JD_mudbug

In the Northeast, two types of rigs are popular. I don't see why they wouldn't work elsewhere. One is like a pompano rig with the weight being at the end. Your main line is tied to a barrel swivel. You tie a line from the barrel swivel to a snap with a couple of dropper loops spaced apart in between the barrel swivel and the snap. On the dropper loops, you rig a hook with bright tubing, a grub, or a streamer fly. On the snap, you can use a diamond jig if you have a pier or boat you can vertical jig from. If you can’t vertically jig, you can just put on a sinker. The other rig is a sinker slider rig. We use those instead of a Carolina rig set up. Slide main line through a sinker slider, put on a bead or a silicone skirt collar, tie on barrel swivel, from the barrel swivel tie your leader and hook/jig/fly. The bead/collar will protect your knot from the sinker slider. This set up has some advantages. You can use a braid main line and a mono or flouro leader. If your hook gets snagged, you can break it off and save the rest of the rig. The sinker slider has a clip so you can swap sinkers easily without having to tie a new rig if you need to change weights. You can pre-try some hooks so all you have to do is tie 1 knot if the line near the hook gets frayed. I usually use bait on a circle hook on this rig. I have also used some of the Gulp products and also a saltwater buck tail streamer fly. These flies have no weight and just flutter in the water. If there is current such as incoming and outgoing tide at a river mouth, we use the flat disc river sinkers. Strong current can cause bank sinkers and egg sinkers to roll on the bottom causing snags and line twist.

I have never done vacuum sealing so I don’t know if this will help. Like Mark, I have sealed with Minwax Wood Hardener. That stuff does penetrate deep into wood if you submerge the wood in it for a while. I used it on baits made of Western red cedar and poplar. These were 7 to 9” baits that were 2 to 3.5 oz. They would gain from anywhere from .15 to .35 of an ounce with dunks over 15 minutes. Prolonged dunks in the hardener did affect the buoyancy slightly. The baits sat a bit lower in the water than similar baits sealed with superglue. I suspect it made them dive slightly deeper. My baits were wake baits and shallow diving jointed swimbaits. It did not affect the action that I could tell, which may be in part due to the large size of the baits and type of wood. Cedar and poplar are more buoyant than maple. Seepage was a big problem with the wood hardener on any dunk besides a brief one. The complete drying/off gassing time depended on the length of the dunk. I submerged a bait overnight once. It took 10 days before the paint stopped getting blisters. I don’t do prolonged dunks anymore because I have to let baits sit for so long just to be sure they were safe to paint. I would put a coat of Rustoleum 2x flat white paint + primer rattle can on the baits after I thought they were dry and let them sit again for 1-2 days to see if any paint blisters developed before continuing to work on them. I suspect with the penetration you will get with vacuum there could a prolonged period of seepage. I remember some posts years ago from a striper lure maker who vacuum sealed lures. I could not find the posts. His baits were also large baits, similar to Gibbs lures. He was using 20% distilled water and 80% water based polyurethane. It did add some weight but did not seem to affect the lure’s action. I believe his baits were made from poplar dowels. He was the only person I remember trying it. In addition to worrying about a change to a wooden lure’s buoyancy and action, the question is whether it is worth the extra effort (and additional equipment if you don’t have it) over the usual sealing methods and whether it is better to just use a casting resin or PVC. If you are vacuum sealing wood to pull all the air out of wood and replacing it with a sealer you are essentially changing a fundamental characteristic of wood (the air inside it) and essentially turning it into a resin-like product. Vacuum sealing never seemed to catch on as a way to seal baits. Maple is denser than the 2 woods I use. You would also be removing more of the air with vacuum as opposed to dunking. I think it would have some effect. I would weigh the wood before you seal and weigh it again after you have sealed to see if you gain more than 10% in weight. Maybe you could make some identical baits, vacuum seal some and seal some with superglue. After the baits are sealed and hardware is installed, you could compare how they sit in the water and their action. There are some videos on YouTube on vacuum stabilization of wood. I don’t know if these would provide any useful information. They all seem to use an epoxy like product called Cactus Juice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWflb2KILIM&t=768s

Same for me for the most part. But sometimes you want a small profile spinnerbait that runs deep. You can wait and let the bait sink down and reel slow to keep it down. Sometimes the small blades don’t spin well at such a slow speed. By going slow, you also cover less water. In the past, I would add weight to the hook. I have an assortment of the hidden weight spinnerbaits for that now. You could also be on a trip where you couldn't bring all your gear and don't have access to a tackle shop. I have had to add weight to a lure in a situation where your gear is limited. It's definitely not ideal but you have to make do with what you have with you.

