New "pikulator" Spoon Testing Video

[diemai]

Hi , folks ,

During the past week I've been busy with making a few of these spoons , that I have named "Pikulator" , ........have put up the initial prototype in my gallery some days ago as well .

By now I have completed a few of these spoons in two different sizes , I'm pretty much convinced about their swimming action and pretty sure , that they would also have an appeal on local predators , ....local closing time is gonna be through in two weeks from now !

Sadly the metallic clicking sound generated by these lures wasn't captured on video , ...but I can 100% assure you , that it can be heard standing beside the tub , ........and the fish would surely sense it , anyway(guess , that I accidentally put my thumb on the mic holding the camera , dunno ?) .

There's also a second video showing some more crankbaits , that I've been working on lately , ......these are the last ones of the entire lathe-turned bunch , ........the others you can see in my recent gallery uploads , ....also on video !

Thanks for your interest , .............greetz , diemai

Edited April 15, 2011 by diemai

[Vodkaman]

Outstanding video as usual. You are getting very good at this.

All the lures had great movement and I am sure that you are in for a successful season.

We will have to figure out how to do a microphone for your tests. A bone mic perhaps, can you buy those?

Dave

[BobP]

Great videos and really nice baits! I fish spoons whenever I can because they are so efficient at catching fish in open-water - and your spoon designs are outstanding

[mark poulson]

Great lures and videos!

[Musky Glenn]

That was an excellent demonstration! How is the pin, that holds the rattle, attached to the Stainless Steel. Musky Glenn

[diemai]

Thanks a lot , folks , ..........sometimes really weird lure ideas come to my mind !

Next week I'm planning on trying to assemble this rattle set-up to two commercial spoons to see whether it would work on these as well , .......gonna sacrifice a German "EffZett" spoon and a American "shoehorn" style spoon for the test , ....please wish my luck !

@ Vodkaman

...........guess , that I can't connect any external microfones to my little camera , .........I'm really wondering , why it did not work out , ....as on prior videos I've managed to capture the noise of lures in the bathtub !

@ Musky Glenn

The 1,0mm dia. wire is attached through two little holes 1,5mm dia. and locked in place by bending the tag ends at 90° to either side of the spoon(towards it's rim) , so that they'd sit snug against the underside of the spoon(hammered them down finally) , .....afterwards snipped off snug to the spoon outer edges .

A bit complicated , as the remaining ridge between bore and rim there is very short , ....might have been easier to bend the tag ends parallel to the lengthwise axis , one side forward and the other one backward , ........won't have to bother about a narrow ridge that way .

@ BobP

I also throw spoons most of the time , ....they are just so versatile when utilizing a couple of different models , .........one can fish them at less than 2 feet depth(very thin Dutch "polder" spoons) or down to more than 50 feet(the heavier German "Effzetts" and the mighty 2 ounce+ American "Eppingers") .

Somewhere inbetween there are my homemades as well !

@ mark poulson

Glad that you like my work , too , Mark !

Thanks a lot again , ....greetz , diemai

[hazmail]

Thanks a lot , folks , ..........sometimes really weird lure ideas come to my mind !

Next week I'm planning on trying to assemble this rattle set-up to two commercial spoons to see whether it would work on these as well , .......gonna sacrifice a German "EffZett" spoon and a American "shoehorn" style spoon for the test , ....please wish my luck !

@ Vodkaman

...........guess , that I can't connect any external microfones to my little camera , .........I'm really wondering , why it did not work out , ....as on prior videos I've managed to capture the noise of lures in the bathtub !

@ Musky Glenn

The 1,0mm dia. wire is attached through two little holes 1,5mm dia. and locked in place by bending the tag ends at 90° to either side of the spoon(towards it's rim) , so that they'd sit snug against the underside of the spoon(hammered them down finally) , .....afterwards snipped off snug to the spoon outer edges .

A bit complicated , as the remaining ridge between bore and rim there is very short , ....might have been easier to bend the tag ends parallel to the lengthwise axis , one side forward and the other one backward , ........won't have to bother about a narrow ridge that way .

