Laminate Horrors

[Underdog]

Hi Every one,

I am looking for some help....

I've been shooting laminates for a little while now. It seems that every color I shoot with equal amounts of color in it, with no pearl or highlight, I can shoot fine. However, once I venture into shooting laminates with one side having pearl or one side having highlight in it - it turns into one swirled mess! I am using the MF medium plastic and the bass tackle dual injector.

For example: my Carolina Bullfrog color, the brownish part of the bait has several colors in it. The greenish part has a few colors and a lot of pearl powder. The green is overlapping more into the brown. Does this mean I need to lower the heat in the brown, or vice-versa? Or is it something to do with the pearl or highlight? My temps are within 10-degrees. I've tried shooting them from 295-degrees, to 340-degrees.

Also, where do we draw the line on selling laminates - do they have to be 100% perfect? If they're a little flawed (color overlapping) are they still worthy of selling?

Any feedback anyone can share (hint, hint: Jim, Jason and Frank - help!) is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Shawn

[ghostbaits]

Shawn:

Same issue here. I actually brought this up with Jason last week. I was sure it was a temperature difference issue however I believe it is more complex. You will notice that any color with a pearl or highlight in it gets "tougher" than a "plain" color in the final bait. The pearl/highlight colors definitely cause a viscosity issue. I believe they bond with the resins.

Anyway, I had some success doing as you suggested. Lowered the temp in my "darker" plastic but keeping the temp higher in the "pearled" plastic. Still am getting mixed results but NOT swirled results!!! LOL!!!

Experimentation is all I can tell you for now as I have shot hundreds of baits this way and when I get a full mold, the next one is slightly off. Once I get the temps dialed in, I will know for that color but it seems to change with the colors slightly.

On sales, I go with whatever the customers go with. If they will buy them, sell them. Always can use them as samples or give-a-ways!

Let me know if you make any headway or have a brainstorm.

Jim

[Jason]

Jim nailed it.  It's all about viscosity.  If one is thicker / harder than the other they are not going to inject evenly.  Unfortunately it is a trial and error process.  We've also had the same problem trying to inject baits with a pearl belly.  Finally got a good injection down, but rather than going cool on the solid color we went hot on the pearl.  Probably a better idea to go cool.   

When in doubt, get a bigger hammer! 

[ghostbaits]

Did more playing last night between the piles of orders and found that white pearl differs from a peral with color as well. Very difficult to judge this so I am focusing on the viscosity of the plastic when I stir it vs the temp now.

You can see when the pearl colors get thin and then it is time to inject. Seems the human eye is a better judge than the thermometer in this case.

I was able to shoot several molds (4 baits each) with near perfect baits every time. I think this is just like other things learned along the way. A few more times and it will be routine to know the viscosity.

I knew hand pouring those dumb sticks by hand would give me expereince for something down the road! Still hated every minute of that!!!! 

Jim

[Underdog]

Thank you very much, Jim. I will try this method out.

Just for kicks last night, I went to Dick's Sporting Goods to check out the baits for sale from the big companies, (Zoom, Powerbait, ect) I happened to noitce that their laminates with pearl or highlight were a bit of a mess. Zoom's red shad laminate looks to have a ton of red highlight in it. I took the worms out of the bag and the laminates were far from perfect. Looks like the big boys run into this problem as well. I found that interesting.

Again, thanks for your feedback!

p.s. Jason Im busting out the ten pounder lol

[ghostbaits]

I think we are far more particular because we handle each bait. When they inject thousands at a time, not so much!!!!!

I can live with a little overun or mixing as every bait fish (or prey) is not perfect and many times the predator will actually look for the (or see easier) the imperfect prey in a group.

I marked a 12+ yesterday evening on a bed. Hope to get back before someone else does! Will be drop shotting a Wutz-It in her face!!!!

Jim

[Jason]

I think we are far more particular because we handle each bait. When they inject thousands at a time, not so much!!!!!

I can live with a little overun or mixing as every bait fish (or prey) is not perfect and many times the predator will actually look for the (or see easier) the imperfect prey in a group.

I marked a 12+ yesterday evening on a bed. Hope to get back before someone else does! Will be drop shotting a Wutz-It in her face!!!!

Jim

GOOD LUCK JIM!!!   

[Underdog]

Holy smokes Jim!!!!! Bring the camera.

[MO QWACK]

you cant go wrong with divider plates    that is if you want a straight down the middle bait but yea it is tuff to get any other perfect. I waste a ton of plastic but I cant stand it if its not right

[ghostbaits]

Update... I have limited the issue to only plastic with pearl white in the bait in my shop. When I use the darker hilites or pearls, I have no issues at all. Even if I make a pearl chartreuse, I get the issue so I am again starting to attribute this to a temp & viscosity issue.

The darker pearl/hilite colors get plenty hot and I shot plenty last night (500+) with no issues at all regarding swirling.

I think I have a solution that I will be testing this week. If it works, I'll let you all know. Nothing along the lines of rocket science. A simple replacement of sorts.

Jim

PS  The BIG girl was gone!!!! My guess is she spawned and rolled out. We did catch a few 3-4lbers on the Slash Shad and a swimbait but nothing in the 10+. Darn!!!!

[ghostbaits]

OK so I used M-F pearlescent as a replacement for the white pearl powder. If you add a drop of white, you can get a real close color. With that change and a thought to shoot the baits at a cooler temp (312-318), my single mold baits give me no swirling at all. The mult-cavity baits are another story still. The 2 outside baits still do not come out that good but the inside baits are almost perfect. Only happens with white pearl colors though.

I can live with how they are now as they are pretty darn close to perfect.

Hope any of this info helps.....

Jim

[Underdog]

Wow Jim!!! This is great info, I can't thank you enough for all your help. Are you still using the bass tackle system with all your lams? I find I get the best results with it, but not the fasted.

[ghostbaits]

Hope this may help in some way. I still use the basstackle blending block and can crank the laminates out pretty fast.

Jim