How to make a balsa crankbait with rattles

Another take on making balsa crank baits, well worth a watch

Discovering - Harley Ragan making Decoys

Fish spearing is not really for me but fish decoys are one thing I can appreciate, this is a great look at some top carving and painting.

Test Tank Tuesday with Mikko

I do not normally post Mikko's (Solarfall Baits) stuff on this blog, because If you don't already know who he is, his website and videos then you are probably living under rock or you have finally been released after serving a long prison sentence. So for those ex-cons and Martians I give you Mikko's latest soft plastic monsters, and what a test tank. This is really a combination of his wood carving skills, mould making and a special soft plastic paint in the hands of a master from CAB paints of Finland. Oh yeah and just to rub it in he goes and catches a nice pike. BLOG LINK http://solarfallbaits.blogspot.co.uk/

The Trouble with Trout Parr

The first fish I ever caught on a homemade lure was a brown trout just a little bigger than a parr but with the attitude of a tuna.

Mikelindo Lures a well framed lure builder

I have been told that I spend a little too much time on the internet but I think it is all worth it when I find things that inspire me. These little collections of frames from Mikelindo of Northern Italy seem to sum up that process of making lures both in terms of process and aesthetics. So I am going back down to the cellar with some inspiration and maybe carve something myself. Thanks

Check out his facebook page Mikelindo Lures and once again share the love or at least the post

Making a balsa weight shift lure part 1 of 2

The warehouse is actually colder inside than outside where the wind blows clean off the river and the docks. I am trying to finish a project I am working on, a giant dog puppet that has dragged on far too long. Next to us they are filming a rock video. The band tell us they have flown in from Brussels to work with the director and drop a name which being an old git I am not sure if it is the band or the director, either way I nod.    

When they return to their green room I get a few minutes to marvel at the camera cranes, huge tripods that carry very expensive digital cinema cameras and the bits of track they have laid out. I am left feeling a bit amateur. Apart from my camera, a pair of cheap lights and some tripods that have seen better days my kit consists of inline skate wheels attached to a plank of wood for a slider, a swivel chair and some gaffer tape for doing circular panning shots. They have a swarm of go-pros and I am still sticking my camera in a plastic lunch box to use in bath.  Jealousy is never a pretty thing and it is far too close to Christmas to be thinking of buying myself presents or kit. 

A wood lobster

It is hard to explain, or understand the level of craftsmanship in this piece and i have watched it a couple of hundred times


Wood spiny lobster from 3ga9 on Vimeo.

Hand made in Korea

Who cares if there are no subtitles, just watch him work

Carving a finger full of balsa

A little bit of light carving.

What I wanted was something I could dropshot with that unlike a soft plastic lure it would have 

some buoyancy. The main advantages of dropshotting is keeping the lure a set distance from the bottom rather than guessing, while also working the lure without changing its position so effectively it gets to dance in a predator’s face rather than racing past . The disadvantage is keeping the rod up and the line tight plus it isn’t great at any distance.  Adding a small float above the hook can work for distance as it keep the line up out of any trouble but inversely it also reduces the distance of cast. So with this aside I thought I would make a floating dropshot lure for a trout and perch water I fish.

I didn’t have to look far for inspiration, when it comes to balsa trout lures there is of course Maki Handmade lures; it would be fair to say that if god wanted to make some fishing lures he would probably serve an apprenticeship with Maki.  There isn’t a lot to say about his workmanship, it would all be a bit superfluous just follow the link   http://blog.goo.ne.jp/makilure?fm=rss            (and don’t forget to come back).

Rather than resort to shell veneers I thought I would stick with foil and also limit my choice of finishes to a bit of black acrylic paint, a dab of red sharpie and 15-20 dibs in some model aircraft dope. One of my aims when I started making lures was to keep it simple and often I find myself jumping headlong into over-complication, while this can be fun I try to remember the person I was when I first began making lures. Keeping it simple means I didn’t want to get the airbrush out, I wanted to sit and just make without the hum of a machine or Darth Vader’s respirator.

So I sketched up what I thought would go for a prototype, redrew it in a Cad program and then printed it out as templates. Rough shaping the body was easy enough with the parting line between two pieces of 4.5mm balsa giving me a dead centre.

