BobP

The best bang for the buck is to buy an inexpensive tool compressor, add a moisture trap and a pressure control/gauge if needed. It's good to have at least 30 lbs of SUSTAINED pressure available. Airbrush compressors are smaller and typically have a sustained pressure that is 15 lbs less than their advertised pressure, which is the MAX pressure. So if you buy a Chinese compressor that says "35 psi", the pressure will be down at around 20 psi a second after you hit the trigger on your airbrush.

I mix the D2T for 2-3 bass baits, then take my 1/4" wide artist's brush, dip it in DA, and shake a few drops into the mix. Stir it in, add a little more if needed until thin enough. It will make the D2T more brushable, extend the brush time by a minute or two, and help it expel any bubbles - but will still cure to touch in about 5 hrs on a lure rotator.

If your lure suspends in cold water, it will sink in warmer water. So getting a true suspending bait usually has to be accomplished on the water, that day. If I were modifying baits to suspend in general, I'd get them to the point of a slow rise in cold water, then you can doctor them to truly suspend when you get them on the water.

Mine is a clone of the Cabelas Real Image 3/4 oz spoon in glow white sold by lurepartsonline.com, and hand painted with glow-in-the-dark white/green paint with an added flashaboo dressed treble.

I got a Carbonlite ML spinning rod a few years ago and think the action was pretty ho-hum compared to the Shimano Crucial dropshot rods I now use. One defect on the Carbonlite was the hook hanger, which was made from non-stainless wire and rusted out immediately. I assume BPs corrected this in later editions of the rod, but niggling little things like that turn me off.

I tried E Glass, then S Glass, then went back to a M action graphite. The E Glass was too heavy and the S Glass was not different enough from a M action graphite to get exited about. I have better feel of what the crank is doing with graphite and I can cast more accurately with it too. Casting a glass rod is different because they load so slowly. Other guys love glass, so it boils down to what is important to you and how comfortable you are using one. To your other question, yes, the rod, the line, your reel, and even your fishing playing style all effect how often fish come unbuttoned. The combined action of Mono on a graphite rod might be very close to a glass rod with fluoro, or even softer than a glass rod with braid. It just depends on the specifics. All you can do is try one to see if it's a fit. Personally, I wouldn't buy one until I got a chance to fish with one.

Well, the absolute cheapest is to take a 50% off coupon from Michaels or Hobby Lobby and buy a single action Badger airbrush that comes with a can of compressed air for around $15. Air from the can shoots over a venturi nozzle connected to a little tube that sticks down in the attached paint jar. Single action means the trigger controls only the amount of air being shot. You control the amount of paint shot by screwing the venturi nozzle in or out of the air stream. You can use this setup to shoot cheap hobby paints thinned with water. Pretty crude but you did say "cheapest". If you want something a little more user-friendly, buy a cheap double action airbrush and attach it to a compressor (a tool compressor is fine). Double action means the trigger controls both the amount of air and the amount of paint being shot. Push down for more air, pull back for more paint. Like JeziHogg says, the Iwata Neo is a good candidate. You might find a good used airbrush somewhere too.

Yellow Rocket Fuel oil for spool bearings, Reel Butter oil for other bearings and levelwind, Shimano ACE-2 Drag Grease for drag, Superlube PTFE grease for everything else. There are lots of spool bearing oils, differing in viscosity. Very low viscosity oils need to be replenished more often but they make the bearings spin faster, so it's player's choice depending on what you and your reel can handle, speed-wise. I especially like the Superlube grease, which you can buy at NAPA, 8 oz for less than $10 (a lifetime supply for reels!). It is a white grease fortified with PTFE (Teflon) and will never gum up or discolor inside a reel.

Not big swimbaits but I like to use a hollow belly swimbait on a 3/4 oz jighead as a search bait. You can fish it at any depth and use any retrieve, so it's very versatile.

If you soak a bearing in acetone (I use ether based starting fluid) and spin the bearing on a pencil point when wet, it will spin the longest because the fluid acts as a very low viscosity lube. Set the bearing aside and when dry, it will not spin as long. Apply a drop of bearing oil and you're ready to go.

