hunt, I have studied them running in the water for hours trying to figure it out. What I have stated above is my conclusion. It is not an absolute. There are always freak baits out there that don't follow the norm. But from my studies, this is my best conclusion. I do believe that shallow hunting crankbaits can be an asset. A bait that shifts as it is running down the front face of a line of lilly pads or running over the top of grass beds is bennificial. However, for deep running crankbaits, it is a detriment. For deep cranking you want the bait to run straight. A bait that shifts right or left while you are trying to hit a stump or small rockpile in anything over 8 ft. is no good. You need to be able to hit that obstruction everytime you make the cast. If the bait does not run perfectly straight, you cannot do that. Very few times have I gotten a hit on a deep running crank as the bait is heading to the bottom. Don't worry about the bait shifting, to attract strikes. When that bait hits the obstruction, it will deflect. This will give you the hit if the bass is there. But the main thing to remember regardless of what we all believe, is that YOU must be proficient at locating the fish, determining their mood, and presenting the bait correctly. Baits that PERFORM correctly make that task easier. Skeeter