Thread: My little Australian Bass lures

Great looking lures James now get out there and see if they work

Not bad looking lures James.

Years back I had a mate named Till Martinello - who designed, manufactured & sold the range of popular "Tilsan Minnow" Barra Lures with timber bodies, made on a cnc pantograph router machine he designed and built himself. Later he designed / invented a cnc machine to paint the lures also... and then sold the whole operation to the Patrick brothers (Neil Patrick - aka Halco) here in Fremantle WA who make the plastic injection molded range and they now also make and sell the timber bodied Tilsan Minnows.

I explored the option of having my own range of lures manufactured (Plastic injection molding) initially in Singapore and then China, (long story).

The thing is for little bass your lures will be fine...BUT if a big ol Murray Cod swallows one it might be a different outcome.

You see the only connection between the hooks and line is via the plastic bib - which if it breaks in a big fishes gob - will result in loss of both the fish & the lure - something fishermen hate!

Another possible weakness in the connection via the bib is when casting among snags and rocks - if the lure hits a solid obstacle and falls into the water - the bib might break and again you've lost the lure and possibly a big fish if one happens to be in that honey hole and swallows it after it bounces off the obstacle back into the water.

From memory Tils Tilsan Lures - had a thin kerf saw slot running underneath the lure, in which was a crimped solid stainless trace wire - connected to the rings fittings holding the hooks, and the tow point in the bib - then the slot filled and painted over so you can't see the internal connection - attaching all the hardware to the main line via the tow point!.

With cotton thin GSP braids like Harro's Gel Spun Polyethylene "Bionic braid" able to have breaking strains up to and above 50 pounds - some freshwater anglers spool up their gear with heavy hitter braid just in case they get mobbed by a big green Aussie Murray Cod, and others fishing the tropics for barra etc do likewise in case of a hit from a massive GT, estuary or Qld potato cod etc.. i.e. they go in heavy gunned with surprisingly small lures - BUT they are armor plated inside with all this stainless crimped trace that connects everything so that the bib isn't a potential weak point.

If your lures work well (look like they MIGHT be mimicking a frog swimming) AND you can armor plate them for the occasional BIG mutha - then all you need do is get them into the hands of the TV fishing gurus (Imagine Harro landing a few New Guinea Back Bass on film, using your lures or Starlo flinging a few round Darwin harbor!) and the rest could be history.

That said the lures bidness is damn cut throat - the reason I never went into it in a big way all that time ago!
Just a suggestion for you.
Good luck with however it works out for you!

Edit - another suggestion - back when I was fishing/filming a bit with Starlo & Bushy, Kaj was working on a suspending lure for black bream and other estuary / freshwater species like trout & bass etc. His idea was that the lure not be positively buoyant nor negatively buoyant, but that it be ever so slightly, a tiniest fraction positive above neutral buoyancy - so that it could be made to "hover" in the strike zone of spooky fish, if they happened to give a lure a tap in territorial response rather than eat it. The idea was to annoy the fish defending its territory into having a second go, if the interloper didn't shoot thru at the first warning tap...in the hope of hooking it on the second go round.

Also - when winding the lure deep - if when you bump into timber structure - instead of it floating rapidly to the surface when you stop winding - you could leave it down there in the strike zone for a loooong pause - during which time it would rise up maybe 6 or 12 inches in the water column, just enough to go over the timber obstruction - when you commenced winding again.

I forget the name Bushy used on it, right now, and I know he messed with hooks and hardware split rings etc etc lots of testing to get it just how he wanted it weight / buoyancy wise until he was happy with it.... I forget who he sold the thing to - most likely Halco... but it was bloody effective in his hands... Starlo used to nick a few off Bushy occasionally coz they worked so well...

So - with this idea of inserting stainless wire to connect everything, you might use that weight as some of your internal ballast to try and achieve that magical neutral buoyancy ideal, i.e. kill 2 fish with 1 lure!

Gimme a hoi if you get them to the point they work well enough you want to send a few to Harro &/or Starlo et al & I will put you in touch.

Cheers!

Originally Posted by tdrumnut

Great looking lures James now get out there and see if they work

Have already caught a few on my earlier ones so hopefully the bass in the coming season likes these new ones.

Timless Timber - Thanks for the info mate, i'll take in what you've said and see how i go.
At the moment, the way i make them is just how i was taught.
And the freshwater areas that i fish (Sydney) mainly only hold Bass, so no Cod here. So i'm safe on that part for now.
I do plan on making a Cod lure (maybe) later, but with a alloy bib.

Thanks for the comments and advice guys.

Stunning looking lures there James...really well done ...MM