DIY Crankbait: Prototype #1 for Information Gathering

I always feel like crankbaits are the easiest to catch fish with, so I wanted to add a crankbait to my lineup of handmade lures. It had been in the planning stage, but since the peak season is about to end, I finally started making it.

The material is leftover wood from my son's school craft project. For certain reasons, it has a 3-layer structure. The ultimate goal of this prototype is to check the shape and resulting action, and to use it as a master for making a mold.

I roughly carved it down. This angle actually gives it a pretty nice shape. However, since I'm aiming for a frog-like design, it's quite flat.

The reason for the 3-layer sandwich structure is to make the middle piece easier to carve out. The purpose is for a weight-transfer system. The wood on both outer sides could be a bit thinner, but since I just used whatever material was available, it ended up a little thick.

I roughly carved out the space where the weight moves using a knife and smoothed it with a file. This 3-layer structure was chosen to make this process easier. I also anticipate that this 3-part split will make mass production with UV resin easier.

This is what it looks like with just one side attached. It seems like it's going to work well. For the weights, I went with one larger weight than this, plus two tiny weights for sound. If you put multiple large weights, they might jam, ruin the stability, and likely cause a backlash on the cast.

To check its performance, I sealed it with plastic model masking material during assembly so that water wouldn't leak inside when casting and swimming it. This is just temporary.

It ended up with a very vivid color scheme. The black part is primer, used as a temporary waterproof coating.

I made the lip by cutting and bending a piece of aluminum. The left and right tips of the lip are bent down slightly, and the middle is bent up a little.

For the line tie eye, there isn't enough space to insert a screw eye because of the internal weight-transfer system. So, for now, I modified the raised part of the lip to attach a snap ring. The aluminum lip itself is secured with wood screws, but since that's also quite shallow, I glued it in place using green masking putty, which also acts as an adhesive. In the end, I might make this part using glue or UV resin.

For this time, as long as it doesn't fall apart while reeling, I'll call it a success.

I brought it to the fishing spot to see if it would swim properly. Surprisingly, on the very first try without any adjustments, it swam correctly. I was imagining the worst-case scenario where the action would completely break down and I'd have to start over from scratch.

The wobbling looks great, too. It's a bit hard to tell rolling action with a pitch-black body, but it looks like it has a good roll as well. I should have painted the belly a different color so it's easier to see.

After testing, I took it apart and found no water had entered. This green masking material works great as a gasket.

By the way, it weighs 10g, which is a very easy weight to cast. Since the volume is quite large, its buoyancy is high. Making it just a little bit heavier might be okay too.

June 7th: Tested it again after painting.

It has a frog color scheme, painted with an airbrush. I haven't done the UV resin topcoat, final shaping, or polishing yet.

This is what it looks like after painting and sealing the surface with UV resin. Surprisingly, it not only wobbles heavily but also rolls a lot, turning it into a really nice lure.

Next up, I'm moving on to mass production.