mark poulson

My silicone swimbait molds have a thin tail stem, so the baits blow out on a fast retrieve. Since I have to trim the baits anyway, I over pour the tail sections on purpose, so they are thicker and stiffer. It's a small thing, only 1/8"+-, but it makes a big difference in how the baits swim.

I found that, when I had my own residential const. company, success was it's own curse, because I couldn't do everyone's job at once without losing the quality control that made me successful, so I had to pick and choose who I worked for, and also had to learn to say no gracefully. And growing larger was a huge change, which I didn't want to make, because it would change the nature of my owner-controlled business. For me, there was no intermediate step. It was either stay small, or go much bigger. I'm guessing it's the same with mold makers. The thing that makes them successful also cranks up demand. It seems to me they can either have longer lead times, and work 6 days a week, or they have to invest in more equipment and hire more employees, which creates a big overhead that has to be met each month. And overhead is a monster that has to be fed, whether or not you have the orders to support it, so it is the biggest threat to any business. That's why I think a lot of small mold makers stay small, so they don't have that big overhead "ax" hanging over their heads each month.

I have both aluminum and open pour silicone molds. To me, aluminum molds are the easiest to use, because I have an injector. I am just a hobby pourer, and make baits for myself and a couple of buddies, so I love the Essentials Do-It molds because they are cheap and they work. I have several ES Do--It aluminum molds, like the 3" grub mold, and I can just heat up a batch of plastic and shoot enough grubs for a few trips. Same with their 5" ES senko mold, and their Ripper swimbait mold. Because they were inexpensive, I have two of each, so I can pour enough from one batch of plastic for a few trips. But I still use my open pour silicone molds a lot, because I can easily make a laminated swimbait with them, and, because they are so cheap, I have five 2 cavity molds for the Lurecraft skinny dipper copy. That lets me pour ten baits at a time, and, because I can pour one half of each mold with the same batch of heated plastic, I am more efficient. I don't have to reheat my plastic during my five mold run, and that makes my plastic colors stay true longer, since reheating eventually changes plastic colors for me, even though I add heat stabilizer. Having cheap molds has encouraged me to play around with different colors and mixes, and made bait making more fun for me.

You are a magician!

Didn't Jimmy Houston win a lot of money with that spinnerbait?

Wow! Good job!

Wow!!!

Put them in the basement of a jail with a slab floor.

Dollar store clear nail polish holds up just as well, and is fast and cheap (my mantra).

Dude, clearly you've got it wired! Hahaha

I do 10 5" swimbait open pour silicone mold cavities at a time, and my baits don't delaminate. Just plan ahead, and be efficient, and you'll get a good routine down.

I hand pour laminates in open silicone molds. I pour the first color, and then go back over that with the second, heated to 340+ degrees so it bonds with the first color. I still get some not too well bonded heads sometimes, but they don't come apart when I fish them.

Nice bait. Clever side fin attachment!

I use a UV cure finger nail light, standing on it's end so the open mouth is up. I use Solarez UV Dual Cure resin, and I rotate my lures every 30 seconds. They cure hard in three minutes. If it begins to take longer, I know it's time to replace the bulbs.

For me, the lures need continual exposure to the UV light to cure. I have not used Alumi-UV but I have used Solarez Dual Cure resin for years. Be sure your UV lights are the right frequency for the resin you're using. Just because a light is UV doesn't mean it's what that resin needs.

I install my swivels with the embedded eye parallel to a line from the front of the lure to the back. That way, I can mark where it should be on the side of the lure before I install it, and then drill a hole from one side to the other for the spinnerbait wire. I install the swivel dry first, to be sure the wire pin actually passes through the embedded eye. It's simple to do a pull test at that point. If I find I've missed (heaven forbid), I just redrill and move the pin to engage the eye. Then I carefully glue the swivel in place, making sure not to glue the hook eye part. Last, I insert the pin, and glue over the pin holes with some super glue. The pin fits so tightly that the glue really isn't necessary, but it's part of my routine now. Vodkaman Dave is right. Any really strong pin material will work. Spinnerbait wire is just what I have on hand, so that's what I use. Once I found out it worked, I never looked for anything else. Too lazy! Hahaha

Read this: The PVC decking I use (Azek) is as buoyant as poplar, and plenty strong to hold screw eyes. You can reduce the risk of pull outs on the belly hanger(s) by using a strong Spro swivel as your hook hanger, and passing a piece of spinnerbait wire from side to side through the eye that's embedded in the bait. That will keep the fish from being able to use the lure's weight as leverage to rip out the trebles.

If you are adding flake, that may be part of the problem. I had trouble with my watermelon/red flake turning into brownish with orange flake. Leonard at Bait Junky's told me that was probably due to flake that wasn't heat resistant. I tried heat resistant flake, and the problem went away.

I used Elmer's white glue, and it worked. I thinned it a little with plain water, and the crackle pattern was smaller.

Google router dust collection systems.

Be sure your POP is completely dry before you seal it with a glue/water mix, or you can get mold under the sealer, which will eventually fail. Don't ask me how I know, but I am going to have to redo my rage craw mold next week! The half sealed with diluted epoxy is fine, but I have to do both halves again, because I can't get the soft plastic masters to go back into the epoxy sealed side. Grrr!!! Hahaha

Ted, Could you chuck the plunger into a drill and use it to rotate your steel wool in the hole to clean it out?

Try using toe nail clippers to trim a round eye to that shape.

What a great idea!

White, a little yellow, and then a drop of brown to taste. Or you can add a drop of black to get a grey bone.