Cgolf

They appear to be at least relatively stable, I had one with at least 10 fish on it including a decent musky and it stayed in place. I was able to smack some of them loose as well. Seeing that I have multiple baits that have this issue, they were never able to fully fix the problem, except it might not be a problem. I did get a device to capture the frequency of the different baits, I will need to take multiple readings and try to capture the max value for each bait. It will be interesting, because I have an orange craw that sounds like it has half its balls stuck. I will label the baits and as the summer progresses note which ones do better, stuck or unstuck, or heavy paint or minimal paint. Agreed, but with all the R&D companies put in, I would imagine that the pitch of the rattles definitely plays a factor. The scientist part of me wants to know why one bait works better than the other. If they seem to want a bait with a certain pitch, i can give it to them. What I am finding with the RES is that the variability bait to bait seems to be pretty high. If I am buying them in store, I can of course check, but mailorder sites make it a crapshoot. The other reason for doing the work of finding out what pitch each bait is in the off season, is that it will save me time on the water, I won't have to waste time weeding through all the baits in my box to find one that works, because to be honest, if they didn't hit the RES, I would try a rippin rap or XR 50 first.

Just got home from Costco and picked up a breathable lightweight rain coat for 20 bucks. Since I only fish in the rain on vacation, I didn't need a high dollar coat, hoping this one will work out for me.

This is where tossing the bone copper head RES where I have one with stuck rattles and another with them free, will give me an idea if it makes a difference. If I had a fully rattling bait last vacation would the musky have jumped at the bait as I was pulling it out of the water? All I know is they killed that bait, this summers test will be more telling because I will know which bait is different. Until last night I had no clue the gill bait had a stuck rattle. Obviously rattles or no rattles make a difference since SK makes three versions of the RES and XCalibur had two versions. Even saw a new bait on TW that has two types of rattles in one bait. Just not sure if minor changes make enough of a difference, but will be marking the good baits this summer. If I did buy multiples of certain colors and some were better than others I would want to know why. If I could pinpoint the reason and like someone said with the Cordell spots pick out the good baits in the store that would save me some cash and fishing time weeding out the bad baits. With a lipless bait I would think sound matters much more than color, just due to the nature of how they are retrieved. A Jay's magic bait is proof of that.

Went through all my RESs that I can see through with a bright flashlight and found four with stuck rattles in the tail. Funny thing was the gill replacement bait I just got for Xmas had two stuck instead of one. Will be interesting to see how they work this summer. Now that I know, I will try a good and stuck rattles in the same color and see if I get different results.

I have a guitar tuner app for my Ipad, if I could find a consistent method to shake and hold the baits in the same spot, perhaps I could get some info out of that. That might be an interesting experiment to do. Wouldn't get the exact frequency, but it might work for comparisons.

Totally agree, but if one has a flaw that works in our favor, I would try to replicate that flaw. The one with the stuck ball is probably not possible to duplicate, but the slight rattle in a silent bait might be doable. I even have drilled holes in a Bandit 100 to let water in, after cracking one that took on water and caught a bunch of fish before it was too cracked thinking the water in side the bait changed the action. I haven't tried that bait yet, but will this year.

Loon, as it is a great dingy water color, and when I was looking for a Musky color on a N. WI clear water lake, Loon was again recommended. Granted loons are all over that lake, so I was just matching the hatch;)

Last vacation I caught 50+ fish and 6 species on an orange craw RES including a 40" class musky. On the last trip I retired it and switched to a bluegill RES and caught like 10 fish in a short time snc had a pike and musky jump out of the water trying to hit it as I pulled the bait in the boat, it was nuts and I got a 30" class musky on this bait. Well after posting about the original batch of baits that had the rattles glued down, I checked out this bait and low and behold, the back rattle chamber had one rattle still glued in the tail of the bait. While this bait caught many less fish due to the limited time I threw it, it was all scratched up and the orange craw looked pretty clean. They seemed more aggressive when they hit this one. I now have to rethink the retirement of the bait. I want to compare it against a new fully functional bait attached a pic of it, hope it is clear, but like @A-Jay I think this is truly a one off bait, I may be better off saving it in case I tourney fish some day. Even though the pic is sideways, it was held tail up. Last vacation I caught 50+ fish and 6 species on an orange craw RES including a 40" class musky. On the last trip I retired it and switched to a bluegill RES and caught like 10 fish in a short time snc had a pike and musky jump out of the water trying to hit it as I pulled the bait in the boat, it was nuts and I got a 30" class musky on this bait. Well after posting about the original batch of baits that had the rattles glued down, I checked out this bait and low and behold, the back rattle chamber had one rattle still glued in the tail of the bait. While this bait caught many less fish due to the limited time I threw it, it was all scratched up and the orange craw looked pretty clean. They seemed more aggressive when they hit this one. I now have to rethink the retirement of the bait. I want to compare it against a new fully functional bait attached a pic of it, hope it is clear, but like @A-Jay I think this is truly a one off bait, I may be better off saving it in case I tourney fish some day. Even though the pic is sideways, it was held tail up.

