Jeff Hahn

Just a guess, but I would suspect that unless you are going to make thousands of skirt tabs, you would never recoup your start-up costs, compared to buying from LPO or fishingskirts.com.

I hang the jigheads by the eye on the oven rack using a straightened out paper clip. Put an old cookie sheet underneath. This way, if the paint runs, it will drip away from the eye.

Yes, bend the top of the blade back toward the hook.

I have found that the type of trailer has a major effect on "hunting." I prefer a split tail trailer, as it does not seem to interfere with the hunting action. But, a trailer with two appendages or a trailer with a big boot tail or big twister tail adds too much stability to the bait and will reduce or prevent it from hunting. Think about the trailer as acting like the tail of a kite. With a kite, you want to add as long a tail as necessary to stabilize it in flight. But, with a vibrating jig, you want to add as little of a tail/trailer as possible, so that the bait runs right on and over the edge of being stable, so that it can dart off to the side frequently.

I don't know about the Chatterbait Elite model, but the aftermarket rounded blades are thicker than the blades used on the original RAD Chatterbaits and the initial ZMan Chatterbaits. I wonder if the thickness of the blades is an issue in how it thumps? I thought about buying some stainless steel stock with the same thickness as the original blades and cutting my own blades, rather than buying the blades from tackle suppliers. But, I never got that done.

I got one of these heads by accident. It was mixed in with a bag of LPO's Classic Grass jigs that I bought. I added a steel leader and made it into a swim jig to use in Canada, where lots of toothy critters live. Maybe I'll rethink that and add a split ring and give it a shot as a bladed jig.

Yep, this^^^. I had the same problem when pouring a jighead using plastic coated wire. Apparently, the melting plastic creates a gas that prevents the lead from completely filling the mold cavity.

I took one bait and reversed the rear bent blade so that it was forward bending. I only got to make a few casts with it, but that modification gave it a very erratic action.

Bending the blade forward...hmm... Gonna have to take some of my rear bent blades and reverse them to see the action. Good thinking outside of the box!

I took a look at my Arkie mold and none of the cavities are large enough to accommodate the Gambler head. But, I did find the Backstroke Swim Jig Head at LPO and ordered a couple to try. they look pretty similar to the Gambler head. http://www.lurepartsonline.com/Online-Store/Stamina-Weedless-Jigs/Backstroke-Swim-Jigs.html

Oooo, I hadn't thought about doing that! I have an Arkie mold and that sounds like an interesting experiment! I'm gonna have to give that a try!

Thanks for the info. I may just have to go with the bullet nose mold. But, I still like the Gambler head a little better!

I've been catching a few nice fishing using a heavy cover swim jig. I've tried several brands on the market and the bullet nose jighead works great, and does the Hack Attack heavy cover swim jig is ok. But, so far, my favorite is the Gambler model swim jig. The head is tapered, being narrower on the top, but is rounded as it tapers toward the bottom of the head. The sides are also tapered, being narrower at the front and wider toward the rear. And, the eye of the 6/0 hook comes right out of the nose of the bait to help shed weeds. I know I can get a bullet nose Do-It mold. But, does anyone make mold for the Gambler style head? Here's a pic:

I bake at 350 for 15 minutes and haven't had a problem with chipping.

I have made a few like that for myself. I use a twin wire weed guard in mine. http://www.lurepartsonline.com/Online-Store/Mold-Insert-Components/Wire-Weedguard.html

I bought some swim bait bullet style heads, but found that the light fiber weed guard they came with did not work as well int he weeds as I had hoped. I pulled the weed guard out a few strands at a time and installed twin cable wire weed guards. For my waters, they work much better. This is the one I use: http://www.lurepartsonline.com/Online-Store/Mold-Insert-Components/Wire-Weedguard.html

My preference is for a jighead that is wide. The best vibrating jigs that I ever fished were the original RAD Chatterbaits. Part of the reason they caught a lot of fish was that the blade would bang on the wide head every time it rotated from side to side. After a while the blade would dent the lead on the head and that's when the bait really excelled. The closest mold I have found to the original RAD bait is the Do-It Sparkie head mold. I use the one without the cut out for a weedguard in the mold.

I tried pushing the keeper farther into the plastic. But, with the small bait I am fishing, if I do that, the hookeye is exposed. Since I am tying a snell knot, with the exposed hookeye, the bait hangs crooked. I also tried pushing the hook further down into the plastic bait. This keeps the hookeye from being exposed. But, given the design of the bait, it leaves the top of the keeper slightly exposed and it collects weeds. I am considering two options. One, cut the keeper off the hook and fish without one. Or, cut the keeper off and tie one of those A-Mart style fiber keepers on the inside of the hook shank.

Not sure if this would go on this board, but it seemed the logical place. I have been using the Hack Attack Flipping Hook, but also tried a couple other brands. They work great around wood, but it seems that every brand is a PITA when fishing weeds. The weeds get stuck between the top of the keeper and the plastic bait. So, I am picking weeds off the keeper on nearly every flip. I had a couple hooks on which the keeper broke, so I added the A-Mart style keeper using a fiber from a weedguard for a jig. Those had the same problem. The only solution I can think of is to break the plastic keeper off of the hook and use it without a keeper. Anyone have any other suggestions?

Sorry about that...fat fingers (or bad eyes!).

The ones I use are LPO part #4047-01, Jann's part #310311-03, or Barlow's part #4108140-2.

I use the high setting, also.

I recently powder painted some jigheads and shakey heads and found that the black powder paint is a PITA to work with. It seems to go on too thick and when cleaning out the hook eye seems prone to chipping very easily. I have been using Jann's Netcraft black powder paint. I would have said that it must be the brand, but I also use Jann's powder paint in brown and it works great. All of my other powder paint is Pro-Tec. Is the black in any brand a PITA or is there another brand that doesn't have these problems?

I always insert the end of the weedguard into the jighead that is NOT fused, but has the loose ends. This way, it's easy to pull out a strand or three to make the weedguard fit into the head. Once I get the weedguard to fit, I put Super Glue Gel into the hole and insert the weedguard. Once the glue dries, try the fused end off of the weedguard and you're good to go.

Is that battery powered? Sorry, couldn't resist! (But hey, it might work!!!)