Kasilofchrisn

It's called fluidizing plate. I've bought some before. I'm not sure it's really that much of an advantage. I mostly use Tyvek on mine now.

I actually run a vibratory fluid bed for certain colors. It is an aluminum base made from C channel with conical shaped spring feet. I use flat end caps permanently affixed to the base with a screw and a little bit of epoxy. I have small electric vibratory motors glued to the back of these bases and the aluminum base. I have two fluid beds mounted on it and in between them is a switch that allows me to adjust the amount of vibration I give them. For providing air I use a 30/60 aquarium pump I bought from Walmart. My cups are made from PVC or ABS using knockout test caps and Tyvek. my flat caps are 3in so I can use 3" cups or install a 3"-2" adapter and use 2" fluid bed cups. If anybody is interested I could post some pics when I get some time to take them. Some paints just don't want to fluidize and I still have some that want to give me minor volcanoes. But with this system it seems to work much better and some paints that used to give me volcanoes don't give me any. As with all powder paint they should be stirred well or shaken up before the fluid bed is turned on that helps me with a lot of colors.

I use the jig clamps from TJ's tackle. This holds them upright so any drips run down the hook where it is easily removed.

I guess your one of those who will never quite get it. If I was looking to save money I'd be much better off buying nearly all my tackle. I certainly don't save much if any money making my own. Especially if I place a value on my time spent making them. But I do enjoy the hobby of making tackle. And catching a fish on your own homemade tackle is a pretty awesome feeling. Once you get the hang of these, which doesn't take long, they don't take long at all to make. And there not that difficult. The only ones that frustrate me at all are the ones that were not designed for the mold. Those can be a pain to get lined up correctly. But the standard shapes/sizes are relatively easy and fun to make.

Gold Aberdeen hooks are what I buy. Something like the Mustad 3261GL light wire bait hook Or the eagle claw 202. But the gold hooks is the key not bronze. I get them anywhere I buy the blades usually Reinke brothers, lure parts online, or Jannsnetcraft.

I've used Sean in the past but he can be difficult to get a hold of and only does what work he wants to do. You might try Bob Lalonde at CNC molds nstuff. https://www.cncmolds.com/webstore/ Bob is a member of the form here and a really good guy to work with. He takes all orders on a first-come first-serve basis. Keep in mind that depending on how difficult your mold is to make it is going to be a lot more expensive than buying a do it mold. It wouldn't surprise me if having a custom mold made cost you a couple hundred bucks or more.

A few other key tips I forgot to mention. You want to use an Aberdeen style hook for these. Bronze hooks do not hold solder very well and I would not recommend them. Also for those inexperienced in this type of soldering you want to hold the soldering iron against The jig and hook until the components are hot enough to melt the solder on their own. If you melt the solder by pressing against the soldering iron you're going to burn up your tips pretty fast and you won't have the best adhesion. To source the blades I used to buy them from Reinke Brothers and Jan's net craft but I've also bought them from a company called anglers Mart. Anglers Mart has some innovative new shapes and blades but some of them do not fit in this mold very well. They have some fish shaped blades and some ant blades and they are bit tricky to get into this mold. I have not tried the ice ant but the fish shaped used in this mold does work if you play around with it some and find one of the cavities that provides the closest fit. Another popular way to paint these is to use nail polish or as some guys call it "male" polish. you can get a whole host of colors in nail polish including glow-in-the-dark Etc. I've just never been a fan of nail polish in general but it is an option that is available almost anywhere. It doesn't take very long to get the hang of making these and you can whip out quite a few of them in an afternoon.

