Hi guys
Doc Lures here with lure making 101 a
simple tutorial series for beginners to learn wooden lure making with minimal tools materials or experience
In this tutorial we'll make a 70 mm shallow diving balsa crankbait
See this lure making project in "Fishing Monthly" magazine www.FishingMonthly.com.au
For lure making templates and tips MakeWoodenLures.com/Fishing-Monthly/
Transfer the side profile of your crankbait 12 mm thick balsa wood
Separate the blanks with a sharp utility knife and pare away some waste
Don't pare right to the line. I'm going to leave a little bit of extra
waste and in the next step
We'll clean this up and square the blanks
It's very important to keep your crankbait blanks square at this stage
So that your hook hangers and tow points are properly aligned
Work with the grain here and always carve away from your hands
To square my crankbait blank I've glued a piece of sandpaper to a wood block
I'm holding the lure on a flat surface and running the sanding block
over until I've shaped the lure right back down to the line
I'll switch over to a curved block to sand the concave side of the lower belly
Use fresh sandpaper and light pressure for best results
Now we're going to mark the location of our hardware
I'm marking a center line on the belly
We're keeping these handmade lures simple so we''ll use twist wires for the tow point and hook hangers
That means drilling a few holes to glue the twist eyes into
I'm using a battery drill with a 2 or 2.5 mm drill bit
Take care not to drill into your fingers!
For the weights I'm using a brad point bit of 4.5 mm diameter
Brad point bits allows us to drill accurately. We can open with a larger drill later if necessary
Use a fine-tooth saw to make a slot for the diving lip
Be sure to get this as square as possible
Which is really important to be able to tune the crankbait. Having a crooked diving lip makes it very difficult
Now shape the top profile. I'm trimming away the waste down to the lines we marked the earlier
Once again, don't cut all the way down to the line. We're going to use a sanding block
To clean up and square up timber
Work slowly work gently and take small slivers of balsa wood
Try and keep the wood as square in cross section as possible.
Once again, that allows you to get everything aligned properly for a high-performance handmade crankbait
Now we can start to knock those corners off and round off the lure
Here you can see I'm making guidelines for my carving
These are basically just a line that goes halfway between the center line and the edge of the timber
I'm going to do this on all four sides
Once again doing it by eye rather than measuring
Take small slivers with a utility knife and pare down between the two carving guidelines
Once you've cut the four corners off you can smooth the shape up a little bit with the utility knife
Then pick up some sandpaper and clean the lure body, refine the shape. Balsa wood is quite soft so
It's very easy to leave too much timber and spoil the shape
There are three ways to add tow points and hook hangers to handmade lures
Screw eyes simply screw into the timber handmade twist eyes made out of
stainless steel wire and glued into holes. And a through-wire which runs in a slot from the front to the back of the lure
For simplicity we'll use twist eyes because they're quick, easy and don't don't require special materials
And they're strong enough for a small wooden crankbait
When using these lures for line classes of six kilograms or higher
I'd suggest going for a through wire just for the extra strength and security
Here's how I make my twist eyes. This is a three millimeter drill bit
I'm simply bending a piece of 1.2 millimeter stainless steel wire around the drill
I use 316 grade marine stainless steel wire for this because I don't want corrosion in my lure
With screw eyes ready to go
I'm going to mix some epoxy. Use 24-hour curing super strength adhesives for this
5-minute curing epoxy breaks down quickly and isn't strong enough
Be sure to get plenty of epoxy into the hole and all over the shaft of the twist eye
Rotating the twist tie against the twist will push the adhesive deeper into the hole rather than squeeze it out
Repeat the process for the tow point and the belly hook and you're ready to installing weights
Why are weights important for this handmade lure?
Well, what the weight does is helps to stop the lure from rolling over onto its side in use.
That allows the diving lip to work better and gives you a better, stronger more stable action over a wider range of cranking speeds
You don't require a lot of weight to stabilize a small lure like this.
In fact, I've split a small ball sinker in two with a utility knife
The weight that I'm installing weighs around about one gram
I've filled the hole with epoxy, placed the weight into the wet epoxy and pushed it n place
And I'm simply going to add some more epoxy over the top fill the void that's left.
Sometimes the epoxy will shrink during curing
And you need to apply a second batch to fill the belly of the lure up so that the weight can't be seen
Once your adhesive is dry it's time to harden your balsa lure bodies
Balsa is a very soft wood, so applying some epoxy to the outside of the lure and allowing it to soak into the grain
can make your wooden lure more durable and longer-lasting
Here I'm brushing on epoxy that's been thinned with methylated spirit (denatured alcohol) to make it soak into the grain better
Simply brush it on liberally
Work it in and make sure it soaks as far into the wood as possible
It helps to have the balsa lure blank warm before you start so the pores of the wood are open
Allow at least 24 hours for the epoxy to cure and then smooth the lure off using wet sanding paper
I'm using 240 grit. You could use 400 grit if you prefer
The idea is to sand until everything feels smooth, and all the gloss has been removed from the epoxy
This process not only hardens the wood but waterproofs it and fills the grain for a better looking paint job
Here's how the crankbait lure should look once the sanding is finished
I'm going to install the diving lip before I paint the lure
This is a personal preference, some people prefer to install the diving lip after the lure has been painted
My diving lip has been cut from two millimeter polycarbonate using a pair of kitchen scissors
Work some epoxy into the lure here. I'm using a paper clip to work at well in
Wipe off the excess
Slide the polycarbonate crankbait lip into the lure making sure it's properly aligned
before setting it aside to cure
If you're just getting started lure making there's nothing wrong with using a brush some artists acrylic, model paints or lacquer
Or perhaps picking up an aerosol can or two from the touch up section of the auto store
But if you get more serious about making lures you'll want to get an airbrush
So for this tutorial, I'm gonna show you some simple airbrush techniques that I use
I'm starting by spraying the epoxied lure with some Autobourne white sealer
The purpose of this coat is to give good adhesion of the paint of the wooden lure
Next I'll give the lure a coat of wicked yellow. This is a great opaque color that's perfect as a base
Notice. I'm not spraying on one heavy coat but doing it in several light passes to get a nice even color without any runs
On the back of the lure I'm going to go over the wicked yellow with Autoair metallic bronze give a nice bronzy sheen
Then I'll spray a little Autoair red under the chin to give a "bleeding gill" effect
In transparent black with a simple stencil I'll paint gills and fins on the lure
Then I'll use a fine piece of wire to dot some black
and then some red dots all over the surface
Finally I'll dab some eyes on the lure using some drill bits to give the finished effect
Hope you enjoyed the tutorial and don't forget to check out my website
MakeWoodenLures.com for tips, templates and tutorials
bye for now