Bassinfool

Welcome to the site, happy to have you!

There is a major Zoom supplier not far from where I live so I will swing by there one day this week and see if they have any. If they do, I would be more than happy to buy them and send them to you if you'd like. If you're looking to make them on your own, from what I can see in the pic it looks almost like a darker version of baby bass with a more gray than white bottom.

I can honestly say I have never seen that bait before, very unusual design. I still think you could get a worm to do what your looking for using a floating plastic, mono or braided line and a light wire hook. I don't use floating plastic and my 6" finesse worms with no salt can almost float a 2/0 hook. They won't stay on top of the water for a long time but they sink so slowly that by the time you twitch the worm it's only sunk a 1/2" to an inch at most.

I think there are some plastic distributors that sell a floating plastic but I'm not 100% sure on that. I know my worms with no salt added will decently float a 2/0 hook.

You can put it in a vice if you'd like that would be fine. I don't know how much of the bubbles you should add because I personally don't and won't work with them because they're so hazardous it just isn't worth the trouble to me. I would imagine they would stiffen up the plastic the same way salt would. I use a microwave because it's quicker for my needs and because I don't work in large enough volumes to warrant using presto pots.

Wear a respirator when working with those bubbles. Little glass spheres are not something your lungs will enjoy having inside them. I wouldn't mix the bubbles with the oil as the oil acts a softener but rather set a portion of your plastic aside you will use for your worms and mix them with just that plastic. Clamp your mold together and inject top down, the vents in the mold will take care of any air inside the mold.

Pics of the bait or name of manufacturer and color of the bait?

Not to be "that guy" but that answer of "just go injection" is a crappy and unhelpful answer to the question being asked. So often that seems to be the generic answer when it comes to people asking how to hand pour and not only is it not helpful in the least bit the person is still left with their question unanswered. Maybe injection isn't a feasible option for them or isn't a worthwhile investment or perhaps they want to do things the way they've been done for a long time. There's no reason a hand poured bait can't be every bit as effective as one that's injected and if that's the route they've chosen then we should help them become better at doing things this way, not telling them they need to invest X amount of money on an injectors and injection molds which is an extraneous and unwarranted expense when they've already spend Y amount just to be able to pour baits the way they are now. I'm not trying to berate anyone or step on any toes, I just want to see this community continue to be here and be helpful to those who seek to get better in this hobby and telling someone they need to invest a bunch of money into injection simply isn't helpful for the average hobbyist who does this for their own enjoyment. Just my two cents, feel free to disagree with me if you'd like. -Nick

I hand pour very rarely not but the molds I have that require a high deal of concentration when pouring are always tricky. One of the best things you can do is pour when the plastic is hotter so the stream is thinner and a little more controllable in those small spaces. Another thing I like to do is start at the head of the bait and pour a nice thin stream at the tip of the bait and after it builds up there it will begin pushing the plastic towards the tail under its own weight. Every few seconds you can move your stream a little closer towards the tail pushing that plastic into all the little corners and crevices without having to directly pour it into the small spaces themselves. A little over pour is no big deal, trimming up baits is a given generally with hand pours so its no big deal. Use the hotter plastic if you can and a smaller pouring spout and that should help you a lot.

I'd like to know what is in power bait that makes it such a volatile remelt. I know it becomes one nasty, boiling cauldron of hell fire if you do try to remelt it lol. Learned that the hard way last summer remelting a bunch of 10" power worms we'd torn up on Carolina rigs.

Don't remelt power bait

If there was a video of me when something like that happened I would have to preface the video with a warning about substantial use of profanity lol.

I make sticks all the time and I don't use a pot and stirrer and don't have any problems getting salt to suspend.

I have the 4.25" open pour mold, pours two baits at a time.

I prefer my original Kodiak mold, I only bought the LinMar mold when I was first getting into pouring. It was nice to have when I was first starting out because it makes a pretty decent flipping bait.

I may or may not have said PoP mold...

As far as I know the LinMar molds were all made of plaster.

Pretty sure Del used to make one like that

I don't know the reasoning behind the non-iodized salt either. Only time I really see iodine is at work in the ER when we're prepping a body part for sterility. I'll give it a try, if it doesn't look better than the powdered salt I can always go back.

Clarity is the only real issue I have using powdered salt. May have to try the restaurant salt, Bob. Is it essentially the same thing as table salt?

All well and good unless you get a hole in your bag like what happened to my partner and I! Luckily it wasn't on my boat considering we just replaced the carpet on it last Spring haha. After the hole in the bag incident he now keeps it in a bag which is then placed inside a Tupperware container.

I bet you'll find it in the last place you look haha

Smelly jelly is an unholy smelling substance but if you use it you can be sure the fish won't be smelling any of your human scent on the bait lol. You'll be able to smell it in your carpet for a long time too if you just so happen to spill some on it

Everything I have ever read and seen points to the reasoning that bass cannot taste or don'y have a very well developed sense of taste, but they do have a developed sense of smell and color. My buddy in fisheries at Auburn has even been involved in a few studies showing that the bass will use it's lateral line, sight, smell and touch before taste is factored in because it is so poorly developed. All that being said, I think the main reason to use scents is 1) Hide human scent and 2) Attract the fisherman as well!

I feel like color doesn't make a big difference for those baits that the fish only has a second to decide if it wants to bite or not like a flipping bait or fast moving bait, but if the fish has a long time to look at it I think sometimes color can play a factor. But who really knows, there have certainly been those days when me and my partner have been flipping jigs or straight plastic where one color definitely out performs the other.