# Grandma Can't Swim



## triton175 (Feb 21, 2006)

I took my newly made lures for a test swim today and discovered that my "Grandma" style lure will not swim. It rolls over the top of the water without diving at all. When I throw it out it sits in the water normally, but when I start to retrieve, it rolls.

The 2 solutions that come to mind are: 1) add weight, but I don't know where to add it, or how much. Or 2) the line tie needs to be on the nose and not on the lip. Any suggestions? It's kind of frustrating to get a lure to look OK, but then it won't work.

Brian


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## ThreeRiversEsox (Mar 27, 2008)

I make a very similar bait as you're making, and I would say that the position of the line tie is forcing it to roll. I've kept the line tie in the nose of the bait and haven't had any problems... Hope this helps you.


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## vc1111 (Apr 13, 2004)

You'll probably need to put the lip on the grinder or belt sander and shave it down so that it does not protrude more than about 1/8 of inch past the nose (when holding the lure level/horizonatally).

Grind it flat and then round the corners just a bit.

Then install a line tie (screw eye) under the lower portion of the nose and above the lip.

The minnow bait is a bit of an exception when it comes to lips. The lip cannot extend much past the nose of the bait when the lip is installed on the belly of the bait. It appears as though yours was installed in the proper place, but was simply too long and creates too much drag...which causes the bait to want to flip over face first or just roll out of control.

I know thats bad news, Brian, but we've all been there. The lip installation is a critical component in building and on minnow baits the installation has little latitude when installed on the belly behing the gill area.

The good news is that the bait can probably be rectified and will live happily ever after.


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## goolies (Jun 28, 2007)

I had some of my lures dart to the left or right, roll on their side, and rise to the surface. I posted this in the tips thread and it may help if cutting back the size of the lip doesn't fix the problem. It worked for me but my line ties were on the nose and not the lip. Good luck.



goolies said:


> Not sure how many know this so I thought I would post it. When water testing a lipped crank bait if it shoots left or right and rises to the surface it could mean the lip is positioned incorrectly. If the bait goes left the lip is positioned to far to the right and vice-versa. If you have already epoxied in the lip you can't move it, but you can remove material from the opposite side of the lip. If the lure goes to the left, remove material from the right side of the lip and vice versa. For my polycarbonate lips I use a dremel with a small grinding stone. Remove a small amount of material and test the lure. If needed remove more.


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## TIGGER (Jan 17, 2006)

Brian I have been there my friend. Ask Vince. I made a batch of 6 cranks for my first ones. I never took them out and tested them. I finished them the whole way and took them to the water. The same thing happened to me. I was able to salvage the baits with some modifications. On a couple I snuck a line tie under the nose and just left the old line tie in the lip. The others I modified the lip like Vince said. Grinding the lip
They may be great twitch baits for shallow muskies on weeds and humps. I did that to some that I couldn't straighten out for trollers. A deadly bait on the those shallow water hunters


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## triton175 (Feb 21, 2006)

Thanks for the advice guys. I'll make the changes and see how she swims. I want to make sure that I have it right before I make too many more of the same size.
Also, I'll have to get some lips that don't have line ties in them. I'm using pre-fab lips for now since I don't have a saw to cut lexan.
Goolies - I'm glad you re-posted that. I had read it before, but forgotten about it.
Tigger - That was my first thought, if it won't swim it could be a jerk/twitch bait.

Brian


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## triton175 (Feb 21, 2006)

OK - I trimmed the lip and added the line tie to the nose. She swam better, but not well. Then I noticed, on the lure that I was copying, that there was a rattling weight toward the front of it. So I thought that adding weight would solve the problem.
After much experimentation, I found that replacing the forward trebble with 1/4 oz of weight solved the problem and the bait swam perfectly. So I know that I need to add 1/4 oz to the forward part of the bait. The question is, How? I don't have the equipment for melting lead, but I figured that you guys would know of a solution.
I'll try to salvage this bait if I can, but in the future with this type of bait I think that I should put the weight in after shaping the wood. What do you guys think?

Brian


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