Balsa poppers

[Jono Shales]

Hi Guys
There's been a bit of talk lately with regards to balsa vs foam poppers. Fishing with any kind of surface flies usually makes for great visual action - I love fishing with gurglers, sliders and poppers and, in my opinion the balsa ones work the best.

At the end of '95 I was in the transkei and fished with a chap from Durban (can't remember his name sorry). He gave me a balsa popper to try and as they say, the rest is history.

Today I make all my own flies, poppers included - here's how I do it.


Buy some balsa dowel - this was around R20


Cut it into sections that are slightly longer than the long-shank hook you intend using


Whittle the balsa dowel and start shaping the popper head with a blade


Sand it down to smoothen it off. This is where it takes a bit of practice, knowing what shape you want to achieve


The finished popper head - notice the flat bottom and slightly sloping face


Cut a groove on the underside to accomodate the hook


Tie a single stapler onto the back of your long-shank hook. This will be used to hold the balsa head in position for the next stage


Push the balsa head onto the stapler and align it so that it's well balanced. Allow enough space in the front for the eye so it's flush with the front face, and at the back so you have enough space to tie the tail on. You can sand down the head to fine tune it.

[Jono Shales]

Next, epoxy the whole underside and fill the groove with epoxy. I use devcon 5 minute clear epoxy.


I find making a bunch at the same time a lot less time consuming


Get some masking tape and cover the hooks, then space them apart and attach them onto a wire coat hanger with more tape. This makes them easy to spray with whatever colour you want to use. I chose white for these ones


Once they've dried and you've applied the right number of coats, you can peel the tape off to reveal clean hooks and a perfect white balsa popper, ready for you to tie the tail on. I chose chartreuse feathers and white bucktail for these ones, although my latest bunch have been black


As you can see, the popper head sits on top of the hook, maximising the gape of the hook. I find with foam poppers that the hook is pushed through the middle of the popper which immediately closes the gape of the hook.

Poppers also have a bad wrap with regards to hook-up rates so I've been experimenting with a tandem popper ... the stinger is a 4/0 Gamma SL12 - I use 4 strands of twisted 70lb single strand wire to hold the stinger in place, then tie the whole lot under the main hook. Superglue in place


Same process as above, except slightly larger head this time


The finished tandem popper


The popper sits slightly lower in the water which is really good as it means you can strip these things as hard as you want, and they will stay in the water and make a real commotion when stripped. I find foam poppers tend to stay too high in the water and when stripped fast, they tend to pop out the water


Hope this helps any budding popper fishermen out there.

Cheers
Jono

[dpammenter]

excellent post Jono! thanks very much

[Chris Shelton]

Get some masking tape and cover the hooks, then space them apart and attach them onto a wire coat hanger with more tape. This makes them easy to spray with whatever colour you want to use. I chose white for these ones


Once they've dried and you've applied the right number of coats, you can peel the tape off to reveal clean hooks and a perfect white balsa popper, ready for you to tie the tail on. [/IMG]

Thanks again for another brilliant post Jono. I hope you don't mind if I add to this?

Just a quick tip on paints. For a smooth and lustrous finish, I find that hobby dope (available at any hobby shop that sells radio controlled airoplanes) works the best. You simply paint it on in layers. The beauty of hobby dope is that and as it dries, it dissolves into itself, leaving behind no trace of brush streaks. I apply about 13 coats for a truly beautiful lustrous finish, and these coats are applied at 5 to 10 minute intervals. (Hobby dope is pretty quick drying). I keep three colours; white, yellow and black. The yellow and black are for the eyes. For nice round eyes, I find that the heads of a 6 inch and 4 inch nail do the trick. Simply dip the head of the 6 inch nail into the pot of yellow dope and let the excess drop off, then touch the sides of the popper in the position of the eyes. The round head of the nail leaves behind a beautiful round impression. After 5 minutes, repeat the process with the black, using the smaller 4 inch nail head, this time overlayering the black onto the yellow, and also off centred for a more realistic effect. Finally, the whole popper gets coated in clear hobby dope. The end result is a beautiful thing to behold, with a finish as good as any factory made lure (Rapalas included). I doubt if it fishes any better than any other, but it certainly provides a lot of satisfaction to the tyer, seeing a thing of beauty unfold before your very eyes.

[Jono Shales]

Howdy guys
Good idea about the hobby dope Chris, I haven't heard of that before.

With these ones, the heads were raw balsa and I had to give them 6 or 7 coats of white and then a couple of clear to get a good smooth effect. It's time consuming stuff, as I'm sure the hobby dope option is. Plus after a few casts of one and dinging it a few times, I also noticed that they bust pretty easily.

The heads of the big tandem ones however were coated entirely in epoxy. Immediately it makes them far more resilient to dings, plus the paint sticks to them much better.

It took 3 coats of black and they were all done. Black because that's all the fish needs to see - a dark sillhouette moving against the background of the sky.

Best regards
Jono

[dpammenter]

can you not use one or two coats of sanding sealer and then normal spray paint?

[ShaunF]

can you not use one or two coats of sanding sealer and then normal spray paint?

That would have been my suggestion. Should dramatically cut down on the number of paint coats required, but not when using hobby dope as per Chris.

Great post Jono and awesome pics !

[Jono Shales]

That's also a good idea, I dind't know there was such a thing as sanding sealer.

I do however find that covering the whole lot in epoxy addresses this. So much so that all my balsa poppers are now being made with full epoxy coatings. They take time but they work brilliantly.

[Methos]

Jono\Chris
Thanks for the info.

Where can one buy Balsa Dowels in SA ?

Will Builders Warehouse have it ?

Cheers

[dpammenter]

Jono\Chris
Thanks for the info.

Where can one buy Balsa Dowels in SA ?

Will Builders Warehouse have it ?

Cheers

no, i don't think they'll have it. you'll probably need to go to a hobby shop - and then you're still going to have to pay $$ for it. balsa isn't cheap anymore.

you might find that it'd work out cheaper buying 5mm thick sheets and sticking them together. also, don't get the super soft stuff. it's very brittle, and the chances are that even with a good coat of paint on it, it'll get smashed by a fish