Styrofoam mold box for diy swimbait silicone mold

I have tried a hundred ways of making silicone molds for handmade fishing lures. For testing a new swimbait shape it is helpful to make a quick “proof-of-concept” mold before wasting a bunch of expensive materials on production quality molds. Put simply- if you carve out a shape for a lure, you need to see how it acts before you put a ton of work into making copies. Molds that use a tiny amount of RTV silicone and up cycled materials are perfect for these down and dirty testers.

In this video I use a wire foam cutter and a chunk of dumpster dived styrofoam in addition to a hot glue gun and some scrap plastic. I used these thing to make a quickie mold box to hold the silicon rubber, in this case mold star 16. The swim bait shape was something I wanted to try for use with 8/0 owner beast hooks, which I have a bunch of. This molding method I used in this video took around 10 minutes and involved no clay, legos, or cussing.

I have tons of experience with plastisol lure pouring. I already know why the quick pours I did for this vid don’t have the most beautiful laminate separations. I knew these weren’t getting painted so I don’t care about bubbles or torch work etc. They will still slay fish if they are ugly testers. Having said all that, if anyone is into this stuff and wants to have constructive conversation about this hobby (obsession), by all means leave a comment.

Last thing I will say is if you are out there in YouTube land watching vids about, and making lures out of this near-napalm material…PLEASE do yourself a favor and wear some protective gear while you pour. I have had it on my foot in flip-flops, leak out of a mold and coat half my hand, etc. The shit is no joke. If it splashes in your eye, you lose that eye. Welding gloves are great, Ben Davis apron, eye protection, stand behind plywood chest high-whatever you have to do. Think “bomb squad”. Ok that’s the end of my “Dad Rant”

I put @er1_swimbaits to sleep for a while but you can find me at @ericross916

Video shot around 2021 idr