So here are some pics of my Reinke Brothers ice jig molds. As you can see one of these has been used and has some rosin residue on it. The other one is new that one is my spare in case the first one is ever damaged. They made several different molds and I happen to buy the ones that contain a variety of shapes. They also made molds that contain all the cavities of the same shape most likely for those making and selling who want to make a lot of one particular style. I've also included a picture of a mold with a teardrop blade and a hook in it. I also have some blades that do not match any of the cavities in this mold. What I do for those is I find the closest match and generally I can still make it work for those blades. You can also switch up the hook sizes if you want to. If the hook is too big it just puts things a little out of kilter when trying to line them up but generally you can arrange them well enough to make it work. I like to keep a bodkin and a pair of tweezers handy which makes it a lot easier to pick these small parts out of the box I keep them in and arranging them in the mold precisely where I want them. These molds do a pretty good job but sometimes the parts are still off just a hair and using the bodkin I can position them precisely as I want them. I have a plastic bodkin I'm not sure exactly where I got it from but it seems to work pretty good and I know it won't damage the silicone mold. I buy ice jig solder from Jannsnetcraft but I have also used a lead-based solder from Radio Shack when they were still in business. The key things are you want at least 60% lead in your solder to make the jigs heavy enough to drop at a decent rate and you also want rosin core solder not acid core. Once The jig Is made you will have some excess rosin on it. To remove the rosin I keep a small glass jar handy with some acetone in it. The finished jigs are placed in the jar and gently swirled around and left to sit for just a few minutes. When the rosin is gone then they are ready for painting. I like to powder paint mine but you will have difficulty powder painting them if you do not have an adjustable heat gun. My DeWalt heat gun is infinitely adjustable on temperature. This way I can dial the temperature in so I do not melt the solder which usually melts at a lower temperature than a pure lead jig. Once The jig Is hot I use the brush tap method to add my powder paint. any excess paint on the shiny back of a blade is removed with a q-tip dipped in lacquer thinner. Then these are carefully baked in my toaster oven being extra cautious in watching the temperature so as not to melt the ice jig solder.

I only seem to have problems with the white stuff coming from my super glue if it comes out and come in contact with my D2T. If all of the super glue stays underneath the eye I don't have any issues. At least that's been my experience.

Cadman the only time I get the white residue is if I have gel glue that gets outside from under the eye and then it gets epoxy over that. If I'm careful and I'm using the gel glue with the fine/ultra fine tip I generally don't get a lot of seepage coming out from under the eye because it's pretty precise in it's application. The thing is with the Jell glues is the finer the tip the less glue you get per bottle for about the same price. So you want to use the minimum amount of super glue. Just enough to hold the eye on but not so much it seeps out around the edges. So there's kind of this trade off the finer tip is easier to apply smaller amounts of glue but it cost you more for the same amount of glue. Say I'm doing a large saltwater jigs with 9/16 size eyes it's it's a little easier to work with as a small amount of glue in the center leaves plenty of the outer part of the eye to cover up the glue. But when using small eyes on small freshwater jigs it's nicer to have the smaller tip as it's much easier to over apply the glue and get seepage from the smaller eyes. At least this has been my experience.

If my eyes won't stick then I use super glue to hold them on. I normally buy the WTP eyes from Barlow's and they stick pretty darn well on their own. but there are occasions when they just don't want to stick do to my paint job or if I'm using up some of those cheaper eyes I bought years ago. I like the jell superglues with the super fine tip which make it really easy to apply. I always top coat mine with epoxy. I was using d2t for several years but now I'm using Alumi UV. It's a bit spendy but it goes a long ways and I built a UV light box that cures them fairly quickly. I've got a 50 watt LED that sits on top of a light box which is basically just a plastic storage tote with a hole cut in the lid for the UV ligh. The entire inside is coated with foil tape to reflect the light all around and I drilled holes and placed all thread near the top so that I can hang the jig's from it and do multiple jigs at a time. This cuts down drastically on the time waiting for the epoxy to cure.

No the extra 5 cents isn't the issue but a penny saved is a penny earned. Like I said I was paying 12 cents for the metal ferruled brushes. I just lost time, ergo wasted epoxy, always having to stop and remove shed bristles when using the acid brushes or metal ferruled ones. Even crimping them tighter I still had some sheds particularly with thicker epoxies like D2T. I suppose I could have played around and found a better crimping technique that gave me less sheds but the Walmart brushes work well enough I haven't bothered to try. I'm usually just coating eyes on saltwater jigs from 2oz-48oz with 4oz-24oz being quite common and the eyes are up to 9/16 diameter. If doing an entire jig I suppose a wider brush might be better. But my system works well for me as yours does for you. Picking out sheds is just a pet peeve of mine I guess.

I have both a Haggens and a Twist tech. I'm starting to like the twistech better. I wouldn't buy a Boggs. Too limiting for me but then again I don't think they are made anymore.

