# Build and Finish



## BeachBob (Aug 27, 2010)

A few years back I started turning swimming plugs, rigging them up, sealing the wood and then turning it over to a professional airbrush artist. It was a fun adventure for a few years and we turned out some real beauties. There's a bunch involved and I learned a lot about plug design and plug tuning.


----------



## poppop1 (Feb 16, 2004)

Good looking plugs...


----------



## jahtez (Aug 29, 2021)

They look really nice. What are their retrieve characteristics... how do you fish them?


----------



## bassinman200 (11 mo ago)

BeachBob said:


> A few years back I started turning swimming plugs, rigging them up, sealing the wood and then turning it over to a professional airbrush artist. It was a fun adventure for a few years and we turned out some real beauties. There's a bunch involved and I learned a lot about plug design and plug tuning.


Nice! I turn and hand carve locally harvested cedar (juniper) for freshwater Bass topwater poppers, wobble baits, spooks, and diving plugs with aluminum, lexan, and circuit board lips. I do my own airbrushing, but not quite as intricate as you show here. I do make the eyes myself and they appear 3D when laid out with refracting prism tape and built up convexed with clear epoxy.


----------



## BeachBob (Aug 27, 2010)

I was mostly using New Zealand pine and some native NorEast cedar. After turning the plug, adding poured in lead ballast/balance weight and drilled for rigging, it gets vacuum sealed with sanding sealer before handing it off for airbrushing and an epoxy clear coat, then it's rigged with a stainless through wire, hooks, and diving lip. Each plug gets a swim to make sure the action and diving is tuned up right. Fun stuff ... a LOT of work for little profit (if any!), but quite satisfying when yer creation lands fishies.


----------



## Billg (9 mo ago)

Wow, great looking plugs! You should be proud!


----------



## Thorhammer (9 mo ago)

Bob, I never get tired of looking at those.


----------