One advantage to having the weight added to the hook is that it gets more weight toward the back which helps with casting distance as that weight will lead the way on the cast. It's one of the reason an egg sinker is put on the wire shaft first (at the bottom) when building a bucktail. With the spinner body and hook weight being at the end it also cuts down on center of gravity tumbling in the air problems. On a spinnerbait or single hook spinner it can be easier to add weight to the hook. You can wrap lead wire around the hook or squeeze on a rubber core weight with the rubber remove. On spinnerbaits, bucktails or roostertail type spinners, the skirt/dressing is before the hook and hides the weight.

You may also want to put some Flex Seal on a piece of scrap material and lay some soft plastic baits on it. I don't know if it will have a reaction with plastisol.

The clear Flex Seal can turn opaque after repeated exposure to the elements. This doesn’t matter much when sealing a gutter on a house. On a dark lure, it can end up looking cloudy. It also won’t hold up to rocks and probably won’t do well in wood. On hot days, it becomes softer making it more subject to penetration. Once water gets in behind it, I have seen it peel off. I have seen it work well in a static situation where it just sits there like sealing around trim on a shed. I have used it to seal a crack in my OnStar antenna on my SUV and its gets worn down after a year or two and needs to be recoated.

Welcome to the site. I mostly use .051" stainless safety wire (also called stainless lockwire) when there is a chance at fish over 10 lbs. I use wire from Malin or Wire & Cable Specialties (WCS). It's good for wire-through baits and making twist eyes. I sometimes upsize the wire to .062" on big baits 7 inches +, and 3+ ounces. I will downsize to .040 on smaller bass lures. I sometimes use .092" screw eyes on medium size lures 1-2 oz. When I use screw eyes, I try to get the eye of the screw countersunk into the body of the lure a bit so my epoxy will reduce the chance of the eye opening up. I don't like going with the smaller screw eyelets.

LPO is Lure Parts Online. Unless you need that particular weight spinner body right away, it's not really worth the effort of gluing 2 weights together. Unpainted lead bodies or finesse sinkers are fairly cheap. https://www.lurepartsonline.com/Lead-Lure-Bodies_2?quantity=1&custcol_beads_eyes_paint_size=78

I wonder too. I am always on the look out for trees struck by lightning. Roy Hobbs says lightning wood is the best wood to make anything out of.

Lots of people are out there still building. I slow down my lure building around this time of year because of pre-winter tasks that have to be done and the holidays. My lure building tends to pick up after New Year’s Day. People in the northeast have to pull in their docks and swim rafts before ice- in, clean up the fallen leaves and other yard work before snow, and give their boats some maintenance and winterization before putting them away. Any day with decent weather, I try to get out fishing. There are still posts being made but they focus on a particular aspect of a lure build like chrome finish and clear coats which apply to building a lure with any material. Other topics have been discussed thoroughly in past posts so you don’t see new posts on them. There have been lots of post on shaping and the best tools for lure building, different sealers for wood, the benefits and draw backs of various types of wood, pvc vs. wood, line thru vs. screw eyes vs. twist wire eyes, different diving lip materials, different types of lure joints, why a particular lure shape does or doesn’t work, choosing an airbrush and paints, stencils and scale netting, different finishes like glitter/foil/chrome spray/decals, mid coats and top coats, etc. I just search the old posts for the info I am looking for when I am planning a new lure build.

I don't think the topcoat will matter as long as the wax mid coat is used. As Anglingarcher said, the key is using a wax that does not have cleaners in it. KBS was asked about by someone in the comments. He said " The best results are from using the floor wax but...it still becomes slightly dull. To answer your question, yes you can coat it with KBS over the floor wax."