With the all plastic ones I rarely get shedding. That's one of the great benefits of that style. And I can use them right out of the package no crimping or loose hairs to remove. Plus they are much cheaper. Most of us have a Walmart nearby to buy these at. Why pay more for an inferior product I have to fix to make work properly? I have also tried the acid brushes and they shed as well. This is all just my opinion but it's what works for me with epoxies and such. For mixing my epoxy I use cheap wood craft sticks from the craft store that cost me 1 or 2 cents each and plastic pill holding cups from the drug store that cost me 3 cents each by the bag of 100. So overall I'm still cheaper that just the metal ferruled brushes this way for the whole set-up. I sometimes let the craft sticks dry and reuse them. Sometimes I even squeeze the cured epoxy out of the plastic cups and reuse them as well. But for 10 cents I usually just toss everything in the trash.

I find the metal ferruled brushes shed waaaay to much for me. Especially with thick epoxies. It got way to frustrating picking out shed bristles while trying to get some jigs done before the epoxy cured. I used to buy them by the hundred count on eBay for a fair price I believe of 12 dollars per hundred shipped. But now I buy the all plastic ones from Walmart. They rarely shed and only cost me 5 cents each in packs of 20 or 30. They work much better for me and cost a lot less. Plus they are always available no shipping.

It'll be awhile because I'm out of town. But I have the silicone mold from Reinke Brothers tackle shop in Wisconsin. The one I have is all the different shapes but they have ones that are all the same shape on one mold. Holds the parts perfectly leaving both hands free for soldering. I hear the brothers are having health problems so they took down their web store. But if you can get one of those molds they are perfect for the task.

Check out TJ's tackle website. He has some video tutorials on powder painting blades and spoons that will help you get it figured out.

Yeah I guess I'm like everybody else and will say I'm not a fan of it. I wanted to get some more red to coat some cast bullets for reloading and the last time I try to order they told me it was hazardous and wouldn't ship to me here in Alaska. So I ordered some powder paints from Cadman and they work wonders for cast bullets and jigs. His prices were really good also.

That's a nice mold but spendy. Shawn didn't really want to make this mold but I talked him into it and bought the first one. I don't know of another one that is closer or has the sizes other than the flutter jig.

You could try forum member Bob Lalonde of CNC molds n stuff. I believe his website is https://www.cncmolds.com/webstore/ He designed and cut a couple aluminum molds for me. I was happy with the transaction.

One of the 20+ Shawn Collins molds I have needs to get much hotter than normal to get a full fill out but other than that it's an awesome mold. And to be honest the heat issue is not really that big of a deal. I don't recall any other issues with any of my other molds from him. But a mold overheating is really a pretty easy fix, either take a break or work a little slower to give the mold a little more time to cool down. Sometimes a person can just have two molds going at the same time that way they have a little extra period of cool down between pours. I have the most heat issues with downrigger molds but those are quite large and when your casting 8,10, or 12 pounds at a time you are going to have to cool the mold or you'll get denting. I believe all of Sean's molds are made from 6061-T6 aluminum alloy. I'm not sure how that compares heat distribution wise to the cast aluminum that Do-It uses? I've got a couple of the rattle tube molds on order from Sean so we'll see if I have any issues with mine when I get them. I'm thinking it's going to be an awesome mold for jigging lake trout through the ice this winter.

It seems this has been asked before. Check out this thread for ideas. http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/26083-564-teflon-pins-for-poison-tail-jig-18-oz/

A lot of this stuff is personal choice. Some of it is what works best in your area as it may be different than what works best in mine. I like metal beads for the bearing bead but glass or plastic depending on how deeply I want them to run. Usually plastic but bought some glass to play with over the winter for use next summer for lake trout. There's a million options out there. I suggest buying one that works well locally and copying it. Then after awhile you'll find ways to tweak it for your needs/wants.

I don't make bass jigs but mostly very large saltwater jigs. I use ss aircraft wire that comes in a cardboard cannister and comes out a hole in the top. Not sure how many feet are in one but it lasts a long long time. Then I use a Clamptite tool to secure the skirts. Not sure if it would work on those tiny bass jigs but a single wrap using the Clamptite works awesome on my saltwater jigs. https://clamptitetools.com/