I prefer regular gauge hooks because they have better penetration than heavy wire trebles. I'm also concerned that the weight of heavy wire trebles will affect the action of a crankbait too much, especially if you are changing out to a larger treble. That said, if I had them, I'd try them and see how they work on the particular baits you have.

The KVD's are fine but I really prefer Gamakatsu, which is my "default standard" nowadays. They have outstanding sharpness and tempering that keeps them sharp much longer than other brands I've tried - and Gamakatsu also sells short shank trebles now. If stocking up for factory hook trade-outs, you need to decide whether you want to up-size most times or not. If you do, short shank hooks allow you to do that and #4 and #2's will be the sizes you need most often. I don't see the need to change out split rings but you'll need replacements eventually and the #2 size is the one used most often. Do yourself a favor and buy a good pair of split ring pliers like the Texas Tackle brand.

A majority of crankbait painters use acrylic latex paint such as Createx, shot with an airbrush. A few use solvent based lacquers. The trick is to topcoat the paint with a durable product that is compatible with the paint you use. Epoxy, moisture cured urethanes, auto urethanes, UV cured polyesters, etc are all candidates.

The lightest strongest containers I've seen are the gray HVAC tubes. Heavy cardboard or PVC is considerably more expensive.

I've changed out or cleaned/lubed bearings hundreds of times over the years. Like Francho, I say keep using stock bearings (clean and lubed) if they are not fried - unless you just can't stand the impulse to hotrod your reel. If you're a red blooded boy, it's almost irresistible to want to tinker with your reel. Yes, it's fun but it's usually irrational from a purely functional standpoint. You'd think from the free-spooling demos that a set of new bearings would cast 10 times farther than the stock bearings in your reel. They won't, of course. Nor would you want them to. And all that slick free spooling might just cause you problems if you aren't ready to control it or if the breaking system in your reel isn't up to the task. We're all reel aficionados but not everyone can take the fastest/slickest reel and use it all day with nary a backlash. Personally, I do better with a standard reel that is properly serviced so I can consistently cast lures where I want them to go without any drama. If my ABEC 99 bearings lubed with whale spit can cast a lure 5-10 ft farther, I can get the same effect by just holding my foot on the power button of my trolling motor for an extra second. Just sayin... Then again, the $8 price on those Hawgtech ceramic hybrid bearings is KILLER!

WRB is right about leaving original warts in their package if all you plan to do with them is resell them. It's the only way collectors want them because the model number on the package guarantees they are the original wart and not one of several later models. If you are going to repaint and fish them, I think the most popular color is ghost crawfish.

Shimano Crucial 6'8" Medium power dropshot rod, Shimano Biomaster 2500, any brand 6 or 8 lb fluoro. The Crucial is a true dropshot design with a hinged action (med power shank with light power fast action 18" tip) - perfect for the presentation and will handle 5+ lb bass.

I got a Biomaster 2500 3-4 years ago and was surprised that it was the same size as a 2000 size U.S. Shimano. Very nice reel and smooth as butter, I've been happy using it for dropshotting with 6-8 lb fluoro and have never felt the need for a larger reel.

I don't know why but I get more bites with the bags of Gulp minnows than with the bucket variety. You wouldn't think there'd be a difference (and the bucket minnows do have fewer deformities) - but that's what I've experienced over the last 3 yrs. I use the 3" minnows quite often for dropshotting.

I got a roll of FRISKET (stencil making material) from Dixie Art.com. One roll will last for years. It's a thin translucent plastic film with a peel-off adhesive backing. One "trick" I've learned - after you draw your design on the backing paper, cut out the design with an X-acto knife. When you're ready to paint, don't peel the backing off and stick it on the lure because the adhesive will tend to pull the paint off the lure's surface when you remove it. Instead, just hold the stencil on the side of the lure and shoot the design. Then dry the over-spray on the stencil with a hair dryer, flip it over and it's ready to do the other side of the bait. Benefits - you can use the stencil again and again on other baits, plus you don't have to draw/cut 2 stencils for each bait.