@ BobP

I also throw spoons most of the time , ....they are just so versatile when utilizing a couple of different models , .........one can fish them at less than 2 feet depth(very thin Dutch "polder" spoons) or down to more than 50 feet(the heavier German "Effzetts" and the mighty 2 ounce+ American "Eppingers") .

Somewhere inbetween there are my homemades as well !

@ mark poulson

Glad that you like my work , too , Mark !

Thanks a lot again , ....greetz , diemai

Dieter-- I could NOT hear the rattle (I'm half deaf anyway) but I could hear your wife banging on the bathroom door ---

Love those spoons (and your hard-baits), the action is great, can you contact me by P.M, here or on L/Lovers--Trout season is coming up and I could do with something like these -- I will be in Sweden in about 3 weeks, are you anywhere near there??

Pete

[diemai]

@ Hazmail

Thanks a lot , Pete , ..........but it was definately not my wife , ......probably the old lady in the flat above , she's sometimes doing bowling with pots , pans and brooms !

From my place to Sweden(Göteborg) it's one hour drive to our states capital city Kiel ferry harbor and another 13 1/2 hrs. overnight on the ferry boat , ........another ferry line from Sassnitz to Trelleborg would only take a few hours at sea but a three hours + drive to get to the German ferry harbor Sassnitz from here .

A plane from Hamburg to Stockholm would take less than an hour , I suppose .

But actually I've never been to Sweden !

When going there , don't forget to bring as much booze along , as the custom regulations allow(not quite sure , but I guess one litre of spirits per person is free of custom charges) , ........whiskey , beer and stuff is bloody expensive in entire Scandinavia and a bottle of good booze is likely to open one or another door over there !

There are special department stores in some German harbor towns located at the Baltic coast , that even have special beverage departments for Scandinavian export only , ....people from over there come down by bus loads for shopping liquid , ....and they don't mind paying their import taxes , still a lot cheaper than buying at home !

Cheers , Dieter

[hazmail]

Thanks Dieter-

I will be there for about 6 weeks, that's a lot of ferry trips/ boooze .

Pete

[diemai]

Thanks Dieter-

I will be there for about 6 weeks, that's a lot of ferry trips/ boooze .

Pete

Pete ,.................... 6 weeks in Sweden , ........that means a LOT of pike ...........PM sent on LAM !

greetz , Dieter

[RiverMan]

I like the action of the spoon, very good. Spoons are an often overlooked lure that can be very effective. We use large spoons here in the northwest (USA) in the fall for chinook....they love em!

Jed

[diemai]

I like the action of the spoon, very good. Spoons are an often overlooked lure that can be very effective. We use large spoons here in the northwest (USA) in the fall for chinook....they love em!

Jed

Thanks a lot , Jed , ..........in fact I've got the impression , that over here spoon fishing is considered as old-fashioned and non-successful, ........at least this is , what I sometimes read in angling magazines and on the websites , ...........the US bass rigs like Carolina , - ,Texas , -and Whacky rig ,...... also drop shot rigs ,....... have become the latest craze over here through the last years , ........also those high-end Japanese hardbaits , ..........nobody talks about spoons anymore , ......though some models have been successfully around for many decades already .

Well , good for me , that I like fishing spoons , ..........local fish would be less familiar and suspicious , .....especially on my annealed dark-colored stainless spoons , as commercial spoons are most likely bright colored and/or shiny polished .

Got myself a couple of American spoons on Ebay recently , ........I count a great deal on the "Eppinger" line , .........but also got some "Red Eye Wigglers" and "Locos" , can't easily obtain all of these over here .

Thanks , ....greetz , Dieter

[mark poulson]

Dieter,

How do you get the cup shape in your spoons?

[diemai]

Dieter,

How do you get the cup shape in your spoons?

