# Balance Jigs



## kingfisher72

I've been messing around making some balance jigs lately. The hair tails are half ounce and the ones with fins are an ounce. 

















The fish liked them...


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## AtticaFish

Cool project. Are you pouring these with a custom mold? Don't recall ever seeing a mold (retail) that would make those.


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## kingfisher72

AtticaFish said:


> Cool project. Are you pouring these with a custom mold? Don't recall ever seeing a mold (retail) that would make those.


Thanks. Yes, I made a male form of a body out of balsa and then a mold using Durham's water putty to cast the lead.


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## HappySnag

AtticaFish said:


> Cool project. Are you pouring these with a custom mold? Don't recall ever seeing a mold (retail) that would make those.


one time guy was making jigging rapala's.
I think he posted on face book,how to make them.
if you can find that put that here.

thanks snag


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## kingfisher72

I can post pictures if you want. What are you looking for?? The mold?? These baits are shaped differently than the rapala jigging raps and have a different (more) action. There are a million videos on youtube about mold-making. That's where I learned. Just make sure your mold is dry before pouring lead into it. The hair tails are fox squirrel and the plastic fins are made from drywall corner guard. You can cut it with heavy scissors and it is already bent to 90 degrees. The first few fins I did failed to stay glued. It wasn't the epoxy that failed, though. The paint between the lead and the fin twisted off allowing the fin to come loose. I started epoxying the fin to the bare lead and haven't had any fail since. The plastic breaks before the epoxy fails when trying to make it fail with pliers.


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## kingfisher72

I made another batch recently and took a picture of the mold as you asked.










Finished jig is 3/4 ounce...


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## kingfisher72

Finished a new batch tonight. These are one half ounce and have a size 4 hook.


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## HappySnag

kingfisher72 said:


> Finished a new batch tonight. These are one half ounce and have a size 4 hook.


they look beter and beter.


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## c. j. stone

Those are impressive. One thing, are you using aberdeen gold hooks(just to get the extra shaft length?) Any hooking/holding issues with those?(I can straighten a size 4 gold aberdeen hook with 8 lb test!) Maybe I'm off base?


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## kingfisher72

Thank you for the compliment. Those hooks are the gold aberdeens. I asked for a box of them for Christmas one year and my mom somehow order a case without realizing it yet claimed they cost the same as a box so I have a ton of them. When I started playing with the mold making and pouring I used these cheap hooks that I had on hand. I have not yet experienced them straightening out on a fish so I continued using them. The need to "horse" a walleye in quickly to the net while using the small hooks on the store brands goes away with these bigger hooks. I have not had any problems losing fish with the larger hooks. Usually if you poke them, they're landed. I'm using 10/2 braid and medium power rods. The fish here are generally in the 15-20" range with occasional bigger fish.


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## Snakecharmer

kingfisher72 said:


> Finished a new batch tonight. These are one half ounce and have a size 4 hook.


Those look great plus its always great when they catch fish besides! Great job!!!!!!


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## kingfisher72

Made a new body shape. Was looking more for a panfish/shad look...
















Started experimenting with foil...








Something already took a bite out of these!!


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## Many Eyes

Them look great!! I’ve toyed with the idea of making a rapala or my version but never got around to making them... great work.


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## silver shad

Nice work


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## joekacz

kingfisher72 said:


> Made a new body shape. Was looking more for a panfish/shad look...
> 
> View attachment 254450
> View attachment 254451
> 
> Started experimenting with foil...
> View attachment 254452
> 
> Something already took a bite out of these!!
> View attachment 254453


Sent you a PM


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## HamiltonKdog

like your way of thinking. How durable are the molds you make with the durhams water putty


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## kingfisher72

I haven't had any fail catastrophically yet from use. The flashing can get worse over time though. That's usually cleaned up with sanding sticks pretty easily. Most of my molds have at least 20 pours maybe? I have one that has maybe 50 pours. I have a couple body shapes that I'd like to do in RTV in the future but the durhams/putty style molds are nice for experimenting with body shapes and balance points. Just make absolutely sure they are dried and cured or the mold could be very dangerous. Use a face shield and cover exposed skin.


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## joekacz

What type of action do you get out of the ones w/o the plastic tail on them?Is there a vibration or swimming type of action?Which one do you prefer? Thank's in advance.


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## kingfisher72

Joekacz,

Most of the differences in action with the balance jigs comes from their body shape and the bait's balance point. The tail material is minimally important but at the same time does play a role. The squirrel tail baits dart a little slower and make a little smaller circle or arc, yet they have the same darting and circling action of a finned bait. The hair material offers some drag but not too much (Bucktail does not work well...it has too much drag. The bait hops up without darting out.). If pressed for a time when the hair tail might be best or have an advantage, they seem to work a little better in colder water and especially through the ice. The hair tails take less time to finish than the finned baits so it hurts less if they are lost/damaged. I can sit down and tie hair on a dozen finished baits in a short period of time. Finned baits take a few days between glue up and drying of top coats. All things being equal (body shape/weight/balance), a finned bait has a sharper dart and quicker circle back to center.

Which do I prefer?? That's a tough call. We fish heavy jigs here and fish them fast for the most part. What people are calling "bombing" lately. That's kinda the way people have always fished here on Chautauqua Lake and how I learned to fish walleye. My bait preference depends on what I'm trying to do. I have some 1.5 ounce thin but deep bodied shaped baits (shad shaped) that fish well as deep as 40 feet on a cast (horizontally), yet because of their body shape have a longer hang time than a cigar shaped bait weighing half as much does. The fish really seem to like that long hang time sometimes. Other times the fish seem to want more of a quick dart and plummet. Then I'm fishing a cigar shaped bait. A cigar shaped bait is a better choice most times when drifting in deeper water. A shad shaped bait needs too much line out to stay down due to its hang time. I prefer to cast these baits and fish them horizontally if at all possible so I usually start with a shad shaped bait.


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## joekacz

Thank's Kingfisher.Being a long time icer your pic's totally impressed me from start to finish.With the deep water there and even on Erie I see where those can be an advantage over most of the commercially ones made.It's funny that you mention Chautauqua,I'm suppose to fish it next Thurs.just to try something different,a bucket list thing.Thank's again for the explanation and good fishing to you.


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## TClark

*In case you ever wondered. Here's a jiggin rap that broke in half on me.*











Can you believe Rapala glues lead together?? What the hell, right?

Great job on those you're making kingfisher!!


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## HappySnag

TClark said:


> *In case you ever wondered. Here's a jiggin rap that broke in half on me.*
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> Can you believe Rapala glues lead together?? What the hell, right?
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> Great job on those you're making kingfisher!!


they do not work by hours,they work by piecework,there is no time to put the glue in.


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## kingfisher72

Poured some new jigs last night. We used my buddy’s set up and it was eye opening how well real clean lead at the right temperature flowed through the molds.

I’ve moved to the Albany, NY area for work since my last post. We fished a local lake with walleye a few times in October and the fishing was good. The fish we were finding were set up much deeper than I’d ever experienced back home. Some were coming out of as much as 50 fow. The 1.5 ounce shad shaped baits fished really well at that depth. Rigging a treble on a split ring attached to the top tie ring seemed to work much better than a belly rigged treble. The baits seemed to snag less and anecdotally fewer fish came loose on the way up.


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