In the comments to one of Engineered Angler’s videos, he says: "The acrylic in the floor wax is super hard and most paints stick to it really well." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZSHv0qKk88&list=PLEVBv_zywucTYrW8i-BqXBWZMdqoc6PnJ&index=17 I do believe I saw where he said to let the chrome dry overnight before dipping in the wax. I have seen him use transparent paint, UV clear resin, and tinted UV resin right on the wax after it cured for a couple of hours. Thanks for keeping us updated. I have been checking to see if I can still find the Pledge Floor Care Multi-Surface Finish in stores. I swear I saw some on a store shelf somewhere recently. It has been discontinued. There is a clear shot of the old product label at 4:56 in the following video if anyone is trying to still find it in stores. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-JfyKYWYGg&t=295s

Not yet. I will give it a shot. The problem is laziness. Most of the casts work fine with the 2 weights so I haven't done anything to it. It's just an occasional wobbler. I was thinking JB weld could work too. If I have to build another with 2 weights, I could glue the weights together on scrap wire, sand the JB to smooth to get rid of the seam, paint and epoxy the 2 weights as a single unit. I figure if I clear coat both weights together it will hold. I still have some LPO 1 oz bodies left. I could file of those bodies down to get it to 3/4 oz. I don't have enough stuff on my LPO shopping list to put in an order yet. Once I get enough on my list, I will add some 3/4 oz lead bodies. Around where I am, I can't buy lead sinkers under an ounce in stores anymore because of the lead ban.

It depends on how stubby the barrel weight is. If the weight is more like a stubby blunt-ended cylinder, the bait could tumble. The beads may help stop tumbling if they are solid. If the weight has more length and taper, it is more likely to fly true. In my experience, the blade does not affect the casting distance much on a single blade inline with a heavy body. The blade just flops back and the body leads the way on the cast. I made an inline spinner with a size 8 Indiana blade and a LPO 1 oz lead body for pike/musky (top spinner). It casts really far even with the bucktail. The LPO bodies have a nice taper on both ends. That spinner can spool 100 size freshwater reels. Any trailer or dressing will hurt distance some, except maybe some tubing on the hook. French blades are easy to get to spin. I think the size 2 blade will spin. My concern is the blade is too small to attract bigger fish. For a 3/4 oz body, I would try a size 3 blade, maybe a 4. I would bring several option to to try. If you will be using a surf rod rated for multiple ounces, I would be looking for 1 to 2 ounce bodies with a size 5 French blade so you can launch some bomb casts. I have a spinner with a size 5 French blade with two 3/8 oz lead bullet weights for a body (3/4 oz total body weight, bottom spinner). It casts far. Occasionally, it wobbles in the air and I don't get maximum distance. I think that is from the 2 weights separating on the cast. You can stack two 3/4 oz weights but that is not as effective as one big single weight. If you have heavier barrel weights, you can give them more of a taper with a file. My favorite lures for distance to get past the surf are a heavy jig head or bucktail jig with a paddletail or big grub, pencil poppers which are tail weighted (Cordell Pencil Poppers are $9-10 for the 1 oz and 2 oz models), the large size Super Spook, and Daiwa SP minnows. You might want to try those. We are allowed to use 2 rods where I am . I usually have a bait rig on one rod and I cast lures with the second rod. Check to see if you can use 2 rods there.

You should check out Engineered Angler's videos on YouTube about chrome. He tests several different products and clear coats. Outside of silver plating with a duplex gun, most chrome sprays will dull some. His best spray chrome results seem to come by painting a black base coat, applying a smooth clear coat to the black (the smoother the surface the better), then he sprays the chrome spray product, followed by dipping in floor wax (Pledge Floor Care Finish) for a mid-coat before finishing the paint job and final clear. He has several videos on it. Some are listed below. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Uo0fyo99G0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-JfyKYWYGg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3z_jF8EdWCA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Eb_XElOUA4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5k3WpdbJTnA

How about using a nylon mesh fabric molded into the bait? I have a couple of Savage Gear 8" 3D swimbaits that use it and those have good action. They are 3 section swimbaits with a serpentine action. I think it would work on a glide bait. I don't do much in the soft plastic arena. In the past, I have used mesh in spots on senko type baits to add durability. The mesh does not seem to affect the action. If the nylon is too flexible for the joint, you could try a stiffer outdoor type mesh made of plastic or vinyl. It is also called patio mesh, insect screen, or privacy screen.

Good timing. I just watched this video from Engineered Angler. He does a great job explaining the watts, wave length, and chamber setup. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVyA-F4tosE His bulbs are 9 watts and 365 nm. You can see the bulb label at 7:15.

