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Posts: 4266
| I painted a Brown Trout on a 15" Deepthreat blank by Kingfisher, and back then I said that I was going to go on a quest to find more wood that I could turn into lures with a minimum of paint. I found many varieties of wood that are going to be great lures, but they will all require the usual sealing/painting process. Only a few are going to be turned into lures with a minimum of effort. Exotics like Zebrawood and Lacewood will be made into gliders. One piece of Osage Orange is going to be Jailbird gliders, but I'll have to paint the black stripes, God took care of the rest.
The wood that turned out to be the best for gliders and even some crankbaits is Big Leaf Maple. Not as heavy as the usual maple that we use, but every bit as hard. The interesting charachteristic is that you get different kinds of features with the wood. Some have a striping on them that goes in the opposite direction of the grain, and some are figured, producing a "depth" to the figuring that makes the wood appear multi-leveled.
Here is a picture of a crankbait that has nothing on it but 2 eyes and the first coat of Envirotex. I have many glider bodies cut from this wood, none of them the same shape because I let the grain guide me when I cut the blanks. Now I have to seal and weight them and even add more to them if I choose, such as shades of color on the back and the face and maybe even some Kameleon scales.
Back when I painted the Brown Trout I told some guys what I was going to try to do, and back then I told them that I would call them "God's Gifts" because He's the one that created the pattern, I just found it and turned it into the lure that was hiding. Watch for more gliders in this Baby Muskie pattern as well as a variety of other gifts that I have to unwrap yet.
Anyway, here's the first of many.
Enjoy the natural beauty that God put in this wood for all of us.
Beaver
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 muskiefirst1.jpg (55KB - 79 downloads)
muskiefirst2.jpg (57KB - 76 downloads)
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Posts: 8
| Amazing
And GOD created you as well, giving you that special gift of extraordinary Talent for Craftsmanship, ingenuity and creativity.
You wont find a fine piece of art like your baits coming out of some plastic injection molding machine !!
God Bless
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Posts: 55
| wow!!! natural beauty, no make-up |
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Posts: 110
Location: WI | Beaver
Very beautiful figure on that piece!! I used to buy rough sawn maple from a guy until I ran out early last year. I decided to get a mill for my chainsaw and saw up my own. There is even a greater reward for me doing this. Anyway I have some slabs drying now with some nice burl, and curl that I will be doing the same as you, "very little paint". I have not found any bird's eye yet but I am keeping my hopes up. Here is one that I had laying around with just a black top and back with natural sides. The camera does'nt give the woods figure any justice, I can't imagine what your's looks like it person! Anyway here it is.
Chad
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DSC07999 (2).JPG (89KB - 77 downloads)
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Posts: 501
Location: Norway | Beautiful Beav! I was very inspired by your previous thread, with the trout, and it has made me look for cool textures/grains. But so far my sugar maple blanks hasnt turn out anything WOW'ish yet.
And after I started makin my own lures, Ive become a woodnerd, waving a fresh blank at my wife, 'smell that, look at that grain' etc etc.
I was also offered some Small-leaved lime (in the basswoodfamily) from a storm here, but I have no idea how to process the wood... But Ill prolly figure something out.
Michael |
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Posts: 1530
| excellent. some woods aresuperb in natural state |
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Posts: 4053
Location: Land of the Musky | Those look fantastic! Really like the natural look. |
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Posts: 67
| Very nice guys 
s54 |
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Posts: 462
Location: Antioch, IL | LOVE THE IDEA! LOVE THE LURE! Makes me want to see it in person. |
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Posts: 425
| those colors look great!!! |
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Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | beav, that is stunning! |
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Posts: 727
| Wow looks great, keep us posted. |
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Posts: 4266
| I finally got around to experimenting with some of the wood, though I must admit that my wood-working skills need quite a bit of improvement.
Anyway, here are some more of God's Gifts, except this time I applied 2 coats of Etex and could have stopped there, but I added some more to each lure. Even when I apply paint to the wood the stripes still show through, they just change colors. I can't show you what they really look like, because many of them have Kameleon scales that don't show up until they turn in the light.
