Fat little Musso's. Look a lot like the ones he made for himself.

Yeah George, like Flap did. Maybe push along at a bit of an angle, not completely flat out at a slow retreive.

Probably look a little fatter in the pic than they are. They are widest at the hook at 1.17. I am also going to make some around 6".
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Got out today and tested a few things I was thinking about for my challenge swap plugs. These were what I brought with me.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps45adfef2.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps563d99f6.jpg

The top two are plugs I have made before with a slight tweak in body shape. I just wanted to see what happened if I swapped weight and hook holes. I liked it with the weight forward of the hook but the other way makes it hunt more and would probably make a good darter. I may make a few of both.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps99f70843.jpg

Next one I had to bend down the line tie and switched the back treble out from a 3/0 to a 2/0 but swam OK on top and would go deeper on a faster retrieve. Still need to mess with this one a bit more.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps363f59cd.jpg

The next one is the Nike'ish looking one. I was surprised at this one. It had an extremely tight wiggle but was very hard to start. Almost had to snap it to get it under and even then would only get going once the entire plug was subsurface. May try adding a slightly larger metal lip on top of the lower face. Back to the drawing board for this one.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps815c5d19.jpg

And finally the bottom one. Very happy with this one. I didn't have high hopes for this but liked it a lot.




I copied an Arcadia Reef popper. I tried some detail carving for the first time. Lots to learn there. Overall I was very pleased the way it came out. Sits with about half the mouth out of the water. Just need to figure out how I want to paint it.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps1ad308a8.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...psf9cf8482.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps88bc2028.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps1cc130cd.jpg

Ted did you try turning the line tie on those big eyed lipless swimmers on the horizontal instead of vertical? Might be able to better adjust the swim depth that way on those? Just a thought! I made the same type of ;ipless and had more options with adjustment that way! They all look great by the way! Love your work!
:uhuh:

I have not with this type of plug. I have done it with some other stuff like some hand carved stuff and you do get a lot more "tunability". I will give that a try on these before I make any more changes.

Awesome, inventive, and unique.

I'm confused though. The last swimmer you show in your hand looks like a Nike (or even more like a FW plug called the bearcat) to me. Is that the one you liked or the one that wouldn't swim for you?

I think I forgot a pic in there. It is the bottom one in the second pic. The one in my hand is the the one I was having trouble with.

The one you liked looks like a skinny musso lipless. Some things on the original that helped are making the face a touch wider than the body and lowering (or bending) the line tie a touch.

The one that struggled looks like a large Nike, which I have trouble getting to swim other than in current (makes sense since he built it for the canal). The next size down nike, like Paul reproduced, is a better still water swimmer (bigger face).

The popper is the nutz. Was it an offcenter turning or "hand carve"?

Have not decided on what I will be making shortly! Must finish cleaning basement so I can move a bunch of crap out of my shop TO the basement! Still have a few unfinished CCBC darters to finish.

The popper is handcarved but unlike anything Ive done before. All the stuff I've handcarved before was just a profile cutout then a topdown view cutout. Kind of easy and nothing over complicated. This one has for lack of a better term, compound curves. They kind of go in two different directions at once. I had to do some of the roughing out with the drum sander. It all came together rather quickly and evenly to my surprise. I'm almost afraid to paint it because something has to go wrong. The power will go out when I put it on the spinner or something. I was afraid that the way the tail hanger was set up that it would turn the plug over but It sits very nice and is pretty stable. It is weighted on the belly hanger. They say that all their lures [Arcadia Reef] are hand made from wood. I have no idea how they do it and keep everything so consistent.

Here's a few that I just finished.

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...psa1887a6d.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps725d07bc.jpg

http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/a...psb172b3aa.jpg

Elegant seems the best word for those.

Greek, those are some cool looking plugs, and the finished ones look like some reel fishy plugs. Making me want to get back in the workshop!
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Great looking plugs, well done.

Ted, your paint blending is incredible, especially on the herring paint! Love the stainless lips you make!

Finished epoxy on the Conrad Jrs. Sit in the water with the back poking out, water line above lip slot and above the rear wire hole. That plug is white pine w/ 9 gram belly weight. Time to swim the finish product.
Just spun a Conrod Jr w/ soft maple. Comparable body weight sans weight and hardware 46gr. maple/ 32gr. pine. did a float test w/ 3/0 & 2/0 hooks (3). Sank head first with 9 gr. belly weight. Sank less w/5gr.belly weight. Floated perfect w/o any weight. Plug weighed bare soft maple w/3-3/0 hooks 2.6oz/ Weight w/Pine finished paint & epoxy w/3-3/0 hks. 2.3oz.
3/0 marry easy (cut), 2/0 OK. I rather 3/0. What hooks usually go with this plug? Any reason not to use a dressed siwash? 5/0 or /6/0.
Plug swap plugs; 1 finished, waiting on color response on other.

