Vodkaman

I paint acetone onto an old brick. This sorts out the loose bristles and cleans the brush at the same time. Dave

Good point Rookie, I believe the rule also discriminates against the visually impaired:eek: Like 'em or not, these are the rules. Personally, I really like them, they keep the forums clean and functional. Dave

There are lots of different epoxies, but they are all formulated differently and all have different qualities. 5 min epoxy is formulated as a quick fix glue. The bad thing about it, apart from speed of application, is that it is only water resistant and it yellows badly. Devcon 2 ton (D2T) is a popular choice. It is crystal clear, shows the colors well, has more working time, is very hard and levels well. The very hard can also be classed as a disadvantage, as it chips on the rocks. It does involve a short learning curve for application, such as how to apply, how thick, how to stop it sagging (by hand or wheel). But if you do some reading, you will master it very quickly. Mine was perfect after a couple of tries. It is important to keep your fingers off the bait, oils from your skin will cause problems. Put it on thick, but not too thick. Use a strong light so you can see what you are doing. Hang it and reverse every few minutes. Do NOT touch for at least 24 hours, even if it feels dry. 48 hours would be better. Mix the 2 parts equally with accuracy and mix well. Mixing causes a lot of issues, so pay attention. I use the bottom of a fizzy drinks can to mix, it has no corners to hide. Let it settle for a minute to allow bubbles to disperse. If you see bubbles on the application, breathe on them and/or a few light passes with a hair dryer should do the trick. Dave

You need to read the rules: http://www.tackleunderground.com/forum/tu-site-info-updates/886-site-rules-you-must-read-before-posting.html You have to use the gallery for exhibiting work, the forums are for technical discussions only. Pics relevant to genuine technical discussions are OK. It is all in rule 3. Dave

Very sorry, I was thinking createx paints. CS vinyl will not heat set, it will probably ruin your lure if you try. I still think you are correct about the thinner thing, so the paint needs protecting before the top coat. Maybe someone can suggest a suitable clear to protect. Dave

I just put the vernier on my soft stainless steel wire, it measured 0.031", that makes it 20 gauge AWG (0.032"). I am very happy with it. The wire twists easily, making forming trouble free. It also makes the baits easy to tune at the waters edge, without damaging the top coat. It takes the load well, only starting to distort the eye once passes 20Lbs, well beyond the breaking strain of the line. I have not tested specifically for the distortion limit, this is just based on passing observations while doing pull tests. Dave

I happen to like thos colors too, I use cyan flanks, yellow belly, purple back and red throat. I top coated these with devcon and had no color change problems. Heat setting is important, as Jamie mentioned, but I doubt it caused this problem, could be wrong though. Read up on heat setting and give it a try. Could be! In that case, heat setting will solve the problem. Dave

You raise a good point. I think the answer is that a lot of these subjects do not have definitive answers. Laying down a sticky with the current opinion would stifle progress. A good example is Devcon. It gets thrashed and hammered almost weekly and many people get frustrated with its frequency. But over time, new ideas emerge, methods, techniques, tools etc. TU has a reputation for being an innovative site, compared to many other lure building sites, that seem to be more about showing off the final result (if you want to show your baits, put them in the gallery, not the forums!). By asking the same old questions and sharing techniques, combining different ideas, innovation happens and we all progress. Yes, it is a good suggestion, but I really don't think we should go that route. Dave

Is your choice of top coat slightly yellow? I ask because I think the purple viewed through a yellow filter (the yellow clear) looks brown. I found this link: WikiAnswers - What does the colors yellow and purple make Also, this is an interesting read: http://home.att.net/~RTRUSCIO/COLORSYS.htm Dave

It is either what Del says, that you failed to pour down the middle of the spout and covered the hole, even for a second. If this is definately not the case, then it could be that a bubble was created at the start of the pour. The solution to this is to angle the mold (as Pitbull wrote above), so the plastic runs down the side of the mold, to the bottom without splashing. I do not think a bubble 1/4" from the top can be caused from lack of topping off. It is a rising bubble. Dave

