Illini Nate

I think for a swimbait (a true swimbait - which I consider to be a bait that is consistent with the natural form of the forage species and produces a natural swimming motion without a lip) my goal is to replicate the natural motion of a fish, while being as close aesthetically correct as possible. I view swimbaiting as more of a finesse technique than anything else. If fish are on a reaction bite then there are plenty of options that are betters suited to cover water, and produce a reaction bite than a swimbait IMO. Having a bait capable of doing all sorts of crazy moves, or move at blazing speeds is really not that appealing to me as I have literally a boatload of other baits that are better suited to fill that need. However when I go through my books at the end of the year the trend that sticks out is that the majority of my big fish and pressured water fish fall for a bait that presents a nice consistent retrieve. Big fish (usually) are not reaction biters and are often used to seeing the "typical" presentations where I fish.....that is where swim baits come in to play for me; and creating something that will fill that void is what drives my designs.

Do you have any pitting in the bodies after you pour them? If so are these the areas your having difficulty with?

For anyone that is starting to look at modeling their baits or ideas I would strongly suggest looking at Rhino. Its pretty intuitive and is a great surface/solid modeling program. On top of that there is a pretty easy plug in available to get your work prepared for CNC work. Now getting the CNC mill to run smoothly; that is another issue.......... Sketchup is alright, it is a purely a surface modeling program and is limited in that you cannot perform an boolean functions nor can you really work with any subtractive processes. Also it is based on triangular components so curves are usually poorly achieved and can be choppy or completely erroneous. If you do find that you like Sketchup for a modeling program then check out Vray for rendering functions (or at the very least kerkythea, googles rendering software for sketchup). You will be much mor satisfied with the results than with sketchup's rendering capabilites.

Weighting is your problem, remove some of the weight from the second segment and potentialy from the head. That form should swim without any issue.

Yep it works.......Getting the correct weighting is somewhat tricky but it does work.

If your located in the midwest these folks have it.......along with just about any other type of wood you could ever imagine (lucky for me they were 5 minutes from where I grew up ). Very nice people and very willing to help. Its good stuff from my experience its very easy to work with and extremely durable.

Wooaa!! that bait is unreal! Sweet paint job as well. Is that freehand or stencil work? Either way its unbelieveable! Great bait!