Wooden Square Bills Blowing out at high speeds

[DingerBaits]

Hey gents, working on some of my redwood square bills and looking for tips on how to keep them from blowing out at higher speeds. I found that with more ballast the chance of it blowing out is less, but if i go too heavy it sits lower than i want it to in the water. Any tips would be greatly appreciated it.

[Chuck Young]

If moving a belly weight forward on the lure increases the action, will moving it rearward slightly decrease it enough to solve the problem?

[mark poulson]

Maybe play with the size and shape of the bill.

 

Also play with the angle of the bill.

[BobP]

I’d look at the length of the lip first and then the position of the line tie in relation to the lip.  It’s interesting how small a lip surface is required to get a squarebill to perform.  Look at the lip on a Mann’s Baby -1 crankbait - They’re tiny.  I like the line tie to be right down on the lip’s surface to give it the widest side-to-side wiggle.  

[Anglinarcher]

19 hours ago, DingerBaits said:

Hey gents, working on some of my redwood square bills and looking for tips on how to keep them from blowing out at higher speeds. I found that with more ballast the chance of it blowing out is less, but if i go too heavy it sits lower than i want it to in the water. Any tips would be greatly appreciated it.

We had a thread about a year ago that was about how to make a lure "hunt".  I wonder if the items discussed then might apply to this?  To me, hunting is the early stages of a lure getting ready to blow out, soooooooooo.

Does your lure start to hunt just before it blows out?  You mention that the lure is running good at lower speeds so maybe this might provide a clue.

Going from memory now, Vodkaman discussed trimming the lip a little more each time.  I seem to recall he may go through 10 lures, going well past the sweet spot, just to make sure he has found the right version.  So, this would agree with 

5 hours ago, BobP said:

I’d look at the length of the lip first

I also seem to recall something in the same, or similar thread, about raising or lowering the ballast location.  I know that from my own swimbaits, a high center of gravity will blow out much much sooner than a low center of gravity.  I have 4 versions of a bait that I am doing, each identical in every way, other then how high the center of gravity is, and when the water clears enough for video, or our pool opens, I will document the differences.  

I also seem to believe Dave mentioned that lip angle made a difference as well.  

Mark and Dave think alike.

17 hours ago, mark poulson said:

Also play with the angle of the bill.

5 hours ago, BobP said:

the position of the line tie in relation to the lip

Yes, I have seen this as well.  

When experimenting several years ago on what I thought were radical designs at the time, I found that even length of the lure, how fat the lure was, well, all the control surfaces interact with each other so changing one can change another.

Funny thing about lure "bill" design is that no two people seem to totally agree.  For example, I knew about the following link and they give their theory.

https://makewoodenlures.com/wooden-crankbaits-4-important-tips/

Tips 2, 3, and 4 might apply.

As for my advice on this one, well, without seeing it myself, take someone else's advice.  LOL

Did I mention that width of the lip, especially a square bill, can make it blow out early on some of the lures I did.  ROFLOL

Sorry, so many variables.  I just hope this summary helps some.

 

[Hughesy]

Does it blow out on the same side every time? If it does, it could be as simple as some fine tuning of the line tie.

Edited March 29, 2018 by Hughesy

[BobP]

All the above are valid points and it goes to show how complicated the performance factors can be on even a fairly simple bait like a square bill.  I’m no crankbait rocket scientist so I usually first make a very faithful copy of a successful commercial bait that I like, then tweak that design to get changes in the direction of what I think will be “better” or just different.  I think that Looking at your problem bait and critically comparing its build features to a known good bait is the fastest way to realize what the problem may be. There are lots of experienced builders here on TU but they can’t really make definitive conclusions about a specific bait sight unseen.  We can only suggest areas where we have goofed in our own building histories and relate the fixes that worked for us, and that’s a scattershot solution at best.

I think from prior discussions and some incidental info gained from commercial bait design info, ballast low in the bait promotes stable action and high in the bait promotes unstable action, especially in regard to building hunting action into a bait.  Not the ONLY factor in getting a bait to hunt, but one pathway to try.

[DingerBaits]

2 hours ago, Hughesy said:

Does it blow out on the same side every time? If it does, it could be as simply as some fine tuning of the line tie.

I didnt have a lot of time to play with it, and we have almost zero open water up here still. I may try to fine tune it and see what I come up with.

[DingerBaits]

All great stuff guys. I appreciate it all. I will be looking at the following as soon as I have more open water to play on. Bill length/width, maybe a little more weight, some fine tuning. The bait has the wobble I am looking for though so I really dont want to change that. I had one with 2 g. of ballast, one with 3 g of ballast and one with 4 g of ballast. The 4 g ran the best with the highest speed retrieve and took the longest to blow out. I am wondering if i do a 5 or 6 g ballast if that will balance it out enough with out sinking. Good thing I have about 100 cut bodies to work with and try to figure this out. This whole building my own baits is gratifying yet it is becoming more of an obsession. 

[Hughesy]

Hey Dinger, are you very close to Hayward? I usually go up there in late may early June and fish Grindstone, LCO, Big Round, and a few others. Great Smallmouth fishing.

[Chuck Young]

Obsession can lead to great things.

[DingerBaits]

22 hours ago, Chuck Young said:

Obsession can lead to great things.

  

 

Or Jail Time!!!! 

[Chuck Young]

Never become obsessed with a lure under the age of 16?

[DingerBaits]

23 hours ago, Hughesy said:

Hey Dinger, are you very close to Hayward? I usually go up there in late may early June and fish Grindstone, LCO, Big Round, and a few others. Great Smallmouth fishing.

 

Im about 3 hours away.  Basically North West of me. I am literally in the center of Wisconsin. I have a lot of great  places to fish around the state.  

[Matt Moreau]

On 3/27/2018 at 5:38 PM, DingerBaits said:

...I found that with more ballast the chance of it blowing out is less, but if i go too heavy it sits lower than i want it to in the water. 

As you can see or know a lot of variables go into making a crank.

Pictures would help!

What is the size and weight of the bait? Find a similar size and shape production lure and yours should be close to that weight. 

Are you testing with hooks? If not put hooks on! You can try try upsizing the front hook and/or both and see what happens to action. You can also put splitshots on the front hook to add ballast for testing purposes.

If I had to guess with the limited information we have here I would say that you do not have enough ballast and its too high in the bait.

You say "if i go too heavy it sits lower than i want it to in the water. " I do not really understand how or why that applies here...is it a wakebait? 

Also where is the ballast located? 

You can easily ruin a bait by trying stuff I know I have ruined far more than i will ever admit to. Try stuff that is easily changed before plastic surgery errr...I mean alterations are done.

 

[DingerBaits]

I will see what I can do for some more info/pictures. I am not too tech savy on this site.