Inline Blade Thickness

[Tuna]

Fished a river the other day. Had the most success by far using a #4 Mepps dressed Aglia. Combo: baitcast, 6' medium/fast, #15 braid with a 12" x #8 fluoro leader joined with a small swivel. Retrieved sweeping the current. After losing a couple #4's (if you're not losing some you're likely not fishing them right). I want to make my own if possible.

Researched a bit. Most french blades are .025" vs .032'? I would assume most online suppliers are selling the .025". I did find a site selling .032". Mepps using .032" on their #3 gold blade. Trout/salmon fisherman swear by the thicker blades especially in the #0 and #1 sizes. Better throb, stay down in faster water and rotate easier in slow water.

Talking bass, so #2 (1/8oz), #3 (1/6oz) and #4 (1/3oz) french blade inline spinners, have you tried the thicker blades? Measured a Mepps #3 blade, .032". Pictured is a repurposed #2 with a tied craft fur treble.

Bunch of questions:

What thickness of blade are you using? Dressed treble or not? Best dressing material? What about craft fur smalljaw? Pear shaped clevis or common stirrup? .030" shaft for #3 and larger? Silver or gold blade?

On a popular bass forum the guys seem to favor silver and undressed. Many reasons; cost, effectiveness and dressed treble prone to treble rust since they don't dry out very well. Welcome any comments. Thanks.

Edited May 4, 2021 by Tuna
spelling

[mark poulson]

The only help I can offer is to use black nickel hooks.  They won't rust.

[azsouth]

when you say inline this is what I think of....

Inline Spinner Blades Brass Finish Lacquer Coated Sizes 1 - 6 - Barlow's Tackle (barlowstackle.com)

blade thickness to me does not matter as much as target weight of the total spinner, I think that once you really get into building spinners instead of buying them, you will find blade size to weight is very important. it allows you to fish it the way you need to..... mass produced ones have a tendency to be just around what you need not dead on.

My .02

[JD_mudbug]

I agree with Azsouth in looking at the total weight of the spinner compared to the blade size. I have a couple of size 4 and 5 French blade spinners with bodies that weigh over an ounce for fishing deeper water in reservoirs. These spinners would be useless in a stream and most rivers.

I prefer the standard thickness blades. I want the blades spin as easily as possible. I find the thick blades can be tough to get start spinning. The thick ones can spin lazily and look unnatural. I use the LPO regal finish blades and painted blades. I mostly use French blades as they seem to spin the easiest on an inline spinner and start immediately. I have a few with swing blades and a couple of with Colorado blades. I only use the .040 thick blades on big bucktails for musky/pike, just for durability. I have not tried any .032 thick blades. Those might not have the lazy spinning of .040 blades. The LPO blades are .025" thick which I am happy with. 

I like the common stirrup clevis. Just personal preference. 

.030" shafts are fine for size 3 blades. For size 4 blades, I use .035. For size 5 and 6, I use .040" shafts. For bigger spinners and bucktails, I go to .051" shafts. I tend to favor the thicker wire shafts as I frequently fish waters with bass and pike. 

For dressings/trailer, I have used just about everything from undressed, colored tube on the shank, flies and streamers put on a split ring, feathers, squirrel tail, craft fur, flashabou, bucktail, silicone skirt strands passed through the hook eye and held on with a small piece of shrink tube, grubs/ menace grubs/ thin bodied craws on straight shank hooks, and paddletail swimbaits on swimbait hooks with a corkscrew. They all have their time and place depending on the conditions.

On bluebird sky, clear water, calm no wind days, silver blade undressed hook may be the way to go. 

Clouds, slightly stained water, ripples on the surface, gold blade or copper blade with a subdued to moderate dressing.  

For rainbows and browns, I usually go with a undressed hook, a fly, or just a few silicone strands trimmed short for dressing. Typically, just 4-6 black strands to resemble a fly or bug.

