diemai

Pete ,.................... 6 weeks in Sweden , ........that means a LOT of pike ...........PM sent on LAM ! greetz , Dieter

@ Hazmail Thanks a lot , Pete , ..........but it was definately not my wife , ......probably the old lady in the flat above , she's sometimes doing bowling with pots , pans and brooms ! From my place to Sweden(Göteborg) it's one hour drive to our states capital city Kiel ferry harbor and another 13 1/2 hrs. overnight on the ferry boat , ........another ferry line from Sassnitz to Trelleborg would only take a few hours at sea but a three hours + drive to get to the German ferry harbor Sassnitz from here . A plane from Hamburg to Stockholm would take less than an hour , I suppose . But actually I've never been to Sweden ! When going there , don't forget to bring as much booze along , as the custom regulations allow(not quite sure , but I guess one litre of spirits per person is free of custom charges) , ........whiskey , beer and stuff is bloody expensive in entire Scandinavia and a bottle of good booze is likely to open one or another door over there ! There are special department stores in some German harbor towns located at the Baltic coast , that even have special beverage departments for Scandinavian export only , ....people from over there come down by bus loads for shopping liquid , ....and they don't mind paying their import taxes , still a lot cheaper than buying at home ! Cheers , Dieter

Thanks a lot , folks , ..........sometimes really weird lure ideas come to my mind ! Next week I'm planning on trying to assemble this rattle set-up to two commercial spoons to see whether it would work on these as well , .......gonna sacrifice a German "EffZett" spoon and a American "shoehorn" style spoon for the test , ....please wish my luck ! @ Vodkaman ...........guess , that I can't connect any external microfones to my little camera , .........I'm really wondering , why it did not work out , ....as on prior videos I've managed to capture the noise of lures in the bathtub ! @ Musky Glenn The 1,0mm dia. wire is attached through two little holes 1,5mm dia. and locked in place by bending the tag ends at 90° to either side of the spoon(towards it's rim) , so that they'd sit snug against the underside of the spoon(hammered them down finally) , .....afterwards snipped off snug to the spoon outer edges . A bit complicated , as the remaining ridge between bore and rim there is very short , ....might have been easier to bend the tag ends parallel to the lengthwise axis , one side forward and the other one backward , ........won't have to bother about a narrow ridge that way . @ BobP I also throw spoons most of the time , ....they are just so versatile when utilizing a couple of different models , .........one can fish them at less than 2 feet depth(very thin Dutch "polder" spoons) or down to more than 50 feet(the heavier German "Effzetts" and the mighty 2 ounce+ American "Eppingers") . Somewhere inbetween there are my homemades as well ! @ mark poulson Glad that you like my work , too , Mark ! Thanks a lot again , ....greetz , diemai

Hi , folks , During the past week I've been busy with making a few of these spoons , that I have named "Pikulator" , ........have put up the initial prototype in my gallery some days ago as well . By now I have completed a few of these spoons in two different sizes , I'm pretty much convinced about their swimming action and pretty sure , that they would also have an appeal on local predators , ....local closing time is gonna be through in two weeks from now ! Sadly the metallic clicking sound generated by these lures wasn't captured on video , ...but I can 100% assure you , that it can be heard standing beside the tub , ........and the fish would surely sense it , anyway(guess , that I accidentally put my thumb on the mic holding the camera , dunno ?) . There's also a second video showing some more crankbaits , that I've been working on lately , ......these are the last ones of the entire lathe-turned bunch , ........the others you can see in my recent gallery uploads , ....also on video ! Thanks for your interest , .............greetz , diemai

Great idea about that temporary "testing " lip , ....thanks for posting ! greetz , Dieter

In Germany this is most likely essential , often even demanded by fishing restrictions ,........ even when fishing for perch , zander , asp and even trout sometimes(don't have bass over here) , a wire leader is essential , as pike are stocked in almost every swim . But what I've found is , that attaching a wire leader to many US-made crankbait models renders these to slowly sink or suspend , and I'm sure , that it would happen as well to many high end Japanese lures(don't own any). So you need to go as light as possible with your leaders , local angling magazines recommend steel 7 X 7 strands , 10 lbs test minimum . 1 X 7 strands leaders are cheaper , but more stiffish than the 7 X 7 stuff , ............I don't fish such minor buoyant baits a lot , I always go for the cheaper stuff making my leaders , ........but if you wanna go more subtle , you need to spend more . I sometimes purchase my leader material here : My link Probably the camou brown steel stranded steel wire without a coating might suit your needs , it's pretty thin , thus not easily visible , ......... the crimping sleeves available there are also quite small . Such leaders usually do not have to be made that long(thus to save weight) , 6" to 8" may be enough already to serve as a little pike insurance policy for smaller bass lures , but with larger and more buoyant lures one should increase the length to at least 12" + and also go thicker than just 10 lbs test , ...........also utilize the smallest possible yet test pound weight matching snaps and swivels for the leaders . I prefer homemade leaders , as I am much more convident with these , and I can also match them to my needs , .......never tried the modern "hard mono" leaders , as I only trust in pure steel to withstand pike's teeth . good luck , diemai

A drag system , ......interesting , .......bassnbrad mentioned this before as well ! Could not quite figure out , ...as nowadays we are spoiled with all fancy gimmicks on our fishing gear I did not think of such an essential thing like a drag to the reel ! greetz , diemai

That is kinda what I was going to say in my last post , ........but I did not find a nice way to put it in words ! greetz , Dieter