The Drop Shot Store

I would think it would be safe to say we all have days when we blank or dont catch keepers. Last night tournament of the season last Saturday night I caught 25-26 fish but only two were keepers. That tells me I was in the wrong spot with the right bait. Knowledge of your lake, fishing experience, and bait thrown all affect your catch rate. For a long time on my local lake I would always hit the same spots each day. Earlier this year I decided to learn how to fish. Now I go hunting for the fish each day. I usually can bag a limit in the first few hours. But believe me, there are days when I cant catch a cold, let alone fish. Tournament fishing is a different animal all together. If you get nervous or tighten up, you'll fish different. If you dont catch a fish by 11:00, most people start to get discouraged and mentally quit. I have heard alot of good fisherman say make a plan and stick to it. I cant tell you how true this is. Find them prefishing, find the bait they want the most, and then during the tournament, just go fishing using your plan. If you dont do well or dont catch fish, you had the wrong plan. But you can be satisfied that you made a plan and stuck to it. Next time you just need a better plan. That being said, there will be tournaments when you will have to find them and figure them out during tournament hours. Sometimes you'll get on 'em, sometimes you wont. You have to fall back on your knowledge and experience when this happens. If I sound contradictory, thats because these are bass. They dont like to go along with our plans. Best thing I can tell you is to try different baits, different presentations, and different locations. Time on the water is the name of the game.

Usually, in water that clear, transparent colors work the best. The exact colors would depend on the available forage, although clear pepper, transparent watermelon pepper, or cinnamon pepper with a hi lite color or micro flake in a color that matches the forage would work. Sometimes a touch of charteuse at the tail will improve the bite. Figure out what the bass in your lake eat, then find out what color the food is, then start pouring to match the food.

LMAO Now thats funny.

It could be that you dont have enough surface area on the lower section of the tail perpendicular to the long axis of the bait. The swimming tail motion is created by a build up of pressure in front of the tail section. When the pressure becomes too great it displaces the tail to relieve that pressure. This goes back and forth between the two sides of the tail, hence the swimming motion. If I understand you correctly your tail is shaped like a triangle. Try filling out the lower sections to create more of a pressure dam. The next thing you can do is to move the tail farther away from the body. One of the tricks used on big swim baits is to heat the tail section in boiling water and then stretch it some to make the thin section right in front of the tail longer and thinner. This gives more tail action at slower retreive speeds. The rule of thumb I use for swim baits is to hold it in my hand, pointing the tail straight up, the tail should swing down and touch the body. If not, I keep working on it. Some baits have all these qualities built in from the start. Take a look at 3:16 Lures and their Mission Fish. Really good bait right out of the box. http://www.316lures.com/ Bruce

Actually it depends on the color the craws are at this time of year in the water that you fish. Green, red, blue, brown, and black are the basic craw colors where I fish. Green is the predominant color although I have seen a couple of really cool looking bright red craws go ducking under rocks. If I understand you right, yours are red, so you might try a smoke pepper back (maybe throw in some red flake) with a red hilite vein and a black belly.

What is your master made of Nate? I can give you specifics after I know what "medium" you are working with. And in my opinion for small production one peice molds, nothing beats the ease of handling of silicone RTV. As in any type of casting, how good your master is determines how good the finished product is.

Good book to have around as reference. So is Advanced Custom Rod Building. One of the first things that I did was go to a local rod component distributor and walk around and look at all the blanks from the different companies that make them. I played with 'em and got an idea of their action and power compared to other companies blanks. That way when I was fishing I could say, Hey, blank such and such would work better for this presentation. If you go to rodbuilding.org you will see a list of site sponsors on the left. Most of them have rod kits that save you from having to choose the components. Some will even fit the reel seat and handle for a small charge. All you have to do when you get it is glue and wrap. Well, you have to place your guides too. It's a great way to do it and saves the confusion of having to decide what guides to use, what thread to use, etc. If you fish hard, like most on here do, you will want to stay with a higher quality blank. Not expensive, just higher quality. Again, the rodbuilder.org site can be of great assistance in finding out what blanks are a good buy and which brands charge for their name. Spend time researching blanks and the companies that make them. Seeker has a great online video about how they make their blanks. Very neat stuff. Read all you can about guide placement. There are several theories about what is best. One of the best tools I bought for rod building was surgical tubing to hold the guides in place for test casting. You can really dial in your setup while test casting and pitching if you use the tubing instead of masking tape. Be warned, building your own rods quickly becomes an addiction. You cant get enough.

"Or can I fill in any big voids I may find with silicon???" I think I can use this at my next club meeting. There are definately some voids that need to be filled.

