Metal Swimbait Or Jointed Spoon ????

[diemai]

Hi , folks ,

You might have seen in the gallery , that I'm into spoon making quite a bit recently , ........and comments by spoopa and Vodkaman got me thinking..........!

spoopa had suggested making a jointed spoon , which I assumed to be impossible , .....Vodkaman said , that he thought at first glance , that the lure in my video "Clicking Mouse Spoon" was a swimbait , due to its swimming action !

Took all this into consideration , did some sketching two weeks ago , ......about 10 days ago I have made the production templates and finally yesterday at work I have shaped the first prototype displayed in here , bath tub tested it straightaway last night after work .

To my surprise it worked quite well:) , I had expected it to have no action at all but just pull straight upward without any wobble or only a very moderate one .

But the deeply cupped front section of 1,5 mm stainless steel sheet(all rear sections 1,0 mm) has an extremely strong body roll from one side to the other , even more than 180

[diemai]

Okay , folks ,

Here are the three pictures displaying the play of the sections against one another !

thanks for looking:yes: , ....greetz , diemai

[Vodkaman]

Love it. I like the tangs, to limit the movement, I presume to prevent tangles while casting.

You will have to make a video for us.

Dave

[mark poulson]

Looks great. I love how your mind works. Amazing.

I would guess that, to get the snake-like swimming action of a wooden swimbait, you'd probably have to figure out some way to turn the tail section so it's at 90 degrees to the spoon. That way, the spoon would move side to side, and so would the tail.

Maybe double tabs, bent both ways, would limit the movement enough to prevent hook fouling on the cast.

[spoopa]

That thing looks wicked Dieter!

I bet one way to get the hooks from tangling with each other is to not place them directly over each other. Like place one hook at the head and the other in the back of the spoon. The only drawback to this is that you may get you fishing line tangled with the front hook if the hook was to close to it.

Then maybe another way to get more action is to have the tail segments connected with one split in the center of the tail vs two:?

This also reminds me of a flasher. It is a giant flat spoon with only the rear section of it kicked out to produce a wobble. There are two purposes of the flasher, to get the fishes attention and to give a lure more action. This is achieved with a very short drop back from the flasher. So the flasher has such a high wobble that it transfer to the lure trailing behind it cause it to have more wobble.

Goodluck, Jacob

Edited August 6, 2009 by spoopa
Brain blast

[bbduc]

Nice idea and craftsmanship. I could see this thing painted up and pulling some hogs in.

Could you bend the tabs inwards to reduce the movement? Most swimbaits when swimming anyway only move a certain amount even though they have the ability to pivot into a full "U".

Love it.

[BobP]

Nice idea. I'm not so sure I'd change anything! Spoons roll, swimbaits swim. Both catch fish.

[diemai]

Thanks for all your comments , guys , much appreciated:worship: !

@ Vodkaman

Made another one today with a differently cupped first section , just to see how that one would act .

If I'd have a change next week to get to a certain swim , I'll try making a short video there , ......there are some long pontoon platforms in there , perfect for taking lures in the water just by walking alongside .

@ mark poulson

Gee , Mark , I haven't thought about such before , .....it could work !

Need to think of an easy way to connect the parts 90

[Basseducer]

diemai,

Don't know if this would kill the spoon wobble action, but if you added a second spoon section to the first making it rounded. It might give you a softer swimming action. You could attach the two halves with the existing slpit rings on the first half. On the other hand I may be way off.

[now thats a fish]

Diemai,

Awesome stuff you got going on...I like the idea of possibly using only one split ring to join the segments. Perhaps you could try a Colorado style blade at the last segment

[diemai]

@ Basseducer

Do you mean two spoon sections behind one another with their cupping into same direction:? ?

If so ,..... I haven't tried such before , but in my theory the rear spoon would not provide any action , I guess , it would just act like a plane sheet as well pulled by the first spoon section , unless it would have a rigid connection to the front section , but this would render TWO cupped sections in front useless.

But I can't really tell as well:( , have to keep it in the back of my head , .......some day I gotta find out .....!

@ now thats a fish

Undoubtely single splitring joints would provide more wiggling action , .......but this way it won't be possible to limit the sections moving against one another and thus provide more chances for hook fouling , I guess .

Concerning the colorado blade tail ,...... I could furnish any medium to large blade of thicker material and still rig a hook to it , ......it won't tear out .

But I guess , that I have found a solution by now :

Yesterday at work I had jammed together a second prototype with a moderately cupped and thinner(1,0 mm versus 1,5 mm at first) front section ,.... and as I was hoping , this one does not roll as much , but swims a tad more to the sides to also pull the tail behind ...........I knew before from similar spoon models , that heavier gauge material is more likely to roll over .

The tail movement has become better now on this one , I am pretty much satisfied with it ,........though one cannot quite compare it to a hardbody swimbait .

The reason for this might probably be , that compared to a swimbait , this jointed spoon rocks from one sideward edge to the other and due to its first sections body curve it swims to the sides for a fraction of the movement , pulling the tail behind .

But because of that approx. 180

[mark poulson]

Would adding additional split rings between the first two sections, so there is a less direct connection, help cut down on the side to side movement? By this I mean each set would be, for instance, three split rings long, to put a longer flex joint between the segments. Would that dampen the side to side?

[RiverMan]

It is really different..........I like it. I'm wondering what it would look like if you replaced the spoon portion of the lure with a wood body of some kind.

jed

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

I am sure , that it would result into less resistance , so that the tail sections won't have to follow that 180

[spoopa]

I think I got it!

Its the design of your first spoon. I did some spoon testing today and i made a deeply cupped spoon like yours in the picture and then I had some commercial ones that had the rear end flaired out.

