I picked up some various spinner parts and am attempting to put some together for winter steelies. I have the Jed Davis book and am following his instructions. I did however wonder about hooks. Jed says that he doesn't like to use Siawash single hooks. I have heard however that they will lead to losing less spinners. Anyone lean toward trebles or single points.
1)Does anyone have prefs on weights. I found some 1/4 and 1/5 bodies and I got some #5 blades. Will the two work together properly?
2)Also color is another factor. I picked up both nickel and brass as well as some pink colored tape.
I thought I would give spinner making a try. I enjoy making my own lures, but I never flyfish enough to use the flies I tie. I am "hooked" on spinner fishing since I caught my first summer steely this August ( a whopper too! ) on a #4 brass vibrax, and several other fish on various blue fox spinners.

Get ahold of the folks at Zigzag lures, (use a search engine to find the website or look for the ad in STS), they can give you some good advice/opinion on the subject plus they have awsome components. I have a bunch of their spinners and they all have single siwash hooks on them. Personally, I've never had a problem with losing fish on single hooks.

Howdy,
A treble hook gives better balance to the spinner and gives you a better shot at hooking up on a slashing type strike.(which is common using spinners) The advantages of siwash are, stronger, larger gap,less snags,can't be leveraged out. Also less chance of ripping open a finger while trying to release a fish.

I like using big spinners(#4,#5) brass,silver, pink,orange,chartruse. For Silvers try casting silver spinners upstream and reeling them fast back down to your position. Another trick is to put half a nightcrawler on the spinner's hook.

A good inexpensive spinner body is hollow core pencil-lead(roostertail's use this) painted to match the blade color. Take Care.

hollow core lead! good idea.
I picked up some 2/0 gammie siawash hooks. Too big for a #5 blade? ( 1/4 -1/5 oz body )

Ya, I go with the siwash, the trebles snag up too easily. WWW.mortac.com www.fishermanshack.com

Hey I use to be the mor-tac rep, they make excellent components, I use size 3 and 4's for steelhead and 4's and 5's for salmon, I do allot of contrasting stuff, like black body, silver blade with green prism tape and so on. Just keep expermenting and you will find what works for you and if you don't like certain ones, just cut them apart and start over again. A friend of mine caught a 54 lb king on the quillayute on saturday on a spinner I made for him, makes me feel pretty good. He is getting it mounted, probably the biggest fish he will ever catch in wa. waters
So they work! peace Superfly

Steelhead Addict - Here are some thougths from a veteran spinner builder:

I use both siwash and trebles. I like the siwash because they don't snag as much and don't do as much damage to the fish. But I've also lost many more fish with them. I've never lost a fish on a treble but often both the fish's jaw and hooks are mangled after I land it. If I'm after steelhead, I'll use the siwash hooks because I always C&R (sometimes I'll keep a hatchery brat). If I'm trying to fill the freezer with fresh coho, I use trebles.

Avoid using nickel or chrome blades for winter steelhead. You need something that has a brighter flash, such as silver plate or 24K gold. Nickel/chrome has a very dull, almost black, flash underwater. Jed Davis states this in his book (ad infinitum). I agree, up to a point. There are times and places when nickel/chrome is effective but fishing for winter steelhead is not one of them. I use silver plated blades exclusivily for winter runs. I usually go with #4.5 or #5.

For coho, I use either an flo orange or charturese blade and a silver body. Usually a #4 if the water is low or clear. If it's off color or high, go with #4.5 or #5. I heard some folks do well with blue or green blades but personally, I have not. But since experimentation is part of the enjoyment of fishing, try anything.

Mor-Tac fishing tackle is probably the best place to get spinners parts since Pen-Tac went out of business several years ago. They're at www.mortac.com Best of luck.



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MSB

Boy if I ever catch a 54 pounder I'm going to mount it right on the boat!

give me a call, I used spinners exclusively for 6 years and we can get together and build some for the East Fork. Buzz

Love fishing for summer runs with a #2 or sometimes #1 Vibrax with a split shot. I always replace the treble with a siwash due to snagging the trebles on the bottom (thats where you want to be ticking the bottom once in a while like drift fishing) and the damage the trebles do to smolts and trout you will catch. I have found that once you hook a fish they stay on just as well as with a treble with a lot less damage if you are going to release them.
RAMPRAT