Floating Plastics

[Flaswimbaiter]

Plan on starting soft plastics in the future and some ideas involve floating baits, but I don’t see many on the market. 

How do you make them float and does it affect the durability of the bait? 

can you use micro balloons?

[SlowFISH]

To my knowledge all plastisol baits float.  Its the addition of salt/glass beads or your hook/weight that makes them sink.  But with that said - usually a hook is enough to make any normal bait sink.

You can do a few things if you want to make them float... yes microballons are one option and a few places sell them to be added to plastisol.  You'll have to test bait volume vs amount of microballons vs hook weight to get the desired effect.  I can't speak to how much you'd need to float a bait with a hook or durability, but I've heard it will effect your colors.

Another option is adding air pockets - if you see people doing core shots - think of doing the same with a smaller diameter rod and not shooting a second shot.  Air works damn good to keep a bait up!!!  But this adds some complexity in either the mold or rigging at times.

I have played with air pockets quiet a bit and can tell you to make a bait float with a hook in it and the weight of the line on it is tough... you have to make a pretty damn big bait as a decent size hook adds alot of weight to suspend and if you use floro for line - that makes it even tougher.

 Hope that helps a bit.

 J.

[Flaswimbaiter]

49 minutes ago, SlowFISH said:

To my knowledge all plastisol baits float.  Its the addition of salt/glass beads or your hook/weight that makes them sink.  But with that said - usually a hook is enough to make any normal bait sink.

You can do a few things if you want to make them float... yes microballons are one option and a few places sell them to be added to plastisol.  You'll have to test bait volume vs amount of microballons vs hook weight to get the desired effect.  I can't speak to how much you'd need to float a bait with a hook or durability, but I've heard it will effect your colors.

Another option is adding air pockets - if you see people doing core shots - think of doing the same with a smaller diameter rod and not shooting a second shot.  Air works damn good to keep a bait up!!!  But this adds some complexity in either the mold or rigging at times.

I have played with air pockets quiet a bit and can tell you to make a bait float with a hook in it and the weight of the line on it is tough... you have to make a pretty damn big bait as a decent size hook adds alot of weight to suspend and if you use floro for line - that makes it even tougher.

 Hope that helps a bit.

 J.

great info thank you.
 

Do you think I would find anything on YouTube for air bubbles?

Edited May 6, 2022 by Flaswimbaiter

[Go55]

You can get from Lureworks Spike-it 

https://www.ispikeit.com/product/772/flotation-beads-4009

[Driftwood]

You may try to shoot a little air into the bait with a hypodermic needle. 

[Jonah]

FYI Be very careful if you use the glass micro bubbles. Wear a mask as you DO NOT want to breathe/inhale this product. A friend tried them and as mentioned, they do alter the color of the plastic and you have to use a lot of tin order to float a book. IMO , not worth the trouble. YMMV

[aulrich]

While most plastisol floats there are specifically formulated floating mixtures, I have not tried any but the concept has been on my to try radar for a while.

[Tiderunner]

I got started with floating plastics some 30 years ago, when Berkley did away with their floating power worms. We used these to skip across fields of lily pads, and other surface weeds. Deadly method!

First off you'll need to use floating plastic. Take your pick of brands. I do use the glass bubble stuff with extra care. Still haven't inhaled any after all these years. I'm more worried abut burning myself with molten plastic.

If you don't use floating plastic you.ll need to use even more bubbles  A Lot More!

Of course because you've used the bubbles, you'll need to use softener to make your bait more flexible, and heat stabilizer because this thick plastic mix will scorch easily.

And of course because your bubbles are white you'll need to use a lot more color.. The only colors I've made are chartreuse, pink, white and black. Certain colors work in different areas I fish.

The to fish the lily pads you.ll need a light wire hook. I use Gamakatsu wide gap no bigger than 2/0  And for line you need to use braid as the worms are too light to throw with mono, and mono sinks.  This is my way of fishing topwater. Your ways may be different.

Before this season is over I will be experimenting with making the bulb end of Neko worms float, and floating claws on crayfish. Again to be fished Neko for smallmouth.

The floating worms are rigged Tex-posed.

[jigmeister]

Mister Twister made the first floating worms I had ever seen in the late 1970's .

They were extremely soft and spongy baits with a twister tail that tore apart easily .

If you tore one in half the plastic was full of tiny bubbles molded into the plastic . They quit making them and I had heard it was because of something that was toxic (or not "environmentally friendly "they added to the plastic to produce the bubbles.

I have often wondered just what that was they were using . 

 

[Les Young]

I've used the floatant material from baitplastics at a 25% ratio for skirts that i wanted to faler out when at rest & it worked great. I also used them in stick worms & they worked great. I did have to add more colorant because it bleaches out the color but that's easy enough to do. 

[Les Young]

Sorry i  meant i used it for making skirts that i wanted to flare out when at rest which it did & had great movement. 

[Steve Baldwin]

I have used the floating additive, micro beads, with mixed results. I found it was very temperamental to work with. I also discovered that frogs would sink after being used a few times, I also noted that reheating the plastic would cause the plastic to sink. I am wondering if the new plastics I have seen advertised as floating, really do work.

[21xdc]

MF Bounce? 

[hpssports]

MF & Lurecraft make a floating plastic. BP/Polysol soft formulas float as well. Everything else we've tested is either a neutral buoyancy or slow sinking. Chemionics advertises a floating formula but it's more neutral & complete junk like the stuff they produce for Dead On.

[FrogAddict]

I agree with those that have said floating a lure with a hook is difficult. I used a frog I made with an insert I also made and the frog was able to float fully rigged with a hook. That was two years ago. I then got smart and asked a buddy to make me some inserts on his metal lathe. I figured having two inserts would be good since they get very hot during the injection process. The new inserts seemed like the same size as my original one so I went about making a ton of frogs with the new inserts for last summer only to find out none of them floated. We are talking a miniscule difference but the frog slowly sunk.

Now I still caught bass with them and there is a time and a place for a slow sinking frog but that wasn't my intention. I like the visual of the bass spanking the froggy on the surface.

Needless to say I'm back to using the original insert and I'll probably make a mold of it so I can swap them out while making up a batch of frogs. I also tank test the first frog out of each batch (yes I rig it with the hook I intend to use). It's important for me to tank test it to make sure it floats because I use a lot of remelts, some of which is salted.

[Frankster]

Hi Guys, I'm new here, was reading thru the topic and saw the comment that Chemionics floating formula is...complete junk like the stuff they produce for Dead On.  I'm new to pouring my own worms, why is Dead On plastisol considered junk?  What do you guys like better, because Dead On is all I've used so far and I want to improve my game and make the best baits I can.  Thanks!

[hpssports]

Chemionics has always been known for it's inconsistency. Figured they may have gotten better over the years, but they still have consistency problems. They sent use a couple of gallons of their soft & medium floating formulas to test out & it was useless. Baits made with the soft were falling apart demolding them & baits made with the medium were breaking apart even after a week of cure time. Both the soft & medium still didn't float even though they market the formulas to do so. MF, Lurecraft, BP(Polysol), Lureworks(Color Tech), & Calhoun are way better choices and you're getting it straight from the manufacturer.