Buzzbait Wire Length

[rfdong]

Second question,

What difference does changing the length of a Buzzbait wire from R bend to head make?

And for the blade arm, I would think it wouldn't make much difference but since I'm not sure I'll ask.☺

[Tony Maxwell]

I am a believer in a compact bait. The head on my buzzers begins just behind the back of the blade. Also the blade just clears the main wire. Don't want to give a bass any more leverage than I have to. 

[smalljaw]

I don't make my own buzzbaits because I'm a firm believer in heavy wire and my wire former will bend .041 but not much more than that.  However, I did make a few back in the day and a little trick I learned from making spinnerbaits also worked with buzzbaits. The trick is to have a very small length of wire coming out of the head, that leaves little room for the wire to bend making it stronger but what it also does is make the bait harder to keep on top. That the reason I stopped making them, I had to leave only a small amount of wire shortening that part made my thinner diameter wire much more resistant to being bent but the bait had to be burned to the point is wasn't very effective because it was so one dimensional. So go ahead and shorten that wire a little bit but not more than 1/2", any more than that moves the weight to far forward and the blade will have to spin twices as fast to keep it on the surface.

[BassBull]

I'm in the same boat as Tony M.. I like that compact style bait. I want the bass to take the hook ,not the blade !!!! Also try if you haven't thought of it already is take a 1/4 oz. head style and leave enough wire to make the bends for a 3/8 oz. blade !!! VERY effective. very slow..  Have fun with it. STEVE