Copper top

I’ve been messing with some new colorants lately and one is a pumpkin brown, a bass color. I don’t do any bass plastic but I do like to use some of the colorants more specific to bass plastics to manipulate colors I make for crappies. The brown is one I have not done until today.

As a rule I don’t care for brown baits but I stirred up a batch of plain old brown today to see if I’ve been missing anything. After shooting a couple molds using the plain old, plain old I was able to see some hope for the color, which by the way sucked.

I added a bit more raw plastic to the brown along with some gold hi lite and gold and red glitters to come up with this very vibrant top color.

The brown looks very much like a rich copper but hold it up to the light and the hi lite and glitter make this color look as real as real gets. As soon as I had eyes on these I hung one on a jig and strolled over to the river behind the house just to see how the color looked in water and I was pretty happy with it. After fifteen casts or so I can say that a small crappie and a small smallie must have liked it too.

Onward now to larger fish. lol

Just curious, do you have a certain injection molding machine?? I am assuming this is how these and other fishing plastic baits are made. Or are they just poured into a mold?? I often hear people say certain plastics are “hand poured” which makes them somehow better (maybe they are). Wonder why hand poured would be better then machine poured??

I always wondered how these are made.

Is there a link or something you could share how these or any fishing plastics are made commercially??

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Just curious, do you have a certain injection molding machine?? I am assuming this is how these and other fishing plastic baits are made. Or are they just poured into a mold?? I often hear people say certain plastics are “hand poured” which makes them somehow better (maybe they are). Wonder why hand poured would be better then machine poured??

I always wondered how these are made.

Is there a link or something you could share how these or any fishing plastics are made commercially??

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Try youtube. Hand pouring baits, hand injecting baits.

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Try youtube. Hand pouring baits, hand injecting baits.

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Here is one youtube video…Looks like they use vinyl plastisol. Still wonder what makes hand poured better vs. machine poured as far as fishing presentation/lure action goes??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTcWY9SUD4Q

I work with a PhD polymer chemist and I might ask her insights about how plastic fishing baits are made.

Because we take our time and make each bait. Hand made baits are perfect, no dimples, dents, bent worms, etc. The plastisol we use (not vinyl) is softer yet stronger than the stuff big companies use. And the most important thing that makes them better than store bought is right here in this thread, they can be made any color the person wants.

Short answer, hand made are made for quality not $$$$$$$$. No cut corners.

The video you liked to is not how most of us do it.

hand injected http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftJ4gG_S6To
hand poured https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iULtNNvN0E

Thanks for the youtube links and clarification.

I work in an environment that has alot of very high volume extruding and injection molding machines and always wondered how plastic fishing baits were made.

Hand-poured can be a terrible generic term too. Lots of references to baits being “hand poured” when in fact they are hand injected, like these are. And honestly, this baits are a combination:the pearl belly is literally poured into the mold by hand using a spoon while the other two colors come from an injector. Its all a “process”.

As B BK has stated, the plastics we use are far superior to any commercial plastic, the colors are easily, but closely, controlled. Having complete control over every aspect of the bait making process involved means way more vivid and realistic colors than commercial products and again, the quality is a large step in front of commercial too.

Wow, very informative posts. As usual, Tom sets a high standard for plastics. Keep messin’ around…love to see the results of your artistry.