I am having trouble with my balsa square bills. They have lips made of Lexan, which delivers great action, but I have had issues with lips cracking and eventually breaking off. This has happened three times in the last three weeks.

 

What other materials can I use for lips that are not going to cost an arm and a leg?

go old school, aluminum

I usually use circuit board. It's not completely transparent like Lexan, however. What thickness are you using?

Saw somebody on another forum making square bills with carbon fiber.

Saw somebody on another forum making square bills with carbon fiber.

 

 

I saw that too

If your lips broke and were molded as part of the bait (as most are), they were plain plastic and not Lexan (aka polycarbonate).  Lexan is much tougher stuff than plastic.  I use 1/16" thick polycarbonate or 1/32" thick G10 Garolite circuit board on lures and have never had a lip break or crack in 15 years.  Of course, if your lure does have a molded-in lip, it can be tricky to remove the old lip and cut a slot for a new lip because you are probably cutting into the interior cavity of the crankbait.  Would I try it on a $15-25 bait?  Yeah, what do you have to lose.  On a $5 KVD?  Nope, more trouble than it's worth.

i use the circuit board material you can get it already shaped at lureparts.com and its cheap!

Sorry, didn't comprehend that we're talking balsa baits.  I just can't believe a Lexan lip on a balsa bait would not last longer than the bait itself!  BassAssassin85 has a good idea to check out some of the online parts stores that sell lips as part of their lure building inventory (lurepartsonline.com, Janns Netcraft).  Good luck with removing the old lips.  Often, you can work the old lips out of the bait with pliers.  If you have to cut them out and are left with over-size slots, I suggest using an epoxy putty log to install the new lips.  Completely fill the lip slot with putty and then carefully push in the new lip.  You have a minute or two to adjust the lip and wipe away the squeezed-out epoxy before it hardens.

any luck with your crankbait lips yet and what route have you taken?

Take a look at crankbait bills made from circuit board material.  The material is very durable and will hold up to banging into rocks and cover.  I use the circuit board bills from Jann’s Netcraft .  Their #005 works awesome for a square bill crankbait.  It is the perfect shape and size for a fat bodied crankbait.

 

Circuit Board Bills

Circuit board is not stronger than polycarbonate and for the life of me I cannot figure out how the OP is breaking lexan bills.

I've seen 1 cracked bill in all my yrs of building baits. The guy smacked the bait on the trolling motor when making a cast.

He hit so hard that he knocked some of the wood off the nose of the bait. Maybe the OP got acrylic material instead of lexan,

a mistake I've made in the past. That material is very week and breaks easy. Lurepartsonline has a very nice selection of bills

pressed from lexan.