Heavy chop, chocolate milk water, low light,  painted blades with a larger type hook dressing,  grub or paddle tail swimbait.

The better the chance the fish can get a real good look at the spinner the more I like a subdued presentation.  I keep switching up until I find the right combo.

I mostly use black nickel hooks. I think they look better in addition to lasting longer.

Using any bait such as a inline spinner with a dressing, spinnerbait, buzzbait, jig, or anything that can trap water, the key is to let it dry before putting it away. I always try to carry an empty hydroflow plano 3505 box to hold baits like those while fishing. I keep an empty one in my boat. It's like a hanging dry rack. Never put wet baits back with dry gear until the baits are fully dry. Once I get back from fishing, I can dry them with a paper towel and lay them out to dry completely somewhere. I usually remove any soft plastic trailers (grubs, chunks, swimbaits) before putting the baits away. The salt in trailers can corrode hooks.

 If you have an unused plano box or want a smaller hanging  dry box, just take your unused box or buy a cheap 3504 box and drill a bunch of holes in it. Remove any gear from the box before drilling. I only say this because an idiot friend of mine drilled the holes in his Plano box without removing the gear inside and ruined a crankbait he liked.

Some more info in a past post: 

http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/topic/37610-blade-weight/

 

 

 

Edited May 6, 2021 by JD_mudbug

[Tuna]

Azsouth, have you determined a weight ratio blade : weight?

JD_mudbug, thanks for the info. Appreciate the information in your reply. Have you made any double inline spinners, using size 2, 3 or 4 french blades with enough drag to be a near surface lure? What about hook size for spinner weight balancing? Making all the size 2 and 3 with .032 because I have a bunch of these shafts on hand. Plan to make #4's and doubles with .039 shafts.

I'm also experimenting with incorporating a buzzbait rivet pinched to shaft and riding against the clevis to cause a sweak vs. a bearing.

Agree Mark with the use of BN trebles but like the looks of bronze and have a bunch left over from crank making.

[JD_mudbug]

You can have a range of overall weight to blade spinners and still have the spinner perform. The weight range will give you the ability to have spinners that run higher or lower in the water column. I have some size 4 blade spinners with 1/4 to 3/4 oz weights. I sometimes troll spinners and spinnerbaits. I use the different body weights and blade sizes to get the bait to the depth I want.

Generally, it looks like I use size 6 trebles on size 2 blade spinner. On size 3 and 4 blade spinners, I use a 4 treble. On a few size 3 blade spinners, I have a size 6 treble (mostly for trout). On some size 4 spinners, I upsize to a size 2 or short shank 2 treble on colors like red white and fire tiger that are just as likely to get a pike as well as bass. On size 5 spinners, I use a number 2 treble. You can downsize the hook for stream fishing. You can upsize when snags won’t be an issue and when big fish are possible.

The chart from Jann’s  can be useful. I wouldn’t just go with the standard spinner setups. Experimenting is the key to finding the most successful spinner.

https://www.jannsnetcraft.com/content/make_fishing_lures.htm

Just wait until you start using Siwash hooks or weighted swimbait hooks. That throws a lot more variables into the mix.

I have made and purchased some double 4 and 5 French blade spinners. I have not any more luck with those compared to a single blade.  The double blades do run shallower. You can get them to run just below the surface with the rod tip up. On a double bladed spinner, I like using 2 clevises that are overlapped as opposed to the one piece S shaped clevis. I like the look of the 2 overlapped clevises in the water. I catch more fish on the 2 clevis setup, but it could just be a confidence thing that causes me to fish those more.

I have not built a ‘staggered’ double blade spinner yet, 2 different types of blades or different sizes of blades (ex. a size 4 French with a size 5 French, or a Indiana with a French blade). The staggered blades setup has become popular for muskies. I wonder if a downsized version will work for bass.

If you have a stockpile of bronze, you can use those for undressed, tubing, and silicone strand dressed hooks. Use the bronze for the dressed hooks that will dry the quickest. Use the black nickel of the fur dressed hooks.