I'm guessing by the weight you are throwing that you are using a baitcaster setup for drop shotting. If so then you would probably be happy with either of those blanks but I would be leaning towards the light action so that the rod doesn't overpower the line weight you are using. My recommendations for a blank would be off base for that much weight. I normally throw 1/8oz. down to 40' and 1/4oz. 40' to 80'. While not always time efficient, deep water strike detection is much easier. Using a half ounce weight, I would think that a light weight, medium power, extra fast action blank would fit quite nicely if you are using flourocarbon. If you are using mono then the tip could slow down a little to compensate for line stretch. I have the perfect spinning rod for you for throwing a heavier weight but it is already built. I bought it to try out but the tip is too slow for the weights I throw but I love the way the rod loads with a fish on. When I put on a 3/8 or heavier weight it really comes alive. Take care.

The drop shot blank I would recommend wouldn't be from rainshadow. It would be of higher quality along with being much lighter weight, and black. What size weight and line size do you throw the most? Mostly vertical or casting out? And yes to the Paypal and yes to selling just the blanks. Be fore warned though, I wont tell you the actual blank part number I'd be happy to hook you up with guides, seat and grip if you need them or at least recommendations although I will tell you the guides should be Fuji Concept SIC's. A little pricey but if you want a really good drop shot rod....

They are Rainshadow blanks Del. Good blanks for the money. Similar in action to IMX but slightly heavier and a whole bunch cheaper than Loomis Slate (IMX) blanks. CountryKat- Talk to some good bass fisherman in your area and find out what they require as far as blank power and action with certain baits for certain techniques. You will find that it varies with ability and needs of the fisherman.

Looks like Rainshadow's catalog to me. How are you relating all these different blanks to the baits you make? Do you have a bait that fits each blank?

Forgot to add one more thing. You can add lead to the belly areas of these baits to get them to sit right in the water. I use the cylinder type weights and push them into a pocket cut with the rattle tool and then glue the channel closed. Experiment in the sink or tub as it doesn't take much weight to make these sit upright.

This is my personal preference and is by no means the right or only way to rig swim baits. Go to the hobby store. Get a peice of 1/8 inch brass tubing and a package of R/C airplane nylon control rods made by either Great Planes or Sullivan. Make sure you drive home before continuing.... Sharpen one end of the brass tube. I do it by taking a chamfering tool and putting a chamfer on the ID of the tube until there is a sharp edge. Take the brass tube, starting at the nose where you want the line to enter the bait, push the tube through the bait, angling towards the belly where you want your treble hook to be. The tube will cut enough of a hole so that you can proceed to the next step. Take the inner sleeve portion of the nylon control rod and cut a piece just a little shorter than the length of the channel you just made. Push that piece of tubing through the bait. Open up the entrance and exit areas of the bait and wick in some super glue to hold that tube in place. Get a few #10 machine screw washers and set them on the bench. Feed your line from the nose of the bait down through and out the belly. You will be tying this directly to the split ring on the treble hook. Aquire a large treble hook and a correspondingly large split ring. Put the split ring on the treble. Thread the washer onto your line that is coming out the belly and then tie off to the treble hook. Bury on side of the hook in the bait to hold the treble in position and you are ready to fish. A variation of this rigging method is to cut the line at the nose of the bait and tie on a split ring, effectively making a harness that stays with the bait. I just want to add that these are not my ideas. They are pretty standard methods for rigging swim baits here on the left coast. Once this is done, go to Home Depot or Lowes and buy some 5/8 or 3/4 inch dowel rod. Cut about a 4 inch piece off. Drill an 1/8 inch hole down the center of the dowel. Cut a 4 inch piece of the brass tube, tap it into the dowel rod, and sharpen it as mentioned above. You now have a tool to cut pockets for rattles. Take care.

I'm using the sculpey. Tried most others and I always come back to it. Play with it some, get a feel for how you work with it and what you can and cant do. Dont worry about slight surface irregularities as you can sand them out after you cook it. I have a little sheet of Lexan than I do mine on while I'm watching TV. It's easy to get the master off of when it comes time to bake it. When you buy the clay, pick up a simple clay carving tool set. Should be about 4 bucks and will give you most of what you need for carving different shapes and such. When it comes to adding texture or scales, look around the house and see if there are things lying around that will give the desired effect. Usually they are right in front of you. Most of all, have fun doing it, and allow yourself some patience with your initial work. After a week of practice, you will surprise yourself. Take care.

I hand carve them. It took quite a bit of practice because while I have a creative mind, I dont have Michael Angelo's hands. But let me encourage you to try it yourself. It can be a very satisfying process. Dont look at the whole project all at once, just try and rough out the body shape first then take a break for a few hours or even a few days. Your mind will refresh itself and may have even come up with a better shape. Then start working on the details. It may surprise you how well it comes out. And if it doesn't, wad it up and start over. On my best couple of baits, it took me roughly 3 to 4 weeks to complete the clay masters. I would love to show pictures of them but I dont want them copied. They aren't on the web site and I only sell them locally. That may change though. Take care.

