Making some clear fishing poppers

[Arron]

Hi. Summer's coming, so I want to make some small poppers for fishing for whiting in the local creek (poppers are floating lures which are dragged noisily across the surface). Apparently the transparent ones work best because they look like prawns skipping across the surface. Size would be about 40mm long by 20mm wide - or perhaps 15mm. Single treble out the back. I want to turn the bodies on my lathe. Any idea what I can use - some type of clear plastic cylinder would be good.

Anyone else made these things and care to share your experiences ?

If I cant make them transparent, I'll just do them out of timber and paint them white. I suspect colour doesnt really make much difference, but I do want to go with the herd and try transparent first if possible.

cheers
Arron

[Scott]

You could use solid, clear, acrylic rod then bore/turn to your required dimensions.

Get the rod from here:

E-Plas Engineered & Industrial Plastics - Home (http://www.eplas.com.au/)

[Scott]

...cast from polyester resin. Lots of tutorials here on casting :)

[dabbler]

Wot Scott said.
If you go the acrylic rod route, find a place that sell off-cuts.

If you decide to try casting, you could probably get away with cheaper resins if perfectly crystal clear is not a pre-req. You can get translucent dyes too but it might start adding up the $. Maybe cast fittings in-situ. Don't forget shelf life.

Turn a precast acrylic, cast then turn or turn a woodie, mould it, then cast. Your choice.

Check the pen forums for casting tips.

[Arron]

Yes, I hadnt thought about casting. Now it seems to be the best idea. I have some casting resin already and I guess I should use it before it goes off. I'll follow this up in the casting forum as there are more questions now.
cheers
Arron

[soundman]

Poppers are easy to turn......I have to dig up one I turned.

I would not bother casting if it was just clear acrillic....rod or offcuts of heavy sheet would be far cheaper.

The issue is going to be weight and flotation......solid acrillic will sink like a stone...but hell it will cast like a bullet.
Maybe, a change in the idea of a popper and how to work them could be made to accound for the sink rate.

I've been having some similar thaughts....the other thing to look at is pen blanks.....some of the translucent & perhaps perlescent whites would work realy well.

The other thing to think about is cutting the blank in half, boreing a chamber in bothe halfs, doing fitted join and then continuing...hell if ya had a chamber you could stick a bearing or two in there for some rattle.

Then ya start lloking at opther options, like working in foamed or low density plasics like foamed PVC and overcoating in eopxy.

NOW...some thing you might want to know.
The wire to use is unfluxed stanless TIG filler rod..cheap as chips at ya local welding shop.
If working in wood, weighting the back of the popper with a sinker works well.....bore the blank out and stuff a sinker of choice upp the hole with epoxy....this adds weight for casting and makes the popper sit bum down in the water...it will then come up and break the surface on each pop, the sit bum down again for popping retreeves.
For burning retreves or walking the dog it tends to keep the bum down in the water and the popper tends to break out less..shape permitting of course.

The softer lighter woods work best..durian if you can get it, cedar of course, meranti and so foth.

cheers

[Arron]

thanks Soundman, lots of information there as usual.
Actually, I'd like the poppers to be on the heavy side. I fish from the shore and the creek is quite wide with the fish-holding flats being more towards the middle. I've bought a couple of clear poppers from the local tackle shop but I cant cast them far enough as they are quite lightweight.

Any ideas where I can buy acrylic rod anyone. I know there are a few plastics wholesalers in the Western Subs but not easy to get to for me.

cheers
Arron

[dabbler]

Some good info there soundman.

Arron, any decent plastics fabricator should have acrylic rod and sheets for sale. Probably easiest to Google using your location so you find one convenient to home or work.

Might pay to ring first. Of the three places nearest me, only one (the largest) sells off-cuts and "mistakes" otherwise 2m rod is the smallest buy, They still price the rod offcuts per metre but they tend to be generous with measurements and rounding.

[soundman]

If a plasics supplier is hard to get to, have a look at acrillic pen blanks.

There is a pearlescent white with black swirl that would go well, then start looking at the colours.......plenty of sparkle and flash in the pearlescent and glittery blanks....would make some of the commercial lures look positivly dull.

The other thing to look at is acrilic and other plastic objects, you can find good sized lumps of plastic in all sorts of places.

Vic McCrystal is famous for his poppers and fizzers made from suringes..that goes back to the 70's.

I can remember some one making lures out of tooth brushes, and there is heaps of cheap plastic tat in the supermarkets and cheap shops, with big lumps of acrillic in it.

cheers