Mark , .......at first I'd beat the readily shaped still flat blanks into a homemade beating template of hardwood , in which I've previously made and indention a bit deeper than the spoons cupped shape but same outline like the blank , .......a small halfround handchisel and a "Dremel" oval bit can be used for making the indention , fixing the hardwoodboard on your workbench's edge with carpenter clamps , ............ the hardwood wood should be not too thin , as it may crack up later , 1" is fine for small and medium sized spoons .

Hold the spoon on one end flush into your indention of the wooden beating template and hit the other(deeper)end with a plastic hammer , so you achieve the intial cupping of the metal blank , ...........for the cupping to become more pronounced , switch over to a small ballpeen hammer .

Now you've done the basic cupping of the spoon blank , it will still be very rough in surface and uneven in shape , ............to become more smooth and achieve an even cupping , utilize a steel plate or a small anvil , hold your blank by the forward end under an angle onto the steelplate/anvil and hit the other side with the ballpeen hammer , always that very spot , where the spoon blank toouches with the steel surface , ..........a change of the holding angle is the control of the grade of cupping , ...........but you'd need quite a few beats and also some practice .

Try making the blank evenly cupped on either side of the rear , you can determine about symetry when putting it on the steelplate and eyeball down the plate .

When you're done with the rear cupping , you would have to furnish the little "S"-shape(viewed from the side)by bending the foreward spoon end upward a bit , ...........you do this by holding the spoon by it's rear , putting it on the steelplate under a pointed angle and gently hit the front end a bit behind the front tip , ....off course the cupped side downward on the plate .

Now eyeball down your spoon to check , whether it became twisted within , ........if so , put the front end into a vise , not clambed tightly , just lose is OK not to squeeze back it's cupped shape .

The spoon should point exactly 90° upward , now take two small wood dowels , hammer handles , pieces of broomstick , etc , ......place the over your spoon on either side and hold both together with your two hands , ...........now you can utilize these as a lever to gently twist the spoon back so that front and rear would become perfectly aligned and level , ......you can eyeball against the edge of the vise clambs to check , .......finally you can put the blank on the steel plate again for eyeballing .

Now you can mark the hole positions from the underside , utilizing a permanent marker pen , ....make sure , that the remaining ridge on either end of the spoon would not become too thin not to tear out under strain(particular important when using soft copper sheet).

Use a 90° centerpunch to tip the hole markings , so the drill bit finds proper grip instantly later , ........start drilling small , maybe 2,0mm dia , .......you can slowly increase hole dia. until you're satisfied with the thickness of the remaining edges , ....too thin and they can tear out , ....too thick and you'd have troubles sliding over the splitrings later .

To finish the spoons outside , I'd brush them with rotating brushes in my lathe motor(a drill would either work) , for brass and copper material use soft brass bristled brushes , for stainless tell start with steel bristles , ..........afterwards corse and fine polish them with textile polishing wheels and polishing paste .

Note :

Above described shaping method counts for softer copper and brass sheet 1,0mm to 2,0mm , ..........stainless steel of same thickness requires one extra working step , before beating the basic shape into the wooden beating template , .......this is because this material is so rigid and tough , you won't achieve the crosswise cupping sufficiently with the previously described process alone .

This is why you must mark a lengthwise felt pen center line onto you steel blank , clamp the blank into a vise(possibly with plane clamps , not serrated ones) so that the center line would come to sit right onto the edge of the forward clamp of the vise , also take a round steel dowel with a smooth surface , preferably hardened and place it in the vise as well , so that it would sit behind the spoon with its biggest diameter also aligned and parallel to the spoons centerline and vise clamps edge , ..........tigthen the vise real tight and beat the half of the spoon that sticks out around the dowel with your plastic hammer , ............after switch around and do the same with the other half .

Steel dowel dia. should be roughly around 1" for small spoons and 1 1/2" for medium and large ones , ........if crosswise cupping becomes too pronounced this way , it is not that important , as you can gently decrease it again on the steelplate with your plastic hammer .

But this only counts for stainless steel !

