Medium-Hard Flexible Rubber Material?

[biggamefish]

hey guys, ive been making the tails of my jointed baits out of plastic lexan, its been working pretty good, but there has been one occasion that i accidentally casted my bait and landed on some rocks and it did snap a portion of the tail off, now im looking to make the tail out of some medium/hard clear/yellowish flexible rubber that i can make a mold and pour, can anyone point me to find the correct materials?

Edited May 23, 2013 by biggamefish

[Nathan]

You may want to ask the guys down in soft plastics ...Nathan

[quickdraw]

I make my tails out of Alumilite Alumisol soft plastic. The have several dies to make about any color you could want and you can add hardener to the mix to stiffen the rubber how ever much you would want.

http://www.makelure.com/products.cfm

[sallystrothers]

There are many options, the best indicator of a fin material's hardness is the Shore A/D hardness. I would imagine you are looking for something less than 80A on the hardness scale. The less hard the plastic the more flexible it is in general.  

[bassrecord]

Just a thought. Been down this road before. Shore Hardness number is a good descriptor of flexibility from one material to another. If (I or)you find a number, or range of numbers, that meet (my or) your definition of "medium-hard Flexible", then suppliers will know a little better of what (I or) you are talking about.

Many gasket suppliers provide Shore Hardness numbers. Perhaps suppliers such as Graingers will let you look at their stock so that you can ID the Shore Hardness number that meets your definition. Other suppliers may send you samples. You may have to buy a run (same material, same size, varying Shore Hardness numbers).

For me it's not over when my Shore Hardness number range was hit. Finding the "the rubber" and "the color" was much harder <groan>.

Good luck!

[quickdraw]

or you just mix your own color into the Alumisol and pour one. If it isn't hard enough you melt it back down again with a little more hardener and pour again. You can do this over and over again every 10 minutes till you find what you want. Write down the mix and you are good to go. Custom color and hardness out of your own microwave oven.

[Anglinarcher]

LOL - OK guys, close, very close.  I think what you want is something tough, but flexible.  Something that can take a beating but come back to shape again and again.

 

Alumilite makes just that product, but it is not Alumisol or Plastisol.  http://www.alumilite.com/Category.cfm?Category=CastingResins should take you to the page.  Look at the Flex 80, or perhaps the Flex 70.  http://www.alumilite.com/ProdDetail.cfm?Category=CastingResins&Name=Flex80

 

If you go to http://www.river2seausa.com/topwater/481-whopper-plopper-130.html you will see the Wopper Plopper that was designed, and originally made by Larry Dahlberg.  In his design, he uses Flex 80 for the tail/plopper/blade.  I have one that has caught a lot of fish, bounced of a lot of rocks, and it just flexes out of the way and comes back to shape.  I expect that someday there will be nothing left of the lure but a metal wire with that Flex 80 blade on the back.

 

I am sure that there are other products out there, but I can assure you that for what you want, either the Flex 70 or 80 will do what you need.  PS, it is easy to mold.  Check out http://www.makelure.com/HowTos.cfm for the video of making the Wopper Plopper to see how easy it is to mold with that stuff.

[biggamefish]

Anglinarcher ive never held that whopper plopper bait so im not too sure how the tail material is but  Im looking for something similar to what river 2 sea uses for tail on their 168 S waver swimbait.