Easy bill material

[mark poulson]

I had to finish a lure, and test it, before I made this post.

First off, I am not a commercial lure builder. I make them for fun for me and my friends.

I put a bill in a jointed lure that wouldn't swim well, and it worked (see the gallery)

I didn't have any lexan or other bill material in the garage, but I did had hundreds of Plano dividers.

I cut out a profile of what I thought the bill should be, left it a little long, so I could trim it with a pair of sheet metal cutters at the test pond, and epoxied it in.

It isn't clear, but it's translucent, and it's flexible, so it wouldn't work for crashing lures into rocks, probably.

But it's rigid enough for wake bait lips, swim bait lips, and shallow cranks, which only have to deal with branches.

The material is tough, so I don't worry about it failing any time soon.

And it's not really noticeable in the water.

The best part is it's cheap, available, and it works!

[captsully18]

Really nice looking bait, Mark. Glad to know about "Plano-Lip-Material". Thinkin' all the time you are.

David

[mark poulson]

Don't tell anyone Dave, or they'll raise the price of Plano boxes.

[captsully18]

Mine lips is sealed!

David

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

Hi , Mark ,

This certain flexibility of such stowaway dividers has always put me off from trying to utilize this material fo diving lips .

Surely it won't break and also won't fall out of its slot , but what has always concerned me was the possibility of water entering the wood at the lip slot because of the flex of that material .

But since I haven't ever tried it , I won't know for sure(lol) !

So relying on your experiences to come !

greetz , Dieter

Edited August 25, 2008 by diemai
writing error

[boomah21]

Any concerns with it warping? Or mis shaping in some fashion?

[mark poulson]

Dieter,

Dave had the answer.

Sealed lips.

More specifically, filling the lip slot with D2T before you insert it, and making sure it's sealed with the epoxy, and top coat.

I wouldn't worry about the lip being too flexible, since I'm using it on lures that are shallow runners, so the lip flexing a little won't be a problem.

I don't know how well it would hold up, flex-wise- on a medium or deep diver, and I don't know how it would hold a line tie, but it will glue in well enough.

boomah21,

I don't think it will warp. I've had plano boxes in the boat for years, and never had one warp.

I guess only time will tell.

For me, it was worth a try, and the worst thing that might happen is it would fail. But I wouldn't know if I didn't try.

I'm thinking it will make great tail material, too.

Edited August 25, 2008 by mark poulson

[boomah21]

Yeah I hear ya.....I love the thought process. Keep us updated if you see any change. I just think I might have to give one or two a try.

Thanks for the creative idea

[mark poulson]

Funny how ideas come to us. I was cleaning up my workbench, and saw some 2 1/4" deep Plano box dividers that I hadn't used lying there.

Bingo!

It's better to be lucky than good!

[Vodkaman]

Mark. Very nice lure, like the tail. I suspect that if you cut lexan to the dimensions of the original divider, it would have similar flexibility. Cut short, it should be well stiff enough.

I've started doing a lot of thinking about swimbaits and how they work. your honesty about this one has helped me learn some more. Many thanks for posting it.

Dave

[Seeking 56]

I would try Lepage's marine epoxy for the Plano lip, hardest epoxy I've ever used. I've banged aluminium bills on rocks and it hasn't cracked yet.

Funny, just tonight I was working on some lures and glanced over at one of my inline spinners, and I thought boy, that colorado blade would make a nice lip.

s54

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

Mark , off course you are right about sealing the lip slot with glue before , didn't think of it(the forest and the trees , lol !) .

Almost is achieved automatically , when glueing in the lip , maybe only some more little care neccessary !

I think , that those dividers DO warp , but not under this given condition as a diving bill:yes: .

I always tend to stuff up my stowaways with too many lures , especially metal spoons and leadhead jigs .

When stored sideward in my tackle pouches over a longer period of time , the weight of these metal lures slightly bends those dividers , and they don't flip back , when reliefed .

Maybe they would , also after a long period of time , I can't tell , because I hardly have my stowaways empty .

When utilizing such dividers as diving bills , such conditions are not given , nobody would store his homemade crankbaits in a way , that pressure would be applied to them for a longer period of time(not even myself , lol) , so no warping of the bill would occur:yes: .

Greetz , Dieter

[mark poulson]

Dave,

Thanks for the kind words.

Here's a riddle I bet you can answer.

I've found that gliders, for me, work best when they are more round on the bottom, and not too tall, almost cylindrical, but my swimbaits seem to swim better if they are more "rectangular" in cross section.

I've kind of figured out that the round bottom on my surface gliders helps them to change direction with less effort, skidding over the water instead of plowing through it, but I still don't have a clue why the rectangular shape, tall and thin, works for swimbaits, while the more round section doesn't work as well.

So what is it about the two body cross sections that makes such a difference?

[Vodkaman]

Mark, would be happy to discuss the subject. But first, I am confused about terminology. Please explain the difference between glider and swimbait. I know what a swimbait is (well I think I do!), but on LKN's recent vid, he referred to his bait as a glider.

This discussion possibly belongs in a new thread.

Edited August 26, 2008 by Vodkaman

[mark poulson]

Dave,

I think of a surface glider as an oversized Sammy. The Pupfish, a knockoff of the Mega Bass Dog, is the gold standard, and the Lunker Punker is the current reigning champ.

It is walked side to side, and the amount it moves is determined by the cadence and length of pause.

A hard swimbait, to me, is a baitfish replica that is larger than the big deep diving cranks. It can be one piece, but generally is jointed to give it a swimming action. The earliest hard swimbaits had bills to initiate their actions, like a crank, and lots of the current crop of jointed swimbaits have bills, too.

As they say, size matters. I think of swimbaits as being at least 4" in length. But the actual definition of a swimbait is a mystery to me.