mark poulson

Maybe jamming a wooden toothpick through the line tie would stablize it enough so it wouldn't move during a glue up from the backside. Tape, then toothpick, maybe some crazy glue at that point to help hold it and seal the hole, and then flip it and glue it. I try to keep any cleaning of the line tie to a minimum, since any rough spots on the eye can lead to line abrasion and failure.

I can sympathize with your plight. You have to wonder about these bureaucrats sometimes, and some of the so called experts who craft rules and regulations. Most of the time, it's the people with the most political clout and their own agenda who fashion the rules, not the ones with the most knowledge of the subject. Here in California, where we have an Austrian weight lifting actor as the Governor, a Federal administrator has decided that the State has to pay $7 billion dollars to improve the State Prison health care system. That's $7 billion for 170,000 prison inmates, while better than half of the general population of the State has no health care insurance, and the private and public hospitals are closing there doors due to lack of funds. And the State is projecting a $15 billion dollar deficit in their budget. So inmates will have great health care, and taxpayers will go begging for health care, and can't find a hospital even if they can afford it. Crazy. The inmates are running the asylum. And common sense is an endangered species.

Ha, ha. That would be a blast, but I'd have to use a salt water fly rod, and heavy leader, for sure, and that would be some workout. I used to see a guy fly fishing for bass from a boat at Castaic years ago, but haven't seen him for quite some time. He did really well in the mornings, when the wind was still down. I'll stick to traditional baitcasters. It's enough of a workout for me.

Deimai, We've had a weird spring and summer start here, too. The water temps stayed in the low 60's farenheit up until a month ago, and didn't hit 70 degrees until two weeks ago. About a month behind. And for the last week it's been over 100 degrees during the day and up aroung 80 at night, so the water is warming fast. 1 degree in two day, up to 74 degrees now. I don't think the fish know quite what to make of it. I caught a giant female bass yesterday afternoon, pitching a Yamamoto Ika tight and shallow next to a rock point. 8lbs 10oz. Unfortunately, she swallowed the hook, and fought so hard that she didn't survive. When I cleaned and filleted her last night, I found she was full of eggs, ready to spawn againk, and had bird feathers in her stomach, a first for me. I'd thrown my swimbaits in the early morning, and had a couple of followers, but not biters. If she'd have hit a swimbait, she'd probably have survived and been released. Too bad.

Thanks David. Me, too! Actually, I caught my new personal best, a nice 8lb10oz largemouth, yesterday afternoon at Castaic, after I'd finished my duties as weigh master for my friends tournament trail. I caught her on an Ika, pitched tight to the side of a rock point. Kind of bitter sweet. She ate it and swam off without a tap. When I saw the line move, I swung but she had already swallowed it, and fought so hard that it must have just torn up her guts. Even though, after I got her in the net, I turned the hook and it popped out with no bleeding, she wouldn't go back down when I released her. We tried to revive her in the live well with Catch and Release, but she wouldn't get off her side, and, eventually died. I took her home and filleted her, and we're having her for dinner tonight, and a few more meals, too. When I cleaned her, her stomach was full of feathers. Funny thing about that, earlier that day my partner and I saw a mother duck with one duckling, and he said, "Poor momma duck, down to one baby", and I said a big bass had probably eaten the rest. Now I know it's true, they eat birds even at Castaic in SoCal. I'm going to have to do a search for bird lures here, and see what I can come up with.

Diemai, Looks like you've take my method, which was really an accumulation of everything I've learned here, to the next level. I'm learning from you now. Good job! I can't wait to see a photo of that lure hanging from the mouth of a big pike!

Diemai, I figured you'd probably tried everything, and had good reasons for you method. Different materials and designs require different methods, and it looks like you've found the method that works best for you lures. I was just being nosey.

Deimai, Forgive an ignorant question. Obviously you've perfected you method, so it works for you. But I can't help wondering why you wouldn't tack glue the wire in place, mask the line tie side, and glue from the back in one shot. From my uninformed point of view, this looks like it would be a heck of a lot simpler. Of course, I've never made a lure like yours, so I don't know all that's involved.

I don't know about the Reds, but the Dodgers are a mess. Their pitching is so inconsistent, unless you call losing consitstently consistent. And the same with their offense. For every good day they have, they have a bad one. And the have a multi million dollar disabled list. Joe Torre needs to play the young guys and let them develop at this level. Every time one gets a chance, he does well, and then a dinosaur comes off the DL and they sit the youngster down again, or send him down. No way to build a winner. Rookie, what kind of clear finish are you spraying?

Take a look at fiberglass web drywall tape. It has larger holes, and it's got an adhesive on it already that doesn't mess up your paint scheme. And it's cheap!