I looked at Shabbona Lake on google maps. There aren't many nearby bodies of water. Because of the limited options and pressure, can you fish them on Wednesdays and Thursdays when the pressure is lower and the fish might be more settled from the weekend? Maybe before sunrise or at dusk? I am just trying to think of anything to give you an edge. Some of the lakes in my area I don't even bother going to on the weekends because of the fishing pressure and recreational boating. I feel the fish are still wary on Mondays because of the weekend boat traffic. I take it for granted I can try new lures or techniques in waters that should be suited to them. I fish the Lakes Region in NH a lot. There are over a hundred bodies of water within short driving distance. They range across nearly every type of water body. Small 30 acre ponds to reservoirs to larger lakes like Winnipesaukee, Squam and Newfound. There all sorts of streams and rivers. You can fish water from super clear to chocolate milk. Cover can range from nearly weed-free rock and sand bottoms to weed-choked marshes. Some of the small 30 to 100 acre ponds don't receive much pressure. Some bodies you have to walk through woods and drag a kayak or jon boat to fish. I have only fished a quarry a couple of times. I did well on tight wiggling subtle cranks like Shad Raps and silent lipless cranks, suspending jerkbaits, vertically jigging a Silver Buddy, and the realistic plastics. I noticed after I caught some fish on a given lure I had to switch to a different technique. It seemed the bass caught on real quick there. When it completely slowed down, I had to dead stick a fluke and even broke out the original Banjo minnow to get bites. Good luck. If you do find a good jig pattern, let us know.

You may also be trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. That body of water may simply not be conducive to a fishing a skirted jig. You might want to try your jigs around cover that limits light penetration like under docks and lily pads, after heavy rain that creates some runoff to stain the water a bit, or on less clear water bodies. 1-2 times a year, I fish a lake in NH where you can see the bottom in 20 feet. I rarely catch bass on a jig there no matter how finesse or natural colored I make it. To catch bass there, you have to alter the way you fish. I don’t use braid there. I use clear mono, copolymer and fluorocarbon lines. If I want to bottom fish there, I throw natural looking baits like a Zoom ultravibe craw, Yum crawbug, or Nikko hellgrammite on a matching jig head or Texas rigged with a matching tungsten weight held to the bait with a sinker stop. The water is so clear I don’t want a skirt. I use plastic baits that have the carapace section lines and side legs as I know the fish get a great look at the bait. For swim jig type fishing on that lake, I just fish a finesse paddletail on a matching jig head or belly weighted hook and avoid skirted swim jigs and big wide kicking paddletails. Not far from this super clear lake is a marshy lake with poor water visibility where you can throw obnoxious baits and big bulky jigs work great. Give your jigs a fair chance and try them on a variety of water bodies. The jig that doesn’t get a lot of bites in clear water may get crushed in stained water.

I get my tabs for LPO, Janns, Barlows, fishingskirts.com, jigjunkie and other ebay sellers, where ever I can find what I want. I break down bass jigs into 2 main categories, crawfish and baitfish imitators. I usually shoot for 50-55 strands (2 and a half tabs) on both unless it is a finesse jig in which case I go for 40-44 (2 tabs). With crawfish imitator jigs, I am usually casting to a target like a laydown, dock, or rock, letting the jig sink to the bottom and hoping/dragging it back along the bottom. I mostly use black, black/blue, green pumpkin varieties with a craw or chunk trailer. I would start with those colors on craw imitators. Green pumpkin works well in clear water. If it is super clear, I would try watermelons or a magic craw color. I sometimes use brown colors like big Texan. The crawfish imitator type jigs I use have Arkie type heads. I occasionally use football heads in rocks. Most of the skirts on these jigs are one color (2 and half tabs of the same color tab). The rest are 2 tabs of one color and a half tab of an accent color like 2 tabs of a brown and an orange accent half tab or 2 tabs of black with a half tab of blue for accent. You can add some additional color with the trailer. Menace grubs make good trailers as you can use them horizontally for craws and vertically if going for a baitfish look. The baitfish imitating jigs (swim jigs) have more tapered heads, sort of bullet shaped. I cast these jigs out and retrieve with a slow to medium retrieve. I am using these to cover water horizontally, especially in weeds. They range in colors to match my local baitfish like gold shiner, perch, silver shiners, and bluegill. I use these jigs with a paddle tail swimbait, grubs, and ribbon tail worms with the head cutoff. The skirts on these are usually more complex involving 2-4 colors. I would recommend starting with either gold shiner, silver shiner / shad type color, perch or bluegill as you have stated. For gold shiner, I put a half tab of black with gold flake for a back, main body of one and a half tabs of metallic gold/gold shiner/ or gold baitfish, and a half tab of chartreuse or orange (or a mix of the 2) for the belly or clear with gold flake for the belly for clear water. For yellow perch, I use yellow or chartreuse with black stripes from the ‘living image’ or ‘real bait’ series for the main body, a half tab of black with gold flake or black with green flake for the back, a quarter to half tab of some type of orange for the belly. Different sellers call the striped tabs by different names. For silver, I go with black with silver flake for the back or pumpkin with green flake for a back for more of an emerald shiner look, metallic silver or silver sil-a-chrome or a mix of the two for a main body, and white with silver flake or pearl for a belly. I sometimes modify this with a few strands of purple in the back and more of the white with silver or pearl for more of a shad look. For bluegills, I have two type of skirts because in the northeast bluegill vary widely color. The first pattern is two tabs of green pumpkin blue flake with barbed wire stripes. The belly is comprised of some pumpkin with chartreuse tip and sapphire with green pumpkin tip, usually a quarter tab of each for the belly. The other pattern is a mix of the green pumpkin above with metallic gold or gold baitfish and sapphire with blue flake for more of a shiney clear water bluegill color. I tried to go no less than a quarter of tab on a color and no more than 4 colors on a skirt. At 3-4 colors, it is hard to get them to line up to where you want them. Over 4 colors is a pain. I use silicone skirt bans. After I get the band on the tabs, I try to line up colors where I want them before cutting the tab ends off. It is easier to arrange the skirt with the tab ends intact. I put the skirt on the jig and adjust the tabs as necessary. Then, I will do any tying. I tie above the band and get the skirt locked in at the base of the head. Lately, I have just been putting a colored zip tie on top on the silicone band instead of any tying. After I get the skirt tied or banded, I cut the tab ends off. When you buy your tabs, save a quarter to a half tab and the plastic bag it came in. A certain color may vary from company to company. Some vendors use the same series and/or color numbers. Having a tab sample with the label showing the company’s name and product number will make it easier to find replacements and do comparisons from company to company.