I do have a spinner with a rivet. It don’t know if it squeaks.  I never thought about the squeak.  I was short on beads and used a rivet. I can’t hear it as it is under water. It doesn’t seem to be any more or less effective.

In addition to properly drying spinners, I like to keep mine in a ze-rust or rustrictor plano type box. You can also buy the anti-rust tabs to put in any box. They do seem to help.

Edited May 11, 2021 by JD_mudbug
typo

[Tuna]

You're a wealth of information JD-mb. I enjoy reading you're responses. Last week I tied a bunch of fluorescent yellow (chart) craft fur trebles. Yesterday, I tested out 10 spinner versions. Craft fur remains wet a long time versus squirrel tail. Caught two bass less than a foot on the color combo; gold blade, black body, chart fur tied with black thread in stained water. Have always done well with black or black grape head and thread/chart tail/fur jigs. Have to find some chart ST or try lure dye to dip them. Won't be going craft fur again. Think I'll just use natural furs, water resistant synthetics or fine skirt materials. Since dressed trebles add drag and therefore effect blade rotation I'll have to try something different for open bodies of water.

The rivet spinners were a fail. The dbl. blade s-clevis spinner with 1/2 oz. weight (2-1/4oz worm weights superglued together at the large ends) and dressed #4 treble ran well but needs a swivel at a leader to braid connection or maybe upsize to a #2 VMC 9651bz I have many of. I had to open the holes of the #3 blade so the flattened ends of the s-clevis would insert. Liked the surface wake it made. I'll do a version using a single siwash or a blue #3 or #4 sproat hook. I have the blue sproat from when I learned how to worm fish back in old 2.

For bodies I'll try some 3/16' hollow lead wire instead of the kind of pricey brass or nickel bodies. Seems the worm sinkers worked well although a bit too end heavy. Maybe a keel style sinker would work but unsure if available separately. Also going to try a bead on the clevis under the blade and a 8mm eye left over from a bunch of rat-l-traps I made a few years back adhered to the underside of the blade. Heck, how about two spaced black dots on the blade to simulate the bands of a perch once in rotation?? Uh oh, looks like I may have to make a linked excel recipe book to keep track of tries.

Tuna

[azsouth]

Tuna, the best way I have found is build to what exactly you want to the style of fishing you do!!

I personally have my spinners built from .23-.73 ounces and most of the time I just slow roll them to were the blades are just turning, sometimes the blade stops and starts ( on purpose ) that is where I get my bites as far as speed.

Both large and Smallmouth eat it that way for me..... best large just over 6lbs... best Smallmouth just over 4lbs slow rolling spinners.

[JD_mudbug]

If you keep having line twist problems, you can try a line tie loop like a Shyster. This gives a keel type effect to a standard type body. You could also try a Super Rooster tail type setup which is more like a cross between a spinnerbait and in-line. These can made in small sizes and eliminate most line twist.

After years of mainly targeting largemouth and smallmouth, I got more into fishing for other species. The last 5 years, I got more into spinners. In the spring, I target rainbows, browns, landlocked salmon, and stocked tiger trout with smaller spinners. I frequently catch bass doing this. When using bigger spinners for bass (blades sizes 4 to 6), I would catch pike and an occasional walleye. That led to building a lot of spinners to try to catch multiple species on a given trip. It's fun when you can catch multiple species on the same lure.

Edited May 12, 2021 by JD_mudbug

[Tuna]

For AZsouth: slow rolling works well! You know what works better for me though? Fishing a 4.5" - 5" paddletail like a jig or a worm and making it dance a couple times during the fall. #4/0 - #5/0 3/32oz or 1/8oz keel weighted swimbait hook. If they tear out the keeper I just bite off the damaged area and re-insert. The absolute best PT I've used is Bitter's baits. I've tried many. Keitech too prone to tearing. Slow kick with parallel fall. Bam! Heck, in Iowa we have (sad to say) large algae matts on some small lakes. I fish the PT like a topwater frog with much greater hookup ratio. Even from shore I throw over the edges of the matt. On retrieve, once the bait makes it to the edge I pop it lightly to tease the lookers. Bam! A PT or senko is my usual follow-up baits if bass are short striking buzzbaits or ploppers. More times than not I've out fished the guy at front as the co-angler if they aren't hogging shoreline. PB LMB #6.57, SMB #4.97 and a flathead #7.63 using an UL with a Mepps #0, #6 mono river fishing. Memories...

