Building metal lipped plugs

[Stripercoast1]

This is gonna be a long one folks. All I ask, is hold your comments until the thread is finished, to keep continuity. Youll know its done when I post the finished product picture, and Ive got a couple of real good ones for that.
Metal lip plugs are, for most new builders, a confusing undertaking. What kind of wood? Shape? Lip? weighting? Its really not that hard, you just need to get some of the clutter cleared out when you start the first one. Hopefully this thread will help you find your starting point.
Start out with something fairly simple. A cigar shaped plug is one of the best shapes to turn, and also catches fish. Wood really doesnt matter, cut a piece of clear 2X4 into a 1 1/2 by 1 1/2 inch blank 7 inches long. The plugs in this thread are made from Cypress, AYC, and Doug Fir.
1) Turn the blank round
2) rough shape the body
3) finish shape the body and sand
These 3 steps are the easy part. The plug in the lathe is going to be a fat head. One of my favorites and I make 4 differant sizes.

[Stripercoast1]

Setting up the body starts with through drilling, drilling the eye position, and boring the eye socket.

[Stripercoast1]

Next bore the swivel hole deep enough to catch the swivel with your through wire. I drill about an 1/8 of an inch deeper than the trough wire bore. Check this by running a wire into the plug and inspecting.

[Stripercoast1]

Heres where you can determine one of the aspects of action.
Weighting. Think of the weight as a pivot point. Where you place the weight, and the amount of weight will give the plug its side to side action. The amount of weight will also affect the depth the plug will go. Placement comes into play as well, and I will try to be as clear as possible on that.
Center body placement will give you the most side to side action. Too far back and it will kill the action altogether.
I usually place no further back than just behind the swivel bore. If I were making a sinking plug I would weight here as well.
Just forward of the swivel hole will tighten up the action, by adjusting the amount of weight will also make the plug dive a little deeper.
Chin weighting will tighten the action enough to not only dive deeper, but give the plug a good fast action retrieve as well. Good blitz plug. This picture shows 3 similar plugs with these 3 locations bored.

[Stripercoast1]

Lip placement, and lip selection.
Forget everything anyone has told you, size of the plug means nothing in relationship to the size of the lip. The size of the lip will affect the action of the plug. A large plug with a small lip and light belly weight will have a tight swimming action for fast near surface retrieves, a small plug with a large lip and heavy belly weight will have a drastic side to side action for deep slow retrieves. By experimenting, you will catch on fast and understand these relationships.
1) Select the lip
2) mark the location
3) Cut the slot
4,5,6) try differant sizes. All these choices will affect the plugs action. Try one, then build another and use a differant lip, and so on.
To test a plugs action, fully rig the sealed unpainted plug, without any weight. bring several differanant sizes of split shot. Tape them in place and test cast/swim.

[Stripercoast1]

All the rigging is now done. Seal it. I use a 50-50 mix of spar varnish and denatured alchohol. It penetrates completely and Ive yet to have a plug split from taking in water. I soak for about an hour for most woods. A full 24 hours will ensure a complete penetrating soaking. I then hang them for 1 or 2 days to dry. A quick sanding with an 80 grit cleans the excess up nice for priming.
At this point I put my belly weight in the bore. I use split shot, its cheap, and I dont have to worry about perfecting the size of the bore for the weight. I fill the hole with an exterior grade wood filler let dry and sand smooth.

[Stripercoast1]

My next step would be priming and painting. I use acrylics through an airbrush. My primer is acrylic Gesso. Maybe another thread another time?
Ill go over rigging now.
1) place the lip in the slot
2) Start the through wire in the hole
3) place the swivel in the hole and continue to push the through wire to catch the swivel in place.
4) when the wire completes its journey through the plug
5) slide the tail grommet onto the wire and into the plug

[Stripercoast1]

One of the most confusing aspects of finishing the job is the tail wrap for some reason. It aint that hard if you have a vise. I put an old drill bit in the vise and its an easy process.
1) bend the through wire straight up in line with the top of the plug
2) place the bend against the drill bit and with vise grips, wrap the wire around the bit, back over the wire.
3) continue wrapping the wire around itself back toward the plug, until all the slack is taken out of the wire
Clip it as close to the plaug body as you can.

[Stripercoast1]

Now where was I going next......

[Stripercoast1]

Oh yeah, finished product........

[Stripercoast1]

Any questions?

[speedy]

yeah dont you work looks like your having to much fun not fair
great job bro

[strikezone31]

Wow great tutorial, thanks for posting that!

[Doublerunner]

Now where was I going next......
Attached Thumbnails





LMAO

[surfwalker]

Thanks for posting that, was enjoyable.

Happy Trails

[surfstix1963]

Nice work Stripercoast great tutorial you answered alot of ?'s on the weighting of swimmers and the different size lips which is the most important feature of building getting it to swim correct.Thanks Again

[DarkSkies]

Great tutorial and details Ed, thanks for sharing with us.

[jigfreak]

Any questions?

Great way to end a thread.
Cool.

[madcaster]

Thanks for sharing that .Just what I was looking for .I want to try to make one.

[JustEd]

Feel free to PM me if you have any questions on any issues not covered in the thread.
Oh Yeah...................... I used to be "Stripercoast"