Greetz , Dieter

[diemai]

For those , that would register on this German site , the contents of this link would become visible , .....some years ago I had described spoonmaking in there , ....heaps a nd heaps of step-by-step pictures visible there .

http://buse.alfahosting.org/V1/index.php?option=com_fireboard&Itemid=131&func=view&id=3073&catid=29

greetz , diemai

[mark poulson]

Dieter,

I don't speak or read German, so I couldn't even register!

But your description here is very clear.

I have some hammers with plastic faces, but they are flat faced, and used for taping metal parts without marring them.

What kind of plastic hammer do you use?

I would have thought to use a steel ball peen hammer, but I know this will stretch the metal.

[diemai]

Dieter,

I don't speak or read German, so I couldn't even register!

But your description here is very clear.

I have some hammers with plastic faces, but they are flat faced, and used for taping metal parts without marring them.

What kind of plastic hammer do you use?

I would have thought to use a steel ball peen hammer, but I know this will stretch the metal.

Mark , I've re-copied my pictures from that site and now put them up in here , ........have a close look at the step-by-steps , .........you'll see the tools being used as well .

Did not take the pictures of the final finishing process , ......guess , it would have been too much in here ,....... it's just the initial shaping .

When making a spoon , ......first pre-assemble the hardware and test the first one before you make more of one size and shape or even paint/decorate it , ..........you might have to re-shape the cupping , .......especially with soft copper sheet there is always the danger of making it too deep getting carried away with the ballpeen hammer !

That plastic hammer of yours should be fine , ........for a ballpeen hammer you'd need one with a half-ball head , smoothely polished not to cause indents or blemishes , about 3/4" head diameter for average spoons .

greetz , Dieter

[diemai]

@ mark poulson

Mark , ...I just saw , that picture #1 and #2 switched around for some reason , ...the picture #2 with paper cut-outs(glued onto 1,5mm aluminium sheet to create marking templates)is supposed to be #1 , ....the first other one showing the marking with a marker needle is supposed to be #2 , .....................otherwise all pictures are in a correct line-up viewed from left to right , top to bottom .

cheers , Dieter

[sambennett]

Very nice tutorial, Deiter. Maybe next winter I will spend some time making pike spoons.

[mark poulson]

Dieter,

Great tutorial and pictures.

I've used hammers my whole life, but it never occured to me to use the side of the hammer face to make a radius, like you do with you plastic hammer.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

[diemai]

@ mark poulson , @ sambennett ,

......................thanks , guys , .........glad if I could provide some input and inspiration , ..........not many people do their own spoons , ..............but I like it !

Mark , ....I ought to use the edge of the plastic hammer's face just to put all the impact energy on one little spot on the blank ,....... that's what all this hammer work is about , ....also with the ballpeen hammer , off course !

One more thing :

If you intend to assemble some kinda facetted or glow beads or even rattlers like on these "Pikulator" spoons of mine , ..........never drill the holes prior to the cupping work ,........ that one would come in a lot harder then or even become impossible to be done properly(haven't even tried it this way before) .

Just pre-drill the holes with about 1,5mm , .........the wire attachement holes would later remain that very diameter , anyway(I'm using 1,0mm wire to fix the beads/rattlers) , .....the holes for beads/rattlers are extended to approbiate diameter AFTER the cupping is completed , ..........the small 1,5mm holes will not disturb the cutting work .

Can also be problematic to drill bigger holes into sheet material , .......go step by step switching to constantly larger drill bit diameters and reduce feed and rounds per minute of the drill with increasing bit diameter, ........but a real PITA to place a 1/2" hole through thin sheet metal this way , .......best is to use a special conical drill bit especially designed for drilling through sheet material , anyway , ..................that one should run very slow and rather "peels" it's way through the sheet , constantly increasing hole diameter with the downward feed due to it's conical shape , .........the fixed depth setting limiter of the drillpress would always provide the same hole diameter workpiece for workpiece .

greetz , Dieter

[mark poulson]

Thanks Dieter.

You are indeed the Metal Meister!

[diemai]

Thanks Dieter.

You are indeed the Metal Meister!

Thanks , Mark , , ................back then during my youth I could never imagine what my apprenticeship in the metal industry would be good for some day !

greetz , Dieter