Fished Apache, Roosevelt and Havasu years ago with a then favorite AG 2600 round.

[Tuna]

Wow JD, a Shyster! Always had one in my river shore box along with a tandem spinner and floating rapala. That's when I used a light brown wonderod (since redone with Minima guides, KR spacing) paired with a green south bend closed face spinning reel. Now I pack one 3400 series with a couple craw colored bombers, small chrome/blue rat-l-trap, Baker 3" rip bait, 1/4oz all black Cavitron, 1/4oz dark bladed/rootbeer-green flake trailer chatterbait, #2 and #3 Mepps and 1/16oz jigheads and twister tails in motor oil or black body and clear chartreuse tails. I always take a float for suspension using a pendulum/rocker retrieve for slow current or backwaters.

Like the hybrid spinnerbait, reminds me of beetle-spins.

Found out yesterday that 3/16" bullet weights hollow lead wire will match the length and weight of Jann's #71 and #82 spinner body parts. What do you use or purchase for the bearing beads? Searched for solid brass/small hole beads without many hits. Oh, also found out that a small oval hematite bead matches length and weight of #80 but unsure how they would hold up vs. metal.

[Tuna]

Found Worth solid brass beads in nickel and brass. Many other spinner parts. Chuckanddeb.com. Not sure if they're a registered vendor but top service and great pricing. Sent a message to have them check out TU forums. Have been buying from them for years. They will credit you back if honest shipping rate is less than charged.

[azsouth]

Changing wire size on so on you can get to where you need to be, but it is all about your exact needs.

give us specifics and most people can probably help.

current is tough too fish but cfs and flow rates do not very in mathematics.

Then it boils down to blade, type, size and total weight.

[JD_mudbug]

LPO has solid beads down to 3/32" in brass, nickel, and black nickel. Jann's has them down to 1/8". The hole on the smaller beads are .039 which works well on the small spinners. Spinners with size 4-6 blades and .040 shaft wire, I use the 1/8" bead. Some of the beads in a given pack will have a slightly larger or smaller hole. 

https://www.lurepartsonline.com/Solid-Brass-Beads?quantity=1&custcol_beads_eyes_paint_size=40&custcol_beads_eyes_paint_color=14

I sometimes use hollow metal beads as bearing beads. Although hollow beads wear out eventually, I find that the wire shaft usually goes first from getting bent by fish or a snag and then bent back into shape. Fishing in northern pike waters with spinners with shaft wire of .040 or less, one fish can mangle the shaft. On .051 shaft spinners, I definitely use solid bearing beads because that wire should last a while.

I use bullet shaped weights for bodies. I use brass, black nickel finished brass weights, colored tungsten weights, and lead weights I paint. Lead and brass weights are cheap. I also do use some actual spinner bodies. On some spinners, I use 2 bullet weights with the bases against each other with or without a bead in between. It gives a nice tapered shape. I thought I might get a clack using 2 brass weights base to base by giving a pause and snap on the retrieve. I don't know if it actually does this. I got the idea from those Carolina Short Cut rigs. 

[Tuna]

Yeah, Carolina rig, kind of a search bait w/glass bead clackers. Attached is the dbl. #3 .032 bladed spinner with a rivet that worked well. I superglued the cone ends of the worm weights together. Skirt even pulsed a bit. Tied it onto a 12" x #8 fluoro leader with swivel today. Very little twist. Going to try the mingled clevis' on the next version.