I have used a mixture of bondo 60% (polyester filler) and fibreglass resin 40% (polyester resin). This mix allows the mixture to be poured. But you can experiment with these figures. I used the fibreglass resin catalyst, as suggested by another TU member (cannot find the link). I added enough catalyst for the entire mixture, not just the fibreglass resin. I mixed the resin and catalyst first, then added to the filler and mixed. It starts to cure in about ten minutes from adding the catalyst, so I allow 4 mins for mixing. Do not mix too vigorously, or you will create air bubbles and spoil the mold. I used floor tile wax as a release agent, but bees wax, parafin wax or any other stiff wax should work. If you use a wooden mold box, make sure you wax it thoroughly also. Make sure you clean off all the wax before pouring the lead, as it wil vaporize and could splash from a closed mold. Test by pouring lead into the open halves first. This will burn off any wax remaining. The reaction of resin is exothermic (it gets hot). This heat is relative to the amount of catalyst that you use, too much and it will get extremely hot. So modelling clay like plasticene or silly putty is going to be a problem, as it will be destroyed after the first half. Best make the master out of something that can take the heat, like sculpy clay (use it soft, not baked). I cannot tell you how many pours that the resin/filler material will take, as my mold was only a prototype to prove an idea and has only been used around 20 times. If you intend to pour thousands, I suggest you keep the first half pour as a master. Then You can then pour as many second halves from this as future molds you require (another TU member suggested this plan). You then use these half molds as first pours and pour the second halves. I didn't explain that very well, sorry. There is some distortion of the mold when pouring lead, so allow the mold to cool after a few pours, or create a number of molds to rotate. Clamp the mold halves together with two or three spring clamps, so if they distort, the lead will not escape. Sagacious eliminates the distortion by adding heavy steel wire, which acts as rebar. I guess adding nails or similare will have a similar effect. Next time I make a resin mold, I will be using this method. Here is the link, read it all, but the information is post No11: http://www.tackleunderground.com/forum/soft-plastics/16214-what-should-i-make-mold-out-2.html Thanks Sagacious. Can anyone else give us an idea of the life of a resin mold used for pouring lead? It only remains to be said, take all precautions with lead. Breathing and burn protection. Assume the worst and protect your whole body. Including your eyes and feet. If you spill molten lead, it gets everywhere and hurts. Dave

After a few nights watching you do this, she will get the cheque book out. A drying wheel need not cost any money. In this throw-away world we live in, people buy new microwaves and dump the old ones. You just gotta find out who is buying a new one, your wife will be able to help you there. The rest of the wheel is just scraps of wood or what ever you have lying around. Once you can produce a really nice looking bait that catches fish, you can sell one or two on e-bay occasionally, to buy your wife a box of chocs or a bunch of flowers or a bandsaw. Dave

Thanks Jim. Nil, you said it good. Dave

No need to flatten it out. Check out some of Hazmails baits. He often mounts the convex face forward. Concave forward should give a stronger action. Try it and report back. Dave

First off, 3/4" inch is not thick enough. Fully cured PoP is brittle and needs more thickness. Some members recommend 1" minimum thickness around the bait. This would probably give a 5/4" overall thickness. Secondly, cure time. five days in a room is not long enough. After 2 days, I estimate that only 6 - 7% of water has been lost. Then by sealing the mold, you have dramatically slowed down the rest of the evaporation process. Do not seal until the mold is dry. To air dry your mold as it is now, down to 70% original weight (fully dry is 65%), I estimate 10 days. Low humidity will improve on this figure, but not that much. By pouring plastic at 350F, is creating steam locally, inside the mold. This, combined with the thin section of the mold, could be causing the cracking. To check your mold drying progress, weigh the PoP when you remove it from the box. After 2 days, weigh it again. Get your calculator, type the new weight and divide by the original weight. You are looking for 0.7 (70%), anything higher is not dry enough. Another indication of dryness is the feel. If you keep a fully dried piece of PoP in the drying room (un-sealed) as a comparison and feel both, the uncured PoP will feel cool. This is because the moisture still remaining is absorbing heat from your fingers, making it feel cold. Cured PoP is a very good insulator. Finally, be aware that PoP reverts back to plaster of Paris when heated to 150C (cured PoP is gypsum), so I hope your pre-heat is 150F and not 150C. If the mold is over heated, it becomes powdery and will break very easily. The reason that it can be used for plastics at 350F, is all down to the quality seal coat, which holds it all together. The plastic temp will not convert the whole mold back to PoP, just the surface, as again, it is a good insulator. Without the seal coat, the detail would soon erode away. This temperature thing is fact, Google plaster curing and read for yourself. I posted a thread in 'homebrew tools' on the subject last week. It might give you a few more ideas. Here's the link: http://www.tackleunderground.com/forum/homebrew-tools/16539-pop-dryer-re-visited.html You should stick with the PoP and just solve the problems, it is all part of the learning curve. Some members (Longhorn) Has molds still working after more years than he would care to admit. Dave