So Bruce, Since I just put my 13 year old IT person on a plane to visit her auntie in San Francisco, I'm totally lost. I have no clue how in the world to reduce a picture. I'm having dinner tonight with a neighbor who actually sells computers and stuff, but she doen't know anything about how they work! So I'll have to wait until Tuesday, when my daughter is back, to give it another try. It does seem strange to me that I can put them in the gallery, and not on the forum, but I guess that will remain one of life's little mysteries.

Go on the site, and look for the PS900 and 950 guns. The both have MAC valves, which are the main selling point. Being able to adjust the airflow at the gun is priceless. The 950 has a smaller paint cup. Both guns have .02 tips, which is really for finer work, so I doubt you'd need the bigger cup, and the smaller brush has a solid ring at the nozzle, not the notched ring, which is a little more trouble to seal when you're backwashing the brush. It's $10 more, but maybe it's worth it. One of the side benefits of wearing disposable latex gloves when you paint (thank you Pete) is that the latex makes it easier to seal the notched nozzle when you backflush by just twisting it in your fingers. Otherwise, it can be a pain. But nothing like when I backflushed a Badger for the first time, and encountered the exposed needle. Ouch!

Does Createx gloss clear work for making transparents, too, or is it just the clear base?

Great looking lure. With galvanized wire, be sure to put the lure where it can dry out after each trip. The galvanizing can flake where it's bent, but that won't rust enough to matter if you dry it between trips, unless you fish it in salt water. Nothing but sst wire survives the salt!

I've found that, if the fish only nips at the tail treble, it doesn't matter which way the treble is turned. If he gets it into his mouth, he's hooked. Now the David Fritts stinger treble needs to be mounted with the elongated hook down, according to the package, although most single hook lures, like swiming jigs and spinnerbaits, have the hook turned up to make them more snag resistant, and they generally hook the fish in the roof of the mouth, which is a good thing. I've seen guys put a stinger hook on their blades with the hook turned down, when they're fishing for suspended fish in open water, but it's a sure snag in cover. I've never use the Fritts elongated treble myself, so I don't know how it would come through cover, but it does seem like a built in stinger hook in open water situations, where the fish might just swipe at the lure or nip at the tail as it goes by.

I uploaded the photo to the gallery. Try there. Not a giant, but fun, and I had a giant make a run up to the same lure farther along in that cove.

Pizza, Those are really tight joints, so being able to coat them assembled must have been quite a feat. I am either unwilling or unable to do work that fine, and to such close tolerances. Loose and sloppy is my moto, with a large portion of easy. That's why I adopted the hinge pin method, so I could coat the joints individually with D2T while holding them in my gloved hand, and then hang them to set. After that, I assemble the lure, and coat the faces on the wheel. The D2T in the joints typically lasts forever, if I'm careful when I clean out the pin holes after the joints have set. If I rush, I can break the bond of the epoxy in the joints, and then it will flake. I try to do my assembly and top coating on the wheel a couple of hours after I coat the joints, so the Etex will bond to the D2T. I make sure I make a 1/4" lap of the D2T onto the face when I'm coating the joints, so the top coat will lap without butt joints that might fail. The extra step of coating the joints separately adds another 3 hrs. to the process, but it saves me so much aggravation, it's worth it. I haven't made any jointed lures with bodies smaller than 4", so I don't know how my method would apply to lures smaller than that. My next batch are also going to be 4" bodies, but slimmer, to resemble trout fingerlings. It should be a test for me, as I will have to use smaller hinge parts for the smaller lure parts.

Well, congrats on the game. My older daughter says the German team has been together a long time, and plays like a machine. From the little I watched, they did seem to be very disciplined and under control the whole game.

Geez, My friend said it's a skinny fish, but not that skinny! I'll try it from my email, where I sent the photo from the picture software. I can see the photo on this post. It is an http// file. If I try to load it from my documents, it's a jpeg, or whatever that is, and it won't load. All of the photos I loaded in the gallery I did this same way, so I don't know whats going on, unless the latest site maintenance cycle changed something.

Jamie, It opens on my computer. Maybe it's in a format that your computer won't open. That happens to me all the time. Here's another go at it: I don't know how to post it larger, or in a different format, and my kids aren't here, so it will have to wait. Sorry if it doesn't open this time.

Bob P, You're a better man than I, Charlie Brown. Whenever I have tried to clean out an epoxied hinge joint with a sst wire in the drill, it's a nightmare, and I wind up hitting the topcoat on the lure. I have to admit I've never chucked up the sst wire in my dremel and tried it that way, but with a cordless drill it's a disaster for me.

New credit card's here, Auto Air ordered, they found my son's car undamaged with everything of his still in it except his wallet and the stereo. And he got it back on his birthday. I told him to take his sweetie out for dinner to celebrate, on me! That kid lives a charmed life.