If I remember correctly a liter of rtv is roughly two pounds and change. As an example, a 5 cavity production mold for 3.5" drop shot baits takes 4 oz. of rtv, so you get 4 molds per pound if I dont goof on the silicone weight. Pops - It can be cheaper to make your own molds if you buy the rtv in large quantities. If you have designed your own bait and are selling them, then this is the way to go. For personal use I would imagine it would be hard to beat L-C stock mold prices. I'll pass on my process for making production molds in case anyone has actually read this far. I make a master out of clay. When I'm satisfied, I'll cook it and shoot it with urethane. I then make a single cavity mold using rtv poured over the above master. I'll pour a few worms out of this mold to make sure things look the way I want them to and that it isnt too difficult to pour efficiently. I'll pour up 8 to 10 resin castings. Pick out the best 5 and glue them down to a piece of Lexan. Shoot the whole thing with urethane and let dry for a few days. You now have a mold master than can be used over and over to make molds.

When I first started pouring I used the double burner and the LC pouring pots. I solved the scorching by doing several things. I cut some .125 aluminum sheetmetal to cover the burner elements. That spreads the heat out evenly and prevents localized hot spots. I then hammer formed the bottom of the pots so that they were dead flat. When heating the plastic I would start on low and gradually increase the temp until it was right. If you are pouring single color stuff, the plastic doesn't need to be any hotter than 300 so you should never be close to scorching. Just use a little patience during the warm up and you wont burn any plastic. It's quite possible that for you needs a microwave and pirex cup might be the best answer. Quite a few of the guys on here use that method and it works great for them.

Good Job at the tourney Tim. Call Bass World West 714-667-6006. They stock them. I dont think they would have a problem shipping them to you. The Rico's run about 25 bucks a piece. Take care.

I figured you had it handled. I thought the same thing.....geez, how many drops DO I have to add? LOL. I made up a 24oz. pot of fl. pink so I could make myself some tubes and shoot, I think I used half a bottle of color.

LOL

I'm using M-F Flour. Pink and got it to come out REALLY hot flourecsent. But it took around 75 drops in 12oz. with three drops of M-F white to brighten it up. The fish HATE this color. They try and kill it as soon as they see it. I've had zero problems with M-F's not blending. I've even forgot to add the color before heating and still got reasonable results adding the color after it was hot. Most of Lurecrafts colors seem to be like their plastic, it separates and needs to be mixed all the time. The flouro colors that I got from Dave have to be shaken for about 10 mins to mix them well. I also throw a couple of washers in the bottle to help mix it up when shaking. That seemed to help some.

Just like that Funny Farm. Nice looking crank. Put some red trebles on it and it would be perfect. You can make me one that size that will dive to 30' right? And Woodsac makes a really good point about green around grass and browns around sand and rock, and split shotting does work. Just think of it as a light carolina rig and you'll have no problem with it. One thing I think people miss is that light line fishing can be a ton of fun because you have to play the fish. While this can be nerve racking in a tournament, it's a blast when fun fishing. You hook what you think is a five pounder and when you get it to the boat the fish is only 12" long. And it really helps develop your skill in converting bites to fish in the livewell by forcing you to do everything just right. One more thing I want to add that might help if you run across bed fish. Take a medium heavy rod, spool with 12lb. flouro, I use a 2/0 G lock hook, rig up a drop shot rig with the bait about 6" above the sinker, and a small bait, under 3". Around here salt and pepper or pink is what's working. Pitch this onto the bed and shake it without moving the sinker. Because the bait is at mouth level they seem to take this setup pretty quick as compared to a bottom bait that they have to move around and go down to pick up. Most of all, have fun and good luck.

I sell alot of drop shot baits to guys around Lanier and they tell me that drop shotting works great there. If you dont have time to practice up on drop shotting, all of Bushmasters techniques will produce depending on the conditions. If you think there might be a topwater bite, try throwing a clear/red mouth "sammy" or popper that will walk the dog. If small and slow isnt working, make sure you speed things up or upsize your baits or both. While small and slow is the general rule on clear water, sometimes it pays off to do something that is different from what everyone else is doing. My personal line sizing is as follows: drop shotting-6lb. flourocarbon, T and C rig-12lb. flourocarbon, pitching-15lb. flourocarbon, flipping-20lb. flourocarbon. In otherwords, if it moves slow, smaller line, reaction bait, larger line. Watch how much noise you make and the shadows you throw. Keep arm movements low and slow. Clear water fish always seem to be spooky. Trim the skirts on your jigs and use a 3" twin tail grub as a trailer to keep the overall package small. The small, translucent Japanese cranks do well in this type of water so dont ignore those. I throw mainly a Zenith Junior D. They are really small but cast a mile because of the tungsten weights inside, and run 8 to 10 foot. I could be wrong but in my experience, bass in clear water lakes hang right below the edge of light penetration, so I tend to fish good areas that are just outside of where I can see the bottom.