Vodkaman

I am a bait designer, looking for sponsorship from a YouTube channel. I think we can do business together. Dave

Mark - smart boy, it's a refraction thing, like adding a second coat of D2T to a scuffed bait. But, the densities of salt and plastic are not the same, so the salt is still slightly visible. With coarse salt you are adding a couple of hundred grains (guess), but ground salt, who knows, hence the opaqueness. Dave

Not so sure that TU is the best place for a self confessed lure addict, but you are in good company - welcome Dave

Welcome McD to the fountain of lure knowledge were we all continue to learn. Dave

I would be starting out with resin pours. If the bait showed signs of being successful, I would be taking it to local injection molding companies. The point is that my initial CAD designed prototypes are injection mold type designs, and so no reverse engineering would be required. They are basically ready to go. Dave

We could do a deal; I do your design and you do my printing. We would just need to negotiate the design complexity to print credit ratio, keeping in mind that sending me the finished print by recorded delivery (UPS etc) is not cheap. This could work Dave

Clemmy - indeed. This is the problem of digitizing from a wood prototype to a hollow plastic model. It can be done, but all the Chinese designer is going to do is reproduce the externals; lip, body, eye positions and everything visible, and will call it job done. Personally, I would model the internals and externals in the same materials, calculate the buoyancy and COG and COF positions. I would then duplicate the model using the plastic materials, hollow it out, keeping the ballast locations, and adjust the air pocket(s) until I can closely mimic the COG, COF and buoyancy. However, this is not easy and can take a lot of time, way longer than starting from scratch. I have worked for three of car companies that wanted us to 'reverse engineer' an existing vehicle. The first time here in Indonesia were they bought 50 cars to cut up, the second time in Malaysia were Toyota gave us a set of bad microfilms to model from. The third time was in China and I left the job, refusing to go down that road again. I have worked on cars from scratch, a blank screen, and it is way easier and quicker. It is the same with lure design, which is why I am designing a hollow lure from scratch. No reverse engineering required if successful. I have given this a lot of thought; if this project is successful, I will offer a reverse engineering and mass production service, and put it in the classifieds, but don't expect $1 blanks, ain't going to happen Dave

A scan leaves you with a shape. You may be able to ratio it up or down, but I doubt even that. With a true CAD model, I can control everything. On one of my models, I can control 15+ parameters; depth, height, length width, and a lot of finer detail. Entering a few details I can change the model completely. Test me, give me some numbers. I will post a pic, then change the numbers and I will post an update. Such modifications take seconds. Nose radius tail radius, height above C/L depth below C/L Length Position of max height Position of max depth Max thickness position of max thickness These are just a few of the parameters that can be adjusted in seconds. Dave

I have very little experience with scanners. But what I have was not promising. I was unable to modify the scans with Catia. So, you are left with the scan data with little opportunity of dressing. My direction would be towards a CAD program. Measure up and create a model. The model will be available for modification in the future. Dave

Most professional CAD systems are available through the torrent system. This is illegal on the face of it. BUT, do not break into a sweat. Companies like Dassau (Catia V5) rely on illegal copies of their software being circulated freely so that as many engineers as possible can become experienced with the CAD software. In fact, I have been freely handed discs of the latest software from Dassau engineers when they serviced the office I was working. Without practiced engineers to employ, why would a company spend exorbitant sums of money on software licenses. Free copies are essential to the system. If a large company tries to cheat and use 'illegal' copies, Dassau will take immediate and aggressive action, but single users have nothing to fear. An official Catia V5 license cost is in the thousands of dollars per seat, and the software cannot be bought for unlimited use, yet I have no problem downloading the latest unlimited licensed software. Do you think that these companies are not capable of eliminating such fraud! Of course they are not going to be seen to turn a blind eye, but in the background, the practice is encouraged. As for learning Catia V5, it is a complex system, designed to cater for all areas of industry. But, as a Google or YouTube search will reveal, there is an endless supply of tutorial material. I myself have 25 years experience, so I have long forgotten the learning difficulties, in fact I learn new things with virtually every project I undertake. I know you are ALL honest and above board citizens, but just think about the system; without experienced users, they cannot sell software. Example - I worked for a company that was cheap on the licenses. The system was lacking in the licenses that enabled the job to be performed efficiently. I actually used my laptop to perform the unlicensed operations, then copied the completed files back onto the company system. How silly is that! Dave

Clemmy - that is about what I thought. Outsourcing would have a significant ramp-up time, and of course, the chances of the outsourced injection bait matching your original's action are remote. Your comment on quality control is spot on, and one of the BIG reasons that I would not go to China. By assembling units with my own team, I control the incentives. The China company incentives will be based on speed and NOT quality. Of course, I am in a very fortunate position to be able to assemble a team and train them myself at do-able costs, and keep a tight control on quality. The problem with the China bait; is that the wood prototype has to be redesigned in a hollow plastic form. BUT, to get it to work the same, the COG has to be in the same place. It is this step that the manufacturer will skip. You may just get lucky. Dave

Thanks Curt. I would like to know about @KcDano. It has been 4 years since he last visited. Dan was a huge mentor for me in my early TU days. We exchanged more than a thousand PMs and hours of Skype chats. We brainstormed vortex theory, hunting and other projects. Hoping someone out there can help. Dave

Max depth is the same as achieving max distance with a canon ball. If the attack angle is too shallow or too steep, the result falls short of expectations. The correct attack angle is solely dependent on the tow eye position. Dave