.031 will work fine. If you will be fishing in areas with larger species, I would go with .035 on that size spinner for more durability. Some of the waters I fish have northern pike which will hit small spinners particularly in spring and fall. I use .040 wire for spinners in the 1/2 oz. size range.

You can use the search feature at the top right or under the ‘Activity’ button to look up clear coat posts. There are a lot of posts with lots of tips. Which ones have you tried already? I have used Devcon 2 Ton (D2T), Envirotex Lite (Etex), and Bob Smith Industries (BSI) and they all can work well. They all can also have issues if not used correctly. Avoid 5 minute epoxies for clear coats as they tend to yellow and can cure too quickly to level out. Look for ones with a 30 minute or longer working time. I mostly use D2T now because it is readily available where I am and it seems to be tolerant of environmental factors. Everybody has their own preference. I plan on trying Crystal Clear Epoxy from East Coast resins in the near future. Someday, I will get around to building a UV resin curing light box and try that. Your picture of craters is also called ‘fish eyes’. That term should help in your searches. As others have pointed out, the most common causes of this are surface contamination, missing spots when applying, and not using the clear coat properly. Surface contamination can occur from touching the bait with your fingers and leaving oils on the paint, the paint not being fully dry, or dust settling on the lure after painting. Try to not to touch the bait and use disposable gloves. You may want to try a spray mid-coat like Rustoleum 2X Clear Matte or Krylon Matte Clear if the problem continues. Do your sanding in another room or outside to avoid dust. Sweep or shop-vac when you have no painting or clear coating planned. Use a heat gun or hair dryer to set the paint and also to blow off any dust just before clear coating. You may want to let the paint dry overnight. It is also possible the sealer or paint you used is still off-gassing. Off-gassing usually produces blisters or areas where the clear coat and paint peel off, and not craters. Another problem could be that the paint itself does not allow good adhesion even when dry. Some metallic paints in particular can have this problem. This problem can be solved by spraying a clear mid-coat before the final clear coat. Missing spots or applying the epoxy too thin will create fish eyes. Your fish eyes appear along the back ridge of that lure. You may have missed that area with the epoxy or put it on too thin. On thicker epoxies, you could thin the epoxy with a couple of drops of denatured alcohol to make it easier to apply. Missing spots was a problem I had before I got a bright light to look over the bait closely. You need to get real close to the bait and may want to use a magnifying glass. Right after applying the clear coat, rotate the bait under a bright light to look for bare spots or uneven clear coat. Look at the glare from the light on the surface of the bait. Deviations or wavy-ness in the glare mean missing or thin epoxy. Pay particular attention to around the hook hangers, line tie, diving bill, any corners or ridges like a gill plate or fin ridge, any sharp curves like the back and belly of the lure. Look for areas that would block a clean brush stroke when applying the clear. You may be mixing the epoxy in too big of a batch, trying to do too many baits at once. The epoxy could be setting up while you are applying it. It does not have time to level out on the bait. You may have to do smaller batches. On my large baits, 7+ inches and 3+ oz., I do one bait at a time. Make sure you follow the instructions of the clear coat you are using. Mix the correct ratio. You may need a digital scale for this or disposable measuring cups. After using D2T for so long, I am able to eyeball this. Try mixing with a plastic stick as opposed to wood. I use disposable paint brushes to apply my clear. I cut off half of the plastic handle for use as a mixing stick. Don’t mix on a surface that can add contamination. Mix thoroughly. Find the temperature and humidity information for the clear coat on the package or their website. Most clear coats have a preferred temperature and humidity. You may need AC, heat, a humidifier, or dehumidifier if you are not close to the optimal temp and humidity. You may want to warm the bottles in a bowl of warm water before mixing if they are stored below the optimal temperature. Try to avoid clearing on rainy or high humidity days. If you are using a rotisserie to cure the baits, make sure the baits are not rocking as they rotate. This can happen with larger lures. You may need a 3rd point to secure the bait from the belly hanger to keep it from rocking. You want the bait to not move on the rotisserie as the rotisserie spins. Big baits have a tendency to flip on the rotisserie if only secured at the two ends. Rocking or flipping can prevent the epoxy for leveling out. I don’t know what clear coats you have available in Australia. There has to some that will work well if the instructions are followed carefully. It may seem like a pain to pay attention to the proper procedures. But once you get used to it, it becomes second nature. Below are some other posts on clear coats. Jim https://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/37686-tacky-epoxy-check-your-temps/ https://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/37532-new-guy-old-questions/ https://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/12510-trying-to-achieve-a-flawless-finish/ https://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/36877-epoxy-issues-and-lure-turner-questions/?tab=comments#comment-301056