For my plywood pour boxes, for resin, I use a generous coating of floor tile wax, purely because I have a large tin of the stuff. I guess any type of wax will do the job. Like Nova said, PoP does not require anything, but I wax anyway (I like the smell!!). Dave

Once you have painted, do not handle the body without gloves. Oils from your hands can cause problems. Apply the top coat under a strong light, so that you can see what you are doing. It is easy to miss a bit. Some members say to breathe on the bubbles, the carbon dioxide in your breath pops the bubbles, some use a hair dryer to warm the coat, this helps thin the coat, allowing the bubbles an easier escape. Some do both, by breathing into the back of the hair dryer. Clean your brushes before you use. You probably tested the bristles with your hand and contaminated them. This would explain the streaks. Dave

Just reduce the amount of microspheres that you add. Are you adding lead ballast? If it floats, just add more lead ballast until you get the sink that you want. If you ballast it so that the back just sticks out of the water a tiny bit, the top coat will do the rest and make it a slow sinker. Dave

Like Bob said, the compass with the wheel to spread the legs (springbow compass) are the best. You can buy a really cheap pair, without the wheel, but you will be forever re-checking your work, because they easily slip. I've just come up from my workshop, after trying to draw a 125 radius arc. It was a disaster, because the legs kept moving (no wheel!). In the end, I had to make a template. The pain. Dave

This link contains everything you want to know about fluxing. http://www.tackleunderground.com/forum/wire-baits/13893-best-lead-melt-flux.html Post No7 gives a description of how to do it. You should read all 71 posts of the thread, then you will understand everything there is to know. Pay particular attention to Sagacious' posts. Dave

Cutting the mold should be the very last option, I'm sure everyone would agree on that. Unless half a dozen write in and say that they have the same mold and it was the only way. When you solve it, post the solution. This kind of question comes up quite often. Dave

You need to get your hands on some microspheres or micro balloons. This is a silicon powder (wear mask) that you mix into the resin. It will reduce the specific gravity from 1.2 down to 0.7 (depending on the mix ratio). Do a couple of searches here on TU for more specific information, it has been discussed fairly regularly, so their should be lots of good reading material. Next time you need to look in to featherlite resin. It is basically the same thing, but has the micro balloons already mixed in. Dave

Yes, the pam would help when using resin. You are not the first person to say this, but I still do not believe it. The prep work for resin is the same as for PoP, both need two components to be measured. The mixing is roughly the same too, except you get your hands in the PoP and rinse under the tap. Should you get the tiniest amount of resin on your skin, you will be rubbing and scrubbing for ten minutes, trying to get rid of it. Clean up, I pour any excess PoP mix into a container, wash out all mixing cups etc under the tap, it takes seconds and you are done, same with any spillage, a damp cloth or sponge and NO SMELL. Clean up with resin is a bit different. The mixing cups go in the bin. Spillage! best let it cure and chip it off with a sharp knife, assuming a metal or tile surface. Then you have the fumes to contend with (from both the resin and the wife). I use both PoP and resin for my projects, each has its pro's and con's, so I am not biased either way. Dave

As far as I am aware, plumbers lead and roofing lead are pure. Try the drop test, post No3 of the following link, by Hawnjigs: http://www.tackleunderground.com/forum/wire-baits/16388-scrap-yard-lead.html Dave