I am thinking about how to store and display the information. I don't want to use a regular display; too big and complex. It could be a two part device, plug in to access the depth information. This would keep the collector device small. I am thinking that the collector would switch on for a second, say 20 seconds after hitting the water. It would count the clicks in one second, the speed of the clicks would be related to the depth. The clicks counted and stored on a simple counter. Even keeping it simple, it is fairly complex: water sensing circuit to switch on. delay timer circuit to allow depth to be reached. One second timer circuit, the click collection time. A voltage controlled oscillator circuit to create the clicks. A counter circuit to collect and store the clicks. Dave

This is a very interesting problem. Years ago, I was working on an electric turbo design. Part of the design was a circuit for a pressure sensor that I had to design. I set up a syringe to vary the pressure in a jar for testing the sensitivity. It was so sensitive that just touching the glass syringe body with a finger actually registered. I am sure a tiny device could be developed to clip on the line and record the max depth reached. That would be an interesting project. Dave

Voodoo - So, what do you need. Are you thinking esox? I can do that. But at the end of the day, this is a shallow swimmer only. You are not going to be bashing rocks 20' down with this lure. Dave

Don't kid yourself. Zero stretch means infinite load. It is pure engineering mathematics and Newton's laws. It is referred to as 'conservation of energy'. Energy is not created or deleted. Energy exists and is merely transferred from one form to another, or transferred to another object. Energy is added to the weight by the action of lifting it, potential energy. The object is dropped, kinetic energy. From here, the energy can be transferred to the ground as compression, floor fracture, depression etc, or can be dissipated as heat. BUT, the energy has to go somewhere, it cannot just stop at the end of a 4' drop. Energy is a difficult concept to grasp, but mathematics rule in this case. Absolute limit (zero stretch / infinite load) concepts seem silly, but they are proven and real. Try this: Carefully place a 100Lb steel weight on to your big toe. Yes, it hurts, it is heavy. Now, drop a 1Lb steel weight from 4 feet onto your toe. Now tell me which hurt more, and explain why! Dave

Long before production becomes an issue, I will be sending out lures for testing. I will obviously test fish extensively here, but there are no LMB in Indonesia. Dave

I am hoping to ride TU's reputation as the biggest gathering of lure building knowledge and expertise, but that is a long shot for sure. Perhaps I should offer up the cottage industry to aspiring lure builders, as an alternative to China for production Dave

Here is a story, but not of the sob kind: About 5 years ago I hit hard times. My UK rent income stopped just as my rent was due here and I lost my house. I had to move into MIL's house, and I was no longer the 'golden boy' and she treated me badly, despite the fact that I actually built the house. At my absolute lowest point in my life, brother in law came over, dug up a few roots from the garden and made me some soup. A year later when my situation had recovered, I placed a stack of 50,000,000Rp on his roofless kitchen table. He was struggling to build his house with his meager income and only had the walls half built on his plot of land. Three months later the house was completed. Just because he made me a bowl of soup - that felt good Dave

Wayne - correct, HUGE difference. The average published salary is US$280 per month. This would support a family of children and parents. I can pay US$500 in a kampung (village) environment were even $100 would be considered good money. I love this country and love the people. I have lived here for 22 years, and it would be marvelous to introduce a cottage industry in the kampung. My brother in law is often out of work, and even when he has employment, it usually involves having to travel to Jakarta for the job, 4 hours away, and then he is lucky to clear $150 for his efforts, for his wife and two kids. I am not trying to lay a sob story on you, but to me it would be very cool to help a few families like this one. Dave

Yes, HUGE problems to be encountered. But, I am tackling some of these problems right now, before I even have a lure in my hand. As you probably know, I am working on a twelve year old project, trying to recreate something that I saw but was never able to reproduce. Just in case the lure works and becomes popular, I have decided to prototype using injection techniques. The chosen material is polyester resin. Not an ideal material in itself, but it does have a density very close to polycarbonate. So, the hollow injection design should flawlessly transfer over to a high production situation, which I can get done locally. Initially, I have worked out that I could actually produce 40 units per day just by myself, that is 800 per month based on 20 days. I can train a small team, paying them above average salary, and easily hit the 10Kpm target, and this is just using home made injection techniques. Of course, I fall flat on my face when it comes to marketing and all the rest of the problems given my remote location. First I need the lure. If it works how I expect it to then anglers are going to want to see this beast. I have taken delivery of the first prototype mold master. There are a lot of problems with it; the vents failed to print. Also, modeling on the computer looks a lot different when you get the results in your hand. I am already working on No2 before I have even poured No1. Dave

Wayne - absolutely NOT! I could get injections done locally anyway. Dave

Wayne - be careful, the figures are totally based on how much the 'wire' stretches at the moment of load. This is basically an unknown parameter. Dave

I am posting this in ‘hard baits’ because that is what I do, and the production processes are a lot more involved than for softies. I don’t recall a post on this subject for cranks in the past, and this is certainly not based on personal experience, purely hypothetical. You invent a new lure and Wallmart or some other outlet like it, and want 10,000 units per month. What would you do? Have you ever thought about it? What numbers could you achieve as a one man operation? How many employees for a BIG order. Personally, yes I have thought about it, although I have never sold a single lure in my life, and I have a plan. I am just interested about what others think, and perhaps personal experiences. This could be an interesting topic, as we all have thought about the BIG time at some point in our lure building endeavors. Dave