I have used tungsten weights to make spinners. I like the black ones and the silver ones in particular. They work well especially if you want to make a spinner that will run deeper. I also use brass weights with a gold blade and black nickel brass weights with a black nickel blade. I use lead bodies when I want color I can't find in a painted weight. I have painted some of Bass Pro Shops XPS Finesse Weights for spinner bodies instead of pouring bodies. https://www.basspro.com/shop/en/bass-pro-shops-xps-finesse-weights

I tie my flashabou on a rivet. The flashabou being tied close to the rivet head causes it to flare out. I saw that method in the following video. The skirt tying starts at 12:00. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtJdI0TXQWk You can put a skirt collar on top of the thread to cause the flashabou to flare if for some reason the rivet does not. I have also made some flashabou skirts using a cheap skirt tool (tube with a hooked wire inside it type). I just put a skirt collar on the flashabou using the tool. You can roll a piece a scrap paper around the flashabou like a homemade 'cigarette' to make it manageable to get it in the tube. I use needle nose pliers to get the flashabou skirt on the rivet. Slide the skirt up to the rivet head and the use a zip tie over the skirt collar to hold it in place. Pushing the skirt up to the head of the rivet causes the skirt to flare. I was lazy and made a couple like this at the beginning of the year because no tying is involved. They have lasted so far. I have also used the skirt collar and zip tie method to make flashabou spinnerbaits and chatterbaits.

I have not seen epoxy melt glitter. I have made baits out of wood, pvc, lead, brass and have used a few different epoxies. I have also used glitter nail polish with a top coat of epoxy and that worked. I don't have much experience with vinyl paint. I have only used it on small crappie jigs with no glitter. I have seen some vinyl jigs get gummy but I don't clear coat those tiny jigs. Once, I did foil an old 4" diamond jig. The jig had to be either Bead or Marathon. I remember doing each side individually and trimming with a razor knife. I think I used D2T as a top coat on that. It lasted a few years and then water started getting under the foil from dings on the edges of the jig. The foil is still on the jig but has been discolored in spots on the edges by the water. You could also try one of the foil Jig Skins. I have a few lures with a foil herring on them. One is a 6" bar/slab type jig. It still looks good after 2 years and maybe a dozen fish. It is coated with D2T.