The flat ones I did first, then the rounded ones, where I took a 1 3/8 square piece and routered 3/8 off of the bottom and 5/8 off each side on the top so it's almost rounded completely. The round ones have quite a bit of wobble on the "tap" and even more on the fall because I left so much flat area on the belly.
As with any attempt at something new, these are pretty generic, but a have a box full of round ones waiting to be routered, and some 3/4" thick blanks that are going to be big crank baits. Every pattern will be striped in some way, and that's just the way that God intended it when He created this wood. Of all the woods that I tried, this one blows the rest away, with Zebrawood coming in second. Zebrawood makes an awesome glider because in most cases all you need is hooks to make the blanks sink. Once Zebrawood is sealed and coated, the striped pattern still shows through, just like the Maple. I feel like I'm making the lures in reverse, because after weighting and balancing, I'm putting on 2 coats of Etex instead if dipping them in primer. "The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.", I guess it goes for lure making too.
Many more gifts from God as they are unwrapped.
Flat or rounded? Which do you prefer? It doesn't really seem to matter when you do a baby muskie pattern. I'll have to find out which the fish prefer when I head to Vermillion in June. Might be a good time to throw some Pike flavored gliders.
Beav
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Group of Gifts.jpg (82KB - 80 downloads)
Gifts.jpg (94KB - 70 downloads)
DSC_0139.JPG (91KB - 75 downloads)
Flat Muskies.jpg (94KB - 71 downloads)
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Posts: 351
| Those are superlative. You did an outstanding job of "less is more." |
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Posts: 434
Location: Omaha, Nebraska | Those look amazing as always. Gotta love the natural beauty of wood. |
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| words fail...very, very nice, Beav.
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Posts: 18
| Awesome baits and wel chosen name "Gods Gifts". You can see His hand in all things.
For those looking to find extraordinary wood species, go and try to find a guitarbuilder or luthier.
These builders often have some nice collections of wood. If they sell any it won't be cheap I guess, but you are most likely to find birds eye maple, nice cedar and beautifull exotic woods.
Grtz Paul
Holland |
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Posts: 4266
| I'll try to replace the group picture with other individual shots, I just couldn't find anywhere to shoot the group photo where they all looked good.
More,later.
Thanks,
Beav |
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Posts: 462
Location: Antioch, IL | Love the baits! Excellent work Beav. |
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Posts: 311
Location: Ontario | Those are aweome Beav. I'd bite 'em! |
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Posts: 727
| Lookin awesome Beaver. |
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Posts: 283
| Beav absolutley B-E-A-Utiful.
Outstanding job keep them coming |
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Posts: 27
Location: Calgary, Alberta | Nicely done as always Beav! You have inspired me to round up some "funky" wood & do something similar. As for your hint regarding maple needing weighting holes thereby disrupting the natural beauty of the wood, I was thinking about using a tapered cutting plug to make those holes. You would then need to sink the lead in far enough to then glue a thin plug of the same wood back into the hole. This wouldn't be a perfectly seemless repair but a lot closer than just lead & epoxy. Have you dabbled with that idea at all? |
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Posts: 27
Location: Calgary, Alberta | Chad, I am a big fan of your work as well. I am constantly impressed by the cleanliness & "flow" your lures seem to have, the first association that pops into my head when I see one is ... SPORTSCAR!!!  I have a couple project gliders made out of Canary Wood which is a kind of yellowish hardwood. They looked pretty chalky & bland after sanding but after a couple coats of clear "WoW!", they have a nice 3-D shimmer. Have you found any other woods besides the maples which had a nice grain to play with? |
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Posts: 4266
| Have some in different stages.
Zebrawood is very cool. Figured Makore, or is it Moabi has patches of gold and dark brown intertwined and looks like it will be a very nice walleye. I'm doing one for a guy that I know that is a Red-Headed Bumblebee done on Osage Orange. I also have some knotless Tennessee Red Cedar that comes in 2x2x12 blocks, and some are half white and half red, so you can make just about anything with a white belly.
Working on more Maple right now. Those group pictures really suck, the more that I look at them. You have to hold them in your hands to check them out. I'm going to do some Baby Tiger Muskies for a guy who I know who catches a few. |
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