Custom Made Crankbaits-Lures

[betursweetbass]

What is eveyone's opinion on these high dollar custom made baits available almost everywhere these days. I've tried some of the higher priced "hand made" lures with no real significant results. Seems my 4.00 minus one will produce more fish than the 18.00 "custom bait" I have used. Overall, it seems to me that the old classic or standard baits still outshine the purdy new fangled jobs....? Share your thoughts/experience's guys. Thank You.

PS....Try going in some of these 99cent stores and checking for fishing equipement, I found 4 Yosuri crankbaits in "dollar" store once, and I saw the same 4 crankbaits in a major sporting goods store for about $11.00 a piece.

[fishn'fool]

I don't get wraped up in high dollar lures. Alot of people think just because they are 18 or 20 $ they will catch fish. I only put about 30 percent of my time and knowledge into choosing baits, colors, sizes and the 70 percent thinking about current conditions and seasonal fish patterns. If you know fish and find fish on the water it doesn't matter if you have a 2 dollar lure or a 20 dollar lure... just my opinion.

[scrap]

like the late great vince lombardi said, "on any sunday". so it is with fishing.
i dont think one can compare the cost of the lure with its ability to catch a fish. it boils down to techique, and if there are any fish in the area. some people can catch a fish with just a hook, well me, i always have to take the bait monkey and his arsenal of tackle. my 2 cents.

[JB]

I've had the same experience with homemade crankbaits, they work and look fine, but aren't my favorites.. I still like rapala, bomber, poes.

[Fish On]

Many times those handmade lures catch more fishermen than fish.

[bassin_okie]

you guys should check out Stamina baits. All the components to build just about any bait you want, and way cheaper than most store bought

[WTL]

I remember hearing something once in a marketing class.

We were talking about prices, and the conversation got stuck on guitars. There was once a situation where this popular and well respected guitar company made these guitars and set the price at this low number...$400 or so dollars. Now conventional knowledge would say that this great guitar at a bargain would have sold very well. As it so happened however, it was priced so low that people thought it wasn't a very good guitar....and when they raised the price the next year to like $800 they sold more volume for a higher price. Now what was at play was people really didn't know the difference between what made a good guitar and a bad one, so they were relying on the price to indicate what was good. When they raised the price a bunch of people who didn't know better assumed it was a great guitar, when it was the same old thing that had gone the previous year for half as much.

The same exact principle is at play with Lucky Craft lures. Nobody really knows what makes a great lure for sure, but they see the inflated price so they assume the live pointers and sammys are better than lures which cost a third as much.

[crankybait]

yeah. cheaper is better or to a point, atleast

[va_basser]

I have a few of the custom handmade baits,hardly throw them for fear of losing them.On the other hand I have Poe's,Wiggle Warts and Bandits I'll throw anywhere.Losing a bait less than 5 bucks doesn't hurt nowhere near as much as losing a 15 buck plus bait.
And FishOn your right.They do catch more fishermen than fish.Coulda bought 12-13 baits for the price I paid for 4. They do look preety tho!!

[Fish2win]

most baits are made to catch fishermen not fish.Go take all the baits that you have consistantly caught fish on out of your tackle box/boxes and see how many are left that you never caught a fish on or that you never really used. You will find that 20 % of your baits or less catch all of your fish. I sat in a tackle shop and watched with great amusement just this last Wednesday. We all know that a rattle trap , hot spot or rattlin rap are at times deadly lures . They all cost about$5.00. We all also know that rattle trap has had a hot craw color(RED) for years and that it works. Well I watched maybe 10 guys come into the store ask for the new hot Lucky Strike rattling bait that was a hot red craw color. It may catch fish but a $18.00 a throw? I think the Trap would work just as well.Fish2win

[bassboogieman]

With so many manufacturers out there you can usually find what you need "off the rack". But by using a lure maker, you can have something made that you will never find on the rack in your favorite tackle shop. Sometimes that's just the edge you will need, throwing a bait the bass have not seen before. I use custom spinnerbaits because I can get skirt colors not available commercially and blade combinations that may not be common also. Take a look at HEAVYCOVER spinnerbaits. They are no more expensive than the off the rack spinnerbailt but you can select from over 300,000 combinations......... it will make you crazy, yes it will! Custom painted hard baits offer the same versitility, but you can spend a lot more money on custom painted vs. off the rack on hard baits. They are more labor intensive and need true artistic talent, so that's not economical enough for me. But the spinnerbairs....... worth it in my opinion.

[Fish2win]

The new rapala DT flat side coffin bill is exactly in every detail like a bait that was made here in east tennessee by a guy named Perry Shockley. He sold out to Bill Norman several years ago and Norman made an altered model of the bait for a couple of years. Shockley was not the only guy making them here but was the biggest and had progressed to haveing an assembley line.The Big O started out hand made/ home made at first. The two guys that developed it had half the guys at K25 in Oak Ridge Tennessee making those crankbaits so they could try to keep up with the local demand. They were using surplus computor boards for the diving bills.They sold out to the big boys and the rest is history. Fred Young is dead and got all the credit, his shy partner John Guttery is still alive and still makes the original Big Os the way they were then for a few select freinds.Fred took good care of John on the sale. That goes to show that sometimes the homemades can be really great. Fish2win

[lizardsrule]

I will say this about made cranks. They many times will run more erractic, which IMO is a plus at times. The different action, can often times come closer to resembling the action of a wounded fish, thereby eliciting strikes a standard "TUNED" crank won't neccessarily do. I actually like more of a erractic action at times.

Lizards