The Hunt For Big Fish with Larry Dahlberg

I just started to make my own spreader bars for tuna up here on cape cod. I want to mess around with different color bulb squid and octopus skirts but certain colors are hard to find. I already made a mold for the green machine heads but want to pour custom skirts and bulb squid. What plastic/rubber would u recommend using? Any help would be great. Thanks

I would start out with alumisol because it's really easy to get different subtle colors, can be mixed in various hardness, and can be remelted and recycled. If that's not tough enough one of the low durometer rubbers, like flex 30 would be my second choice.
best
L

Hi guys,
I would like to learn the process of making the squid skirts. Can someone post a link or thread title on here that might help me get started. I've made some machine type heads too but sourcing the skirts has been difficult and a bit pricey. Seems like a great way to kill some time over the winter. Thanks!

Steve4hire wrote:
> Hi guys,
> I would like to learn the process of making the squid skirts. Can someone
> post a link or thread title on here that might help me get started. I've
> made some machine type heads too but sourcing the skirts has been difficult
> and a bit pricey. Seems like a great way to kill some time over the winter.
> Thanks!

I have been messing around trying to make a mold for the skirts but it's pretty tough. I haven't found any info anywhere else on how they make them. Making them hollow is the toughest part. I assume they're injected. I'm in the same boat as u, can't find skirts cheap enough to make a spreader bar. I'll keep ya updated if I figure it out.

I have not seen any home made skirts that are similar to the ones that are commercially sold. The material and processes by which they are made are not yet available to the home builder. There are some silicones available that might do a pretty good job, but they too are pretty expensive. I've seen a process by which home made snow shoe bindings were made that might work but have not chased it down.
I will continue to have my eyes open, and will post and do a tutorial when I get it figured out!
In the very beginning when guys like Black Bart were first messing with this type of lure they used various types of naugahyde vinyl which they bought in fabric stores, then cut into fringes and wrapped on the heads they had pressure cast out of either clear epoxy or urethane. They used standard serving/rigging floss to secure the fringe strip. Not as sexy looking as the current state of the art, but caught plenty of fish!
best
L