Carving the face required some very light music, I found a YouTube channel that played Gregory Alan Isakov, songs back to back and settled in for the duration. I shouln’t really call it carving, it was more a case of cut and sand; balsa being a bit of a pig when comes down to fine details. Carve, fit the through wire and weights, foil, paint with a bamboo skewer and then dip every half hour in dope until I lost count but a least over fifteen times would be a good guess.

So I have my lure it is a little smaller than my index finger and more importantly it has been finished just as the trout season is over so I won’t know its true value until next spring. It isn’t perfect but I know largely the bits that went wrong and how to avoid them in the future. This is a start and the learning has only just begun so I have quite a lot of fiddling about ahead of me. Maybe if I get a bit better at it I'll make a video.

How To Make A Balsa Crankbait Part 2

I took my little crankbaits for a testing session at one of my favorite lakes, what I hadn’t figured was that while I have been away from fishing the rain has also managed to hold off and the lake had shrunk a little. Not being a very deep lake to start with its shallow margins which reach a way out into the lake had become very shallow; down to inches in places. The cold had also kept the weed growth down leaving any would be pike practically naked if it had chosen to leave deeper water.

Well it was water and water is a good place to test lures. The crankbaits surprised me casting cleanly with only the occasional tumble and reaching distances I had not expected. Even as the wind began gusting enough to push up some waves I had no problems cutting in. The retrieve really threw up some god vibrations although the waves made it a little hard to check out the action and once again they ran straight out of the box without any tuning.  Despite the obvious lack of fish I was happy, well who wouldn't be stood in water holding a fishing rod and casting homemade lures. I hung around for stupidly long period of time before realizing I could safely walk out in my wellington boots and nearly reach the distance of casts. 

Starting At The End

Having in one way reached the end of the construction part of this set of videos I find myself at the beginning with a lure, a rod and a lake. I have been taking bits of wood shaping, painting them and throwing them in the water for over five years and I still get excited every time one of my fishing lures springs to life at the end of a line, but when it stops dead in the water and the rod arcs as something grabs hold that’s when it all kind of makes sense.  

I would not of been able to make these videos without the help, inspiration or encouragement of other lure fanatics, those people who share to the ‘how to’ either as bloggers, video makers, writers, professional lure makers or the people who take time to answer question on forums so thanks and thanks to my family for dealing with my lure obsession with compassion, understanding and only occasionally singing or shouting in background while I was filming.

Special thanks to

Solarfall Baits, Genie Lures, Hansom Lures, Maki Lures, Pondbuster Lures, Lure Passion Italy, Manart Craft Baits, Mac Tackle, 61diemai, Japanese Handmade Lure Blog, Salty Water Rusty Memories, Dawn Patrol, Brain Pope and Tails From The River Bank for the encouragement and Lauri Rapala.

Part 6 the end is a bit nearer but not yet

The penultimate video, I feel like Cecil B Demille but maybe a little poorer. While I am prating round with wooden fish my little brother is providing animation instillations for the Victoria and Albert Museum,  obviously when he grows up he too will film wooden fish.  Tomorrow I will fish not film and do some other work I have been putting off. 

Building A Balsa Fishing Lure Part 3

After spending a little too long messing with videos I needed to get out and get some fresh air. So this morning I headed off to the local pond while the weather was bad enough to deter less fool hardy anglers.  Building lures can be great but fishing with them is in a whole different league. I wasn't expecting much from the pond it had rained for the whole of the previous day which had raised the water level a little but surprising not coloured it much beyond its normal noodle soup hue.  

There was one carp angler who was packing up his tent after what looked to have been a heavy night. I clipped on a Phox Minnow and sent it the short distance across the lake. With the summer weed almost gone the lure bounced off the bottom on fast retrieves only bringing home the occasional autumn leaf.  I worked along the reeds and covered both shores at the tail of the water. When the Carp man had gone I moved to a deeper stretch and took a jack almost on the first cast. The hook was looped around a gill raker but luckily it had not pierced any flesh and there was no blood. I slipped the hook out gently and the raker flopped back into position undamaged. Back in the water the pike bolted and I move along the bank a little.  Five or so minutes later I was in a again and then as I struggled to find my camera the fight came to an end as the pike broke the surface and threw the hook.  I took a few casts over the same spot hoping for a replay and surprising I hit into something a little larger once again I let the line fall slack as I pissed around with my camera and then the pike was gone.