Well to my surprise I noticed that the spoon that had the tail slightly flaired out had a very wide wobble vs the deeply cupped spoon. So maybe if the first spoon was changed then maybe it would improve the action:?

Goodluck, Jacob

[diemai]

@ spoopa

Very sorry , Jacob , I don't know the meaning of "flaired out":huh: , couldn't find it in my dictionary as well.............but if you are refering to most spoons "usual" shape and cupping , I can tell , that these can't take ANY larger attachment without loosing a big share of wobble .

Seems that this(viewed from the side) pronounced curvy shape is essential to still provide action , even with some kinda tail attached ,..... a deeper cupping crosswise lets the spoon roll more and give it a tendencey to overturn and swim upside down , just like an airfoil .

greetz , Dieter:yay:

[diemai]

Alright , folks ,

Here is the video , that I had promised to make , .......the lure action is much better to be seen this way as if only tested in a bath tub .

If you should not quite understand my German accent:huh:, .......the first pass of the bait back and forth the pontoon platform shows the deeply cupped version with a thicker 1,5 mm thick front section ,........the lure displayed in the second pass back and forth has a moderately cupped front section of only 1,0 mm thickness .

It seems to work more lively , but also rises up faster .

Hard to be seen , but these lures do not get spin , they only strongly rock from side to side .

Now , as I look at that video, I see , that the lure model does emit quite a nice flash , as the four rear sections plus the dragging front spoon swim along ,.......I guess , that the appeal of this lure would be strong enough to coax some strikes by local pike.........if only this dead calm , hot and humid weather would be gone one day:( !

greetz , diemai:yay:

[bbduc]

The lighter 1,0 mm definitely has a better action and flashes much more. I was surprised by the action leaning more towards a swimbait than that of a spoon, I expected more roll. I think you have a winner on your hands. Thanks for posting the video, always nice to have a live visual with the words.

Hope the weather breaks for you. Here are water temps are still way below normal and now so late in the summer season it doesn't look like we are going to get the warmer water. Guess I'll just start fishing the fall patterns.

Great job on the metal swimbait.

[spoopa]

Hey Dieter, sorry about the confusion with the words:o. Lol I need to learn how to speak proper english without the slang in it....

Well what I meant by the "flaired out" is just a smaller cupping. It looks like you nailed it in the video with the action:yeah:. I really like the action you got to, it has a lot of flash to it and the action is very nice. It looks like a fish going through the water8O.

Goodluck, Jacob

[hazmail]

Diemai - again great result and beautiful work here - Isn't it great when you get such a good result after so many sleepless nights. Good on you - The lurkers will be all over this. Pete

[JBlaze]

Diemai, Once again you are pushing the boundaries. Don't know how you come up with these ideas. But they are great and ingenious. I like this one.

I just watched your video and I think it has plenty of action and great flash. I think it will get clobbered (aggressively attacked) when you take it fishing.

I would think of it as a metal swimbait with a different action which could be a very good thing. Thanks for posting. Good work. Hope it gets you a big one.

John

[diemai]

Thanks a lot for your kind words , guys , much appreciated !

Happy , that the second video I've ever made turned out a bit useful to the viewer !

Actually I've been tinkering on swimbait-like lures consisting of metal sheets for some time already , but this pure metal one here is the first one , that does entirely fulfill my goals of design:yes: !

I started my luremaking career with metal baits many years ago , guess , that's why I still hang to them quite a bit !

I can also get the material for free and have access to industrial grade machinery for working them down .

With metal lures I do not have to face any problems with painting , topcoating and water sepage , ........once they're done , they'd stay in shape , no maintenance required(OK ,.... maybe new hooks or applying new decal foil ocassionally , no big deal !) .

After having seen so many swimbaits here on TU and also making my first wooden one(that even works nicely) I had thought about adapting that swimbait principle to metal lures , as I would not have to bother about complicated hinging and especially keeping the joining parts waterproof(never knew about PVC then and still it seems not to be easily accessible to me) .

Anyway ,about one year ago I started out with a crudely jammed together metal swimbait prototype of 0,5 mm stainless steel sheet , made to stay afloat by some bottle corks just slid over the top rims of the metal sections .

I was aware , that I would need multiple tow eyes for testing for action , so I drilled many holes into the front section .............and this thing really swims like a real swimbait attached to the outer holes ,....... don't remember , whether it was on top or bottom , but I guess on both sides , ....only one better than the other .

So I was curious and launched some three similar baits more employing the same principle , but this time of different metal sheets , copper , brass and stainless steel and also of different thicknesses .

Instead of bottlecork I used abachewood as flotation bodies , .......I was soon aware , that these small pieces of wood would not be able to keep the lures afloat , but at least I was hoping that they would let them(or a part of them)sink in an upright position .

The assembly and painting was a PITA , as one has to connect the sections with the splitrings PRIOR to glueing on the "flotation bodies" of wood , thus also prior to painting , decorating and topcoating them , so the previously mentioned advantages of metal lures I claimed for turned out a hoax:huh: !

Anyway , I got finished with these one day ,....... only to find out , that none of them does achieve any "snake-like" swimbait action , no matter of what hole I'd attach them to:mad: !

The heaviest one of them sinks like a brick , and the lightest still goes down at at least 1 1/2 feet/sec. ,.... I could probably only try using them twitching along the bottom to get a bit of action out of them , .......but never did so far .

Anyway , I had dumped these prototype and failures in my basement for a year or so ,........ until this certain "Mouse Spoon" got to my hands , that is able to tug "anything" behind it without losing it's wobble..........the result is here now;) !

greetz , diemai:yay:

[Vodkaman]

Great video, love the accent.

That second spoon swam really well. You should try just polishing one without finish, take advantage of that flash. Then again, it might scare the fish away.

Impressive work as usual, thanks for sharing.

Dave