New To Bait Making

[kentuckyraider]

I am new to bait making and was wondering what is the best site for beginners? I fish a lot and spend a lot of money on buying baits. I have always wondered if it is more cost effective to make your own. Additionally, by making my own baits, will they have the same impact as the commercially manufactured baits? What really got me interested was that I saw you can recycle a lot of your soft plastics. I use a lot of soft plastics and spend a ton of money on them. Any suggestions would be great. Thank you.

[Big C]

It depends on what you want to do.

 

Makelure.com is Larry Dahlberg's website.  It has great videos and a forum devoted to lure making.  Their products are geared more toward 100% do it yourself.  Which gives you way more creativity. 

 

Jannsnetcraft.com (probably the best for beginners because they have a little bit of everything).  They have a wide variety of stuff from spinners/buzzbaits, wooden crankbait, and soft plastics. The are a little salty, but it's the best place to get things like wire, hook hangers, and thing of that nature.

 

Bass tackle molds and do-it molds are the best when it comes to aluminum cnc machined molds. 

 

Hobby Lobby is where I get all my paint, glue and epoxy.  They always have printable 40% off coupons on their website, which makes buying an airbrush a little easier. 

 

Hope this helps.

[Snakehead Whisperer]

Check out tackleunderground.com. It's a forum like Bass Resource, but dedicated solely to lure/tackle making.

[basscatcher8]

Definitely don't get into this looking to save money cause you always find something you want to tinker with and end up spending more money on tools to modify something to get what you want. I started with jigs and moved to soft plastics now I started building rods. I guess my next step is to build a mold and start laying fiber glass for a hull lol jk.

 

Barlows tackle has always been good for picking up molds and components for lure building as well.

[junyer357]

Be forewarned lure making can become an addiction just as time comsuming and expensive as fishing itself. Man is it so worth it though when you catch a nice one on a lure you made yourself. Ive painted plastic blank cranks for a few years now and love it. Working on saving money now to build a small workshop bldg to get into more areas like spinners and buzz baits as well as balsa cranks. Ive been doing it in a spare bedroom in home. Hot lead and sawdust wont mix well on carpet...

Like mentioned above i second tackleunderground. Huge wealth of knowledge and experience on there.

[Jig Man]

 by making my own baits, will they have the same impact as the commercially manufactured baits? What really got me interested was that I saw you can recycle a lot of your soft plastics. I use a lot of soft plastics and spend a ton of money on them. Any suggestions would be great. Thank you.

Yes your homemade baits can be as effective as commercially manufactured baits.

 

Recycling leads to green or brown, (mostly brown) as colors mix.

 

As for a ton of money, I bought everything needed to inject tubes.  My very first tube cost me $400.  As the cost has gone down over the last 6 years I'm getting close to what I can pay for them. 

 

Figure over $100 for each mold, injectors, blending block, plastisol, dozens of colorants, several colors and sizes of glitter microwave oven or hot plate, nor por, pyrex, or pans for melting, respirator, gloves, goggles, etc, etc.  

 

If you use over $100 worth of plastics yearly, you might come out in a decade or so.

[Thomas Johnston]

Larry Dahlberg is definitely the man when it comes to making his own baits from scratch. He teaches you about all the different reactions of material and shape. Plus he has the most awesome request for when he passes away. He wants to be cremated and part of his ashes made into a bait and someone fish with it and when they hook a good one cut the line and let the fish have him. Very cool idea

[Salamander12]

On ‎6‎/‎10‎/‎2017 at 7:17 PM, Thomas Johnston said:

Larry Dahlberg is definitely the man when it comes to making his own baits from scratch. He teaches you about all the different reactions of material and shape. Plus he has the most awesome request for when he passes away. He wants to be cremated and part of his ashes made into a bait and someone fish with it and when they hook a good one cut the line and let the fish have him. Very cool idea

 

Not sure if I read that correctly, but he wants someone to hook into a good fish with his cremated ash infused bait and before they land the fish cut the line so the fish is stuck swimming with a lure in its mouth?

[smalljaw67]

I will echo Jig Man's post, this isn't going to save you in the short term, in fact it will cost you. If you find that you only want to make 1 to 3 different styles of lures in 4 or  different colors, well you can probably recoup the start up costs in 1 to 3 years depending on how many baits you normally use in that time span. The problem is that most don't take into consideration the learning curve and the time it takes to get good at it and the time you put in to make your lures. I can tell you that it is a very rewarding thing and fun but time consuming and possibly dangerous if you try to rush things. The other issue is like Junyer357 mentioned, it can become an addictive hobby where you never really save because you end up buying all kinds of glitter in every size (yes, there are multiple sizes of each color glitter), tons of plastisol to make baits and experiment, molds, small injectors, large injectors, O-rings to replace worn ones in your injectors, blending blocks, dual injectors, laminate plates and on and on. Most who end up sucked in will tell you it is a money pit but it can be really fun and a good hobby to have when you can't get out to fish. So, if you think you can drop $300 to start making baits and feel you can stay at that level just buying fresh plastisol from time to time, well then you will save some coin after a bit but if you really like using soft plastics I'd imagine after learning that you would have a hard time not buying additional molds and other stuff so you end up either wanting to save money or having a new hobby or saving money but you never really save with the hobby unless you are very disciplined and that will be hard if you end up liking what you are doing, good luck.

[AllDayBASSIN]

LurePartsOnline has a good selection of parts!  Janns netcraft too

[crypt]

also on this site is the best lure maker I know . Baitmaker...have several of his creations and they are awesome. check him out. 

 

look under the heading    my creations.

[Bruce424]

Tackleunderground would be the site for ya. When you recycle your soft plastics, just make sure they are the same brand.

[AllDayBASSIN]

you should look up "The Handmade Fisherman", He has the best youtube videos i have ever seen about making lures! he also has a blog and stuff, but the videos is where most of the learning is!!!

[Jigfishn10]

If anything, by learning how to make lures, will allow you to take some of your old lures and give them a make over:

• New skirts for jigs, spinnerbaits and buzzbaits, maybe new blades for the spinnerbaits as well.
• Painting your old cranks and/or topwaters?
• Knowledge of replacing hooks and split rings with the correct sizes
• Melting old plastics down and making new

Just some ideas of not only building new from scratch, but repairing/replacing what you have. It will take you some time to recoup the dollars on just building new, but there is an assumed savings by working on what you have.

 

For me? I just like the winter hobby building tackle provides.

 

Good luck.

 

 

[Munkin]

I started because I couldn't find what I wanted and was tired of taking apart brand new spinnerbaits to rebuild them. 

 

Allen 

[Chance_Taker4]

Tackleunderground.com for questions and information

Del-Mart.com or BTSmolds.com for mold

Lurecraft.com Silicone hand pour molds

Ispikeit.com (lureworks) for glitter, color, oil, scent

Shopbaitjunkys.com for plastisol

 

Those site will help you start up and continue the hobby for less. Especially Bait Junkys Plastisol. It come with heat stabilizer in it and has removed all the air which will benefit you when learning. Plastics don't have to be expensive of you are ok with hand pouring once you get into injecting that when the money comes into play.