Stringjam

Some of the worst worm hooks I've ever used....possibly THE worst. Just MO, of course. If you demand a cheap worm hook, just pick up some of the XPS round-bends from BPS. You can get 50 for about $11.....that's only a few bucks more than the Tru-Turns. They're not Owners but they're infinitely better than the Tru-Turns.

Nice! Clown is a killer color around here in the winter. I like the subtle scaling!

Wow - fantastic stuff, Marty!!!

Man - you've been busy! The Speedie Trap is killer!

I'm really not sure why it ended up being so much wider(?) The line-tie positioning, lip style and angle are very similar to the Charlie. The only thing I can think is that it might have something to do with the body shape. My bait has a pointed snout (like an RC 1.5) so the overall location of the lip/line-tie is farther down the nose of the bait. I'm going to try a lot of different lips and combos in this proto, though......there really are a TON of options on these shallow cranks to mess with. I think I'll also make another one with the lip moved down from the line-tie a little with increased angle.

Sexy Sharpie.

This! I've been reading the hardbait section for a few years - - TONS of invaluable info at TU!

I'm diggin' the purple jailtime!!

;D I think I have my hands full at the moment trying to learn to build around one material - - although in time I would like to experiment with woods like balsa, cedar, and paulownia, and possibly urethane foams as well. Here's the video from my initial assembly and testing: At this point, it is acting very similar to the Charlie, except that it definitely has a bit wider kick (especially when slowed up during the retrieve - the tail seems to "kick out" wider than the Charlie)....a little bit more roll maybe as well. I have more experimenting to do, but I'm happy with the initial results (and still always in shock that when I put these things together they actually do something... ;D )

I hope nobody is sick of my prototyping posts - - I just thought posting some of my newbie progress and thoughts might be of interest to anybody else just starting out. Since my deep crank proto process is on hold until I can get it into some real lake water, I thought I'd start my second favorite design type. This is going to be a 2 1/2", shallow diving, square-billed crank. It's going to be a moderately tight wiggler - not too much roll. Some definite Charlie-O influence going into the lip design and angle, but the body is far more angular - more of a rounded / flatside hybrid. Edit: Initial trial video:

That is super-righteous!! I love the clean, classic look. Outstanding!

Another vote for tin snips.

Nice job, Toledo! 8-)

Great job, bnw.....that craw pattern on a Wiggle Wart would be awesome.

I like the burnt yellow pattern on top - very nice!

FWIW, the older Bagley DB3's are very inconsistent from bait to bait, just like the older Poe's. One bait may be noticeably different in size compared to the other. The biggest difference in action from the old baits to the new came from the redesign of lip angles and line-tie location, IMO. The brass line-tie that a lot of Bagley collectors tout as "better" I don't think had anything to do with it.....but moving it's location DID. If you look at really old B series cranks, the line-tie comes straight out of the nose.....during the redesign it was dropped down closer to the lip, which significantly WIDENED the action. A "New Original" bait is nothing at all like the old ones - - just another marketing scheme.

Very nice, Marty (as usual!)

That's definitely not an old original......my guess is it's just some rare color, and the guy's either using a bud to run up the bid, or it's just those wacky Bagley collectors. Either way - I don't get it. 80's version DB3's are constantly on eBay.

Does the lip come straight out of the front of the bait with very little angle, and have a lead slug built into the line-tie? If so, it's the original early version. If it has a more angled "factory" style lip (with a built-in line-tie) it's the later version introduced in the early 80's. Past that, I don't know.

Marty - - I actually did go ahead and buy some of the 3/8 oz. cylinders and cut it down. Still a big piece of lead, though! Pulling the weight down a little bit so that it extended out of the bottom as you just described did help a bit, but I'm not sure I like the appearance. I'm going to try a bit of a weird experiment. I ordered some Tungsten powder tonight (derby car racers use it for precise weighting). My thought is that I can measure out exactly how much weight I want for any given shape or situation, drill the cavity and fill it with the powder....capping it off with a suitable filler. I don't know....I like experimenting so I'm going to at least mess around with it. Tungsten is so much smaller (it looks to be almost half the size of lead) it would really make things easier. I also looked at a company that makes Tungsten shot in a myriad of sizes (without minimum ordering). I can get a pound of shot for about $30 - - an exceptionally good price considering the price of "fishing industry" tungsten sinkers.......and even better than lead.

That's interesting, as I really didn't have the Poe's in mind when I was trying to shape it up. I think the pics do make it look a little bigger than it is, though. Here's a top view of it beside a vintage Poe's. I tried to really keep this thing as compact as I could - because I think that really aids in casting. The DT was/is kind of the standard I'm judging everything on. I think it's one of the best designs out there today. My first proto actually resembled the body shape of the DT too much for my taste, so I gave it some sharper angles and straighter body lines (it also has a much sharper taper fore and aft, and flatter sides.) Observation today - - I drilled out the cavity and mounted the ballast on the inside of the bait. This vertical movement of the ballast had a definite effect on the action. It kind of tightened up the shoulder movement (roll) - didn't really effect the wiggle any. It's subtle, and might not even be relevant (it's still livlier than a DT), but it's enough that I'm trying to think of ways to get that little bit of roll back without having to resort to increasing the lip angle. It's a big old cylinder of lead though, and I'm thinking about drilling out a cavity along the chest, and laying the lead sideways to keep as much weight as I can as low as possible. I think a tungsten weight would come in handy right now because it would be SO much smaller and easier to mount......the problem would be that (I think?) cutting the Tungsten weights to get the right weight would be impossible. I have a few Japanese baits that use a "plate" ballast, and now I assume this situation is why. Interesting....I'm going to keep experimenting.

Not anymore...I was gluing the weights on so that I could move them around, and I've taken them off now to drill out the cavity and mount them inside of the bait. After adding the hook hanger, the 1/4 oz. weight was just a bit too heavy, rose a bit too slow. I cut it up until it was just right. I'll post a pic when I get it mounted again - - but basically, ALL of the ballast weight is up towards the nose (about where your secondary ballast marking was on the diagram), and none is around the hook hanger. This also gave the bait the best nose attitude so far. I think one reason the action is so tight is because there is almost no lip angle.

Sharpie

She just found out today....that I fish in her bathtub. I think she understands......I think....

I've spent quite a bit of time today experimenting with weight, weight placement, and even front hook hanger placement. Every movement seems to make a difference (the hook hanger has more influence than I thought as well). I settled on a ballast placement that is definitely not where I expected, but this is all preliminary to real lake testing, so that may change. I took a video of my tub test. ;D This is definitely the kind of action I'm looking for.....towards the end of the video, I start ripping it. One of the things this bait definitely had to be able to do is be burned. You can tell the bait is also still pretty buoyant.