I use an airbrush with a .3mm tip and shoot at 15-30 psi, and don't do much thinning. Createx sells 4011 reducer to be used with their paints but says you can just use water, and that works OK most times. There are various home brew reducers you can try. Check out You Tube. Rather than custom mixing paint, I like to use a mix of airbrush paint from different companies including taxidermy paints like Smith Wildlife. Taxidermy paint tends to come already reduced. I also prefer layering transparent (I think the term should be "translucent" vs "transparent" but Createx uses the latter term) paints over one another when looking for lifelike effects. Most of the basic Createx paints come in both opaque and transparent versions. Spray it lightly for effects, heavier for solid color. For glitter, I prefer the cheapo glitter suspended in a clear acrylic from a hobby shop - I squirt a little in a shot glass, add water, then paint it on the lure with a brush. That allows me to put glitter where I want it, in the amount I want, and not on areas I don't want. But it's larger glitter and will not shoot through an airbrush. As far as white color base coats, anything white will work - but a heavily pigmented white will do it faster and without multiple coats. However, if all you're painting is blank plastic lures, the Createx white should do fine. I paint wood lures and do repaints over existing finishes, where hiding the substrate is at a premium. You're lucky to have access to a pro auto paint shop. A two part catalyzed auto clear with high solids is an excellent clearcoat. Other options may drive you crazy until you get their particular procedures down pat. If I had paint shop access, auto clear would be the ONLY thing I'd use.

Drag grease is different from regular grease and drags will stay smooth much longer if you use it instead of other types of grease. Cal's, Shimano ACE-2 Drag Grease, Penn Muscle Grease are all good drag greases. I use the Shimano, which is a thick, sticky cosmoline based drag grease. To clean the drag disks, whatever type, soak them in some naphtha and then apply the grease sparingly. When I used regular Teflon based grease (which I otherwise love on other reel parts) on fiber drag washers, it would last about 2 months before the drag became jerky. With the dedicated drag grease, I can last a whole year or until I do a complete tear-down, cleaning, and re-lube.

Big bass have harder mouths and require harder hooksets and sharp hooks to penetrate. Even pros using flipping sticks get flummoxed by that sometimes. When you set the hook, you usually don't know the size of the bass on the other end of the line so I think a sharper hook is more important because a giant hookset can tear the thinner membranes in the mouth of a small or medium size bass and then come out on a head shake. I wouldn't expect a whippy rod to apply enough force to penetrate the roof of a big bass's mouth. And it also sounds like your flexible rod may be causing extended fights when a big bass is hooked. Give a big bass too much time to fight and it will eventually find a way to beat you. Long fights also exhaust bass and cause increased mortality. I can't conceive of a fight with any size bass taking more than about 30 seconds, with the right equipment.

Createx is the most popular acrylic latex and yes, you can spray it over/under Wicked. Opaque = Solid. I use a heavily pigmented white acrylic latex for color basecoating. My favorite is Superhide White by Polytranspar but most paint companies sell something similar. There are 3 popular topcoats: 30 minute epoxies like Devcon Two Ton, moisture cured urethanes like Dick Nite S81, and two part catalyzed automotive clear coats. If you use 2 part auto clearcoat, observe proper safety precautions - the catalyst is poisonous and you DON'T WANT TO BREATHE IT. Wear a organic solvent rated mask and use adequate ventilation. Some guys try spray can clearcoats - including some advertised for autos. They don't work well because they just aren't tough enough for a crankbait. Lately, some have begun testing UV cured polyester resins and solvent based concrete sealers as clearcoats. The jury's still out on them.

Wait a minute - you aren't planning to whack off a limb and start carving are you? Better let it dry for months before using it because the moisture content will be way too high. Personally, I like working with kiln dried basswood because it sands beautifully and has negligible grain effects. But for a lure intended for toothy critters, white cedar might be even better since it will resist water absorption better when the finish gets punctured.