Glide Baits (swimbaits) -- Type of wood etc

[cbrodbeck]

Hey guys,

I'm looking to make some glide baits (swim baits). What type of wood do you recommend? Need something to where it would suspend in water. Any info would be much appreciated. Some links to buy some equipment would be awesome. Lessons learned would also be a plus

 

Thank you

[Musky Glenn]

Take your best glide bait and just lay it in the water. Mine sink like a rock, maybe not quite that fast but they only stay up because of how I work them. If it suspends in the water it will probably float on the surface.  Unless you put some mechanism to make it sink below the surface. Just my $.02.

[AZ Fisher]

Welcome to TU! Alder and Western Red Cedar are two woods I have used.   Each type of wood takes a different amount of weight  to ballast for the swim or fall rate you're looking for.  Glides are one of the harder baits to build successfully, due to all the variables, (Wood type, water temp, line tie placement, hinge type, hook placement, ballast distribution, tail construction...)  Need more info about what kind of equipment you are talking about, Lure Parts Online has hardware for glides.  Learn to use the Search function in the Hardbaits section.  There is tons of info in this section, you just need to search it out.  When you get stuck or have a question, don't hesitate to ask and someone will be along to help.  "Solarbaits"  has some great vids on Youtube on making glides.  Hope this helps, and  tight lines!

Edited May 8, 2017 by AZ Fisher

[Anglinarcher]

I can jump start your learning curve by giving you some recipes to look at.

http://www.lurebuilding.nl/indexeng.html

I can link you into a good primer on the theory of glide baits.

http://www.makelure.com/store/pg/54-How-To-Videos.aspx#prettyPhoto/7/

I can also point out that "Swim Baits" and "Gliders" are completely different in our use of the terms, so that can be confusing when you ask your question.

Last, I can tell you that you can make a floating glide bait, or you can make a slow sinking bait that will tend to suspend in use, but a true suspending bait must get it to depth first and glide baits have no control surface to get it to the depth.  Thus the sinking nature of that subcategory of glider.

I hope this helps, but it looks like you are in the early stages of this so like suggested, start looking at videos, use the search feature, and start your research.

 

 

[cbrodbeck]

Anglinarcher,

Thank you for your response this is what I have been looking for. Maybe I can use some of my existing baits to mess around with. Make some molds and experiment with some materials. Sorry I am completely new when it comes to making baits.

As far as the type of bait this would be glider bait "slow sink" like a Deps bull shooter for example or river 2 sea s waver. Something along that nature. Where the Buoyancy would have a super slow sinking action.

Anymore videos you would recommend ?

Thanks for everyone help

[mark poulson]

We had a big thread on glide baits a few years ago.  Try the search feature at the bottom of the Bowse tab drop down.

[Anglinarcher]

3 hours ago, cbrodbeck said:

Anglinarcher,

Thank you for your response this is what I have been looking for. Maybe I can use some of my existing baits to mess around with. Make some molds and experiment with some materials. Sorry I am completely new when it comes to making baits.

As far as the type of bait this would be glider bait "slow sink" like a Deps bull shooter for example or river 2 sea s waver. Something along that nature. Where the Buoyancy would have a super slow sinking action.

Anymore videos you would recommend ?

Thanks for everyone help

OK, now we are getting somewhere. 

A glide bait is a bait that when twitched or jerked will turn to the right or left and "glide" several inches to several feet.  Another jerk/twitch and the bait turns to the other side and does it again.  Glide baits are by nature unjointed, and being you are familiar with River2Sea you can refer to the Dahlberg Gliders they have as excellent examples and River2Sea has videos of how they work.  The second video I gave you is also excellent on this.

Swim baits are designed so that the body "swims" back and forth like a swimming fish.  The S Waver and the Bull Shooter are two sine wave swimming type swimming baits.  Vodka Man, on this site, did a series of excellent multi-joint videos a few years ago so search on his videos or PM him.  The single joint swimbait like the Bull Shooter and S Waver are much more difficult IMHO and are not good starter baits.  Ballast on the single joint swimbaits seems to be more sensitive.  Ballast is not as sensitive on the multi-joint for some reason.

I had a video on YouTube of my Wandering Taildragger, similar in nature to the S Waver, but it might have been lost when I closed down my account and channel.  Still, you might check it out and see if it is still there.

[Thiko]

I have build a few good working glide baits with pine wood. I think the English name would be Scottish Pine. I'd take a wood that is not very soft (assuming you use the lure for fish with teeth), but definitely not very heavy. Light wood can take more ballast weight and if the ballast weight is placed low, you get much more stability compared to heavy wood with little ballast weight. I have made slots in the wood to glue stripes of lead as low as possible. This is the way to make the lure extra stable. And stability is for a glide bait the key to succes. All energy you put into the lure by pulling, must go into forward motion instead of in rolling over.

Also very important is to make them sink precisely horizontally. So you need to test them individually, with ballast weight duc taped on the blank, all hooks attached and the leader tied on. Don't forget the leader especially if it is a heavy fluorcarbon/steel leader! If these lures do not sink horizontally, they do not glide very well.

Making a glide bait is mostly a matter of patience regarding finding the correct amount and position of the ballast weight for each and every blank you make. Every piece of wood will need a slightly different amount of lead to sink horizontally. The only really difficult step is, if you drill holes for the ballast weight, you have to be exactly in the centre or the lure will never go straight. But I avoid that step!

[surfk9]

the lure building web site recommended by anglinarcher is where i first learned how to build gliders...great site...iv'e  built them from poplar and Azek (thank You Mark).....mine have been in the 6-8 inch slow sink models shaped similar to the "stalker glider"...good luck

[Big Epp]

Resurrecting an old thread possibly, but what progress have you made?  I've been making some small gliders lately (3inches +/-), and have been really happy with some of them.  I've noticed some of them have a slow "S" swimming motion on a straight retrieve.

Also, I agree the ballast needs to be as low as possible on the bait for stability.  I overdrilled one, putting the weight too far up into the bait, and it tends to turn on its side.

The first two I made we kind of accidents.  I thought they would be more like a jig, just heavy sinking lures that I could twitch along, but they have a great swim motion and a good glide, both at under 3 inches.

I've been using a wide variety of bases, I like working with cedar and pvc decking, but have also used white pine, douglass fir, southern yellow pine, and poplar.

[AZ Fisher]

RIP SurfK9,   Sadly Michel passed away a couple weeks ago. His motto was something we can all get behind, he always signed off with  "Go Fish!"  Didn't mean to hijack thread...

[Vodkaman]

AZ - Always sad to read of a member passing. Thanks for reporting.

Big Epp - the S-motion is interesting. I wrote about this several months ago.

A lure will waggle at a specific frequency given its shape geometry. But, there is also a pendulum effect. If the pendulum frequency matches the waggle frequency then the waggle will be exaggerated, and could be the cause of the bait going on its side.

The lower the ballast weight then the slower the pendulum effect. Normally the pendulum effect has little influence on the waggle motion as the two are out of sync. However, if the pendulum is slow enough to match the waggle at a lower harmonic, then the two forces will combine and give an action 1/3rd of the normal waggle speed.

Consider the waggle with capital letters representing combined motion.

L r l R l r L r l R l r

Superimpose the pendulum.

L - - R - - L - - R - -.

I hope this makes sense. It is a new lure movement concept that has never been explained before, and rarely seen if you don't experiment with shapes and ballast locations.

Dave

Edited April 27, 2020 by Vodkaman