I put the camera away and headed over to a small stand of reeds on the other side of the lake where I had often seen movement. This had all the looks of classic pike hold up,  a sunken tree trunk, reeds, shoals of juvenile fish and almost impossible to fish with a lure. I managed a few casts and something rumbled under the surface on the edge of the reeds. In the excitement I buried the lure into the submerge tree and after a harsh tug on the line there it stayed and will probably always stay. I tied on a new trace and clipped on my larger pine minnow casting it way out beyond the snags, it wobbled its way up to the reed bed and the rumble came out to meet it.  This was a much bigger fish and I kept the camera safe inside my jacket until I had it on the bank. 

I need a go-pro or a cameraman

Jack Pike On A Phox Minnow

How to Make a Balsa Lure Part One

Here goes building the Phox Minnow

Link to PDF Fig.1 Wire Template Layout

Link  to PDF Tools and Materials for Through Wire

Hopefully this is a pretty straightforward start.

Back To The Drawing Board

Image Above: The Phox Minnow Blueprint 

Despite owing a few drawing boards I rediscovered CAD this week after downloading a free to use program called Draftsight.  It has been a good few years since I last used this type of software but I am slowly picking up the bad habits I got into last time.  So I have set myself a bit of a challenge to come up with a set of plans and instructions on how to build a Balsa Minnow for anybody with a bit of spare time on their hands. One of the hardest tasks I find while making lures by hand is getting uniformity. The other is waiting, watching resin dry can be pretty nerve racking.  

One of the big disappointments I often find with lure making tutorials and books is the reliance on a well kitted out workshops and a range of expensive power tools.  So I have set myself some limitations as to tools and equipment.

As for the lure design, this is a refinement of a minnow I built a while ago that just keeps catching fish. The inspiration behind the design came from Japan and minnow lures that are still made by hand by craftsmen who should be working in temples rather than workshops.

Hopefully I will get the first vid out around the weekend and a PDF of the Plans.  Watch this space. 

An Ordinary Thursday

Image Above: New colours.

I had a very mixed day. I finally got my new E-Shop up and running and my first new customer followed shortly after. I spent the morning finishing some new Hybrid Casting Spoons that I had sprayed up in a fire tiger pattern with a stripe of UV reactive green. The UV reactive paint shifts light form the ultra violet range into the visible spectrum thus making it appear brighter in water where UV light penetrates a little deeper than the red end of the spectrum.  As an opening offer on my shop I have put half a dozen up at an introductory price of £9.95.

The rest of the day was a bit full on epoxy coating pine wobblers, sanding down balsa blanks ready for priming, priming some casting spoons, pouring a new silicone mould, coating floats with Nitrocellulose and then a trip to the post office and the Tackle shop. While buying some fishing weights I was introduced to a wholesaler who gave me a bit of insider knowledge, luckily I had a balsa wobbler in my pocket from a fishing trip earlier in the week to show him.

I finished the day photographing the casting spoons above and testing a lure in the bath I had carved from some short scraps of balsa. Best of all I got a couple of pictures from Scotland of a little girl who has just caught her first fish and on my lures.

Tomorrow is going to be a much harder day; I am looking after my youngest sons.

Image Above Right: Balsa Lure carved from Scraps
Image Below: Bea and her First Fish.

Another Handful

Image Above: A morning’s work carving balsa wobblers

The coarse fishing season officially opens tomorrow; I may just have to go fishing despite the weather and the need to make lures. I spent the morning carving more balsa wobblers. I can’t say I am getting any faster despite the practice but it is beginning to feel rather natural.

Carving Balsa Lures

Image Above: A Roach Fishing Lure Prototype

After all the recent float fishing for natural prey subjects to turn into lures I have started on my Roach prototype. I began with a drawing taken from a photograph of a fish I caught but once I began carving the balsa the experience of handling real fish took over.  Again it is made in two halves with the wire and weights hidden in the centre.  Still in the early stages but I cannot wait to catch my first pike on this.

Balsa Jubilee

Image Above: Hand Carved Balsa Lure Bodies

Summer has missed beat and a little bit of early spring has once again reared its head. The lake water at least looked to have benefited from the cold snap and the rain; it had gone from its normal Campbell’s cream of mushroom soup to a light broth with a hint of ginger. I spent a little longer there this morning than I should of float fishing and catching my fair share of roach, skimmers and golden bream all candidates for a new look alike lure.