Sorry you misunderstood. Take a truly silent new bait and knock, whack, smack it to make it sound like the above bait giving yourself a backup:)

Have you ever tried to create a second not so silent bait? I know when I got a RES kit when they first came out from BPS with the BBs glued in place, SK replaced the lures for me, but also told me to whack them to see if I could get them loose. I was able to smack them on a table to free them up, probably with some glue in the chamber though. Perhaps you could do the same to replicate that bait you have. Not sure though how much abuse the bait would take before it would crack. Now I am curious if one of the baits that produced for me last year was one that I had to do this to? I have heard of guys putting stuff in the rattle chamber and resealing it to change the action/sound of a bait. Didn't sebile have an oil filled lipless at one time?

Here is a picture of the two baits that look quite different. Ultimately I had scraped the paint off the one to get an all clear bait to see how it would work.

Recently I scraped the paint off two RES and found that one had a clear body and the other a white body. This got me to wondering if they were made of different plastics which would give off a different sound. Talked to a guy at work that knows plastics and the thought was it is the same, but we did get into a discussion on how different paint schemes could give off a different sound. If they are different plastic formulations that would be interesting to know. Take clear sexy shad which has very little paint on it, vs say the orange craw which has a lot. The paint could dull the sound some. Same goes for the chrome covered baits. In the past I would have thought that a slight change in sound wasn't a big deal, but @A-Jay has me convinced it makes a difference with his non-silent silent RES. I also have a silent one that clicks very slightly I want to try out this year.

This is my last post for awhile and going back to creepy lurker status lol. I figured I should end on a helpful note. I had seen an expensive jig spinnerbait box come out recently, that while cool was way to pricey for me. When I was at Menards recently I stumbled across the box in the pictures. It seems to be the right size for even bigger spinnerbaits and would hold lots of jigs too. The hook packets fit nicely in there as well. The box with it in one of the pictures is 3700 size to give you an idea how big it is. The kicker is that the box was 5 bucks.

The weird bit about this whole Ned rig thing, is this it doesn't feel much different then what we have been tossing for years. A light jig and small plastic equals Midwest finesse, which everyone wants to label and have rules for. As I posted earlier I have had two rigs for years slider heads and jigs, picking the weight by what the fish want and the conditions dictate. What drives me nuts, is with the same plastic, I am fishing a Ned rig only if the jig is light enough. If I am fishing in 2-3 footers and heavy winds, a Ned sized plastic may get the nod, but need a 1/4+ jig to do battle in those conditions and it is then a Shaky head lol I guess from now on I just fish what works skipping all the labels it is just all to confusing:)

Essentially the Ned rig is a small soft plastic of any brand on a jig head of a certain weight. You have been fishing almost that for awhile now. There are some on here that can clarify the plastic size and jig weight sizes for a true Ned rig, but what you do works great regardless of what it is called. For me 75% of my plastics are fished on a slider head and the rest are on a jig head, follows the KISS logic, keep it simple stupid lol. Been that way for 15 years.

Seeing where you are at, the chain can be ridiculous, except very early in the year. I do like tossing a Sled rig at docks, 1/2 Zinkerz on a slider head. Looking to try the Big TRD to get more bait behind the hook. Purple haze was good around docks in that lovely green water;) My PB 20" Smallie came on the Ned rig last year.

The reel was 20, hooks a buck a pack and the traps were two a piece. The Lews was mid 50's originally so not a great one, but it is a 7 to 1 so perfect for me. Haven't seen sales like this in a while.

Personally on our WI lakes I use slider rigged worms. I sometimes use the Ned, but find most lakes either to heavily weeded or it is to windy to cast to cover with it, the line gets blown all over the place. To me it is not a good bait to cast to visible cover, it is just too light. The slider spider pro heads have a very stout hook. I do use the Ned a lot on the river, just have not found it to be very efficient on lakes. I have caught WI bass on 10" worms and the KVD 8.0 squarebill, so you don't really need to use micro baits.

You all weren't kidding about Wally World, under 50 for all this stuff.

I did and last summer it was a good bait for me. Picked up a couple of different colors plus refilled another with the Black Friday deal on SK baits at TW. It is nice to have different options, between the Menace, 5" Kalins single tail,. And a tube on a slider jig I can cover a lot of different bass moods and situations. It is truly a unique bait which is cool.

I was 18, 52, 60, 64, and 90. Ish and Scroggins struggling were surprises to me.

I got the sarcasm, but still was trying to gather opinions, and on here certain brands styles have serious fans, so trying to weed through that is fun at times lol. The biggest reason even today, with all the tackle I haven't used I find myself agonizing over decisions and actually researching baits before I purchase them. The only impulse buys now are clearance items. Having a kid in school and trying to keep her debt after graduation to a minimum means some sacrifices by mom and dad:) I don't want to buy tackle anymore that fills the same niche of a bait I already have. probably didn't need to defend the thread, but after the day I had I figured what the heck

Picked up some Sasquatch lures double spins and bladed jigs.

Surprised to see David Fritts being up so high. Didn't think his approach, or what I knew of his approach would work well on the Big O.

Totally forgot about the shallow game, well that is because the simplicity of 4 baits that is my deep box, my shallow to 9 foot selection is ridiculous. I love squarebills and lipless baits and then have some other stuff that sees water quite a bit too. I really need to start tightening up my shallow game so I don't have to carry as many cranks to the lake.