Definitely try one with more weight. Probably another 5-7 grams. Your's sounds more like it is set up as a surface swimmer.

They work well if they float level with the back just barely out of the water (the tail will be well below the surface). Your plug will swim fine, but it will not get as deep as one weighted more heavily, it will also require a faster retrieve to fight its buoyancy and stay down. Most importantly (I think) it will not suspend as well when you pause it......and that is when the plug gets hit the most often in my experience.

I've done little this week and am working this weekend :sad: so I've got little to offer this week.

George the belly weight hole was taken off PM's drawing. With the hooks it's barely out of the water. adding more may make it sink? The maple version actually sinks head first w/9gr. granted the stock alone is approx 14 gr. heavier. I try to swim this week and get back w/results. Thanks

Sorry, if it is barely floating it is perfect already.

I did speak with a guy who floated a bunch of originals for me when I was first trying to resurrect these plugs. He mentioned that some of his Pichneys floated head down and there was a lot of variation among the plugs he floated. I've not tried one set up as such, however. Guys also talked about upsizing the front hook (which would pul the head down) on the Jr version almost as if it was the norm to do it.

Sanded and primed a bunch of stuff on Friday night.

Those torpedoes, needles, some odds and ends that I never finished and some plugs that I scored from g2h that came with the lathe.

Hopefully will be using Paul's carbide cutter tomorrow on some Saltys ayc I bought. 1.75" stuff, going to make some Ccbc surfsters and some big pikies with it and maybe some of those early pichney giant atom 40s

Need to figure out a cheap and easy spray booth, work area doesn't have any windows, so could be a problem.
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George went back to float test the Jr w/ 2/0 & 3/0 hooks on all three hook hangers. The tail is slightly lower almost covering the tail section. I need to do my homework on the water. Results next week.

Swam the Conrad Jr (pine), very windy, choppy and dirty water. Couldn't see the plug until it was a rod lengths away. Couple feet at that distance. Tide was 3/4 down and didn't pursue anymore swims fearing losing the plug. Did this last year same tide loss a Conrad Sr. low water is around 6'. Hit the high tide next week hopefully the water clears. Spun a few maple and AYC Conrad Jr for eelskins. Stock for myself.

tested a new needle design today, 7.5" floater at 1.75oz, one big .5oz belly weight about 3/4 back from the nose, with two 3/0 vmcs.

slow retrieve it makes a massive v wake, bigger than a danny or surfster, faster retrieve with some twitches it spooks left to right and glides to a stop, was going to add more weight after my first float test but after fishing it today, i think ill leave it, i have plenty of other needles that sink.

Dont have any that are TRUE floaters, but lots of slow sink ones.

will be nice to have a longer profile needle/pencil for the back bays that will serve a dual purpose.

finished sanding 40 more plugs on friday night, just need to prime and theyll be ready for paint, and then put together a large order for weights, lips, swivels, wire, etc.

have a lot of random one off stuff from a few years ago and stuff that never got finished that I want to put to bed already.

Spending the weekend cleaning the shop....then I have a few ideas I want to work on!!:uhuh:

Turned some ayc conrad jrs. and small 4 1/2" swimmers. Hoping to complete my duplicator this week, had to weld up some different sized washers to use as tnuts because I wasn't able to find t-nuts big enough and didn't want to drill and tap the lathe bed to hold the base of the dupe. Still have to make some modifications to the sled and then I'll be up and running. Hope to have some stuff finished for plugfest.

some stuff I'm working on for the Spring... ( I gave up airbrush paint-jobs awhile ago. now its rattle cans and the fish still bite just as well.)


some needlefish and small poppers. needles weigh 2-4 1/2 oz (some are notched for skins) the poppers are sugar pine and range 3/4 to 1.5 ounces

...flags this week...
 

...been putting it off too long now to get ready for Plugfest...

...got a buncha boring whites done...now on to the colors...

...course I can use some direction between now and then so if you don't want to be bothered dressing tail hooks or flags ....I might be able to match your custom paint jobs...

http://i1091.photobucket.com/albums/...dman/flags.jpg

...I know I got the Knipex around here somewhere !!!!!


Old Man aka Bob

Built some small darters this week. Had a lot of them so I fooled around a bit with pattern sawing. I liked the results and thought someone else might be interested.

First you need a decent band saw that can hold good tension on a blade, and a decent jig that will hold your plug steady and square. Next you set up a guide stick with a notch for the saw blade. I clamp this to the table then clamp a piece of scrap perpendicular and behind it to prevent the guide stick from being pushed backwards.

Then you need your sled, which will hold the plug square over the pattern you want to cut. Mine has a top and bottom pattern, but you only need the bottom pattern. I use a tail pin to index the plug and a belly hole pin to hold it upright.

Then index the sled to the guide bar and cut.