How do you make a Watermelon Apex Lure?

I'm impressed how this lure seems to dominate the west coast from Washington to San Diego.  I'm also impressed that this 6" piece of colored plastic probably costs $0.50 to make and sells for a 10-15X markup.  The owner of that company must be a zillionaire (apparently not, based in Victoria BC, google reports annual revenue of less than $1M with 10 employees...).  1. Has anyone tested this lure in some kind of pairwise comparison, or is this a case of fisherman following the crowd?  2. They seem to be made of plastic. It seems like an easy shape to make by bending metal, but then the metal would likely cut the line, so its a clever design.  Anyone figured out a DIY version of the ubiquitous WM apex lure?

I just buy them.  I also buy the Brad's cut plugs which have been great as well and are sometimes a bit cheaper.

Fisherman’s warehouse in Sacramento stocks DIY materials including blades, beads, reflective tape, paints etc...I picked up a bunch of the large blades and turned them into kokanee dodgers, spoons for mackinaw and LCT at Pyramid.

Each setup cost about $2.00 to make including hooks, split rings, etc...I find making my own is more fun than purchasing online. Just put a little custom paint, some hardware, and a custom bend on one of the large willow blades, should be a pretty good WMA alternative for a bit less $

For the apex shaped lures in the top left (pic 4), I used Alaskan yellow cedar and shaped the lures using sandpaper and a pocket knife. They swim a lot like the cut plugs or apex do.’those took forever to make, but I’m pretty happy with the result.

I also like to pick up plate steel and cut/shape it using a dremmel and a few hand tools, the larger spoons started out as plate steel like the last photo. Takes time, but it’s lots of fun!

those lures are cool!

NICE WORK!    I understand the motivation, but I'm afraid I don't have that much patience. 
    But I did recently make some 6" dodgers to troll around in SC's partly rocky & weedy halibut holes.  I decided they earn their money making those, but it was rewarding when they did as well or better than store-bought. 
   Aluminum carpet strip, saber saw with hacksaw blade, Dremel with sander & grinder, pliers, ball-peen hammer, split rings, crumpled aluminum foil or mylar from keep-cold bag, glue.

i fished them side by side with other lures and bait- same flashers, same depth.  there's times when they out fish others, but the reverse is also true.  Seems that when the fish are targeting hard baits they work better than krill bites....but whatt the hell do i know

I'm impressed how this lure seems to dominate the west coast from Washington to San Diego.  I'm also impressed that this 6" piece of colored plastic probably costs $0.50 to make and sells for a 10-15X markup.  The owner of that company must be a zillionaire (apparently not, based in Victoria BC, google reports annual revenue of less than $1M with 10 employees...).  1. Has anyone tested this lure in some kind of pairwise comparison, or is this a case of fisherman following the crowd?  2. They seem to be made of plastic. It seems like an easy shape to make by bending metal, but then the metal would likely cut the line, so its a clever design.  Anyone figured out a DIY version of the ubiquitous WM apex lure?

I would start with Tap Plastics see what it takes to make a mold, and go from there.

Like the mold idea. Maybe can  try using plastic epoxy or resin and reinforce with fiberglass cloth? Interested to see how you choose to do this.

Summer time I was hopping the part I couldn’t see on my iPhone after watermelon was wine!

Nice fish attraction devices you got there. 

I thought it was a joke thread. 

Like, "How do you make a Hormone?   Refuse to pay!"

Bouché

NICE WORK!    I understand the motivation, but I'm afraid I don't have that much patience. 
    But I did recently make some 6" dodgers to troll around in SC's partly rocky & weedy halibut holes.  I decided they earn their money making those, but it was rewarding when they did as well or better than store-bought. 
   Aluminum carpet strip, saber saw with hacksaw blade, Dremel with sander & grinder, pliers, ball-peen hammer, split rings, crumpled aluminum foil or mylar from keep-cold bag, glue.

Pics or it didn't happen!

I thought it was a joke thread. 

Like, "How do you make a Hormone?   Refuse to pay!"

Bouché

Right, don't wanna pay $8 so spent all day making my own. 

Still must admit I have done many similar endeavors. 

3D printing

I think we share the same disease, Trutta. Those look great, and I've made my own "flying C's" from Fisherman's Warehouse parts. Very happy with how those turn out.  And traildad, after the first one, i can knock a flying C out in 10 minutes or less and $1 in materials. 

None of your creations, Trutta look like that weird Apex shape.. maybe it doesn't matter.  My sense it their popularity is entirely legend. Next time I go out I will try to fish 2 different lures instead of 2 apexes...Yes, I think tap plastics is a good start.. but plastic doesn't bend like metal. That shape looks like it was designed in metal.  A mold?  Well that's possible, but copying the lure exactly isn't somehow as satisfying, cast epoxy with fiberglass is actually pretty expensive, and would have a different result. Epoxy is brittle among other things. 3 D molding occurred to me.. again, a perfect copy isn't really the goal.  Thanks for ideas...for those that cut and dremel metal... on the apex, the mono goes through holes in the lure.  I think metal will slice through the mono very quickly.. clever of the Apex designers to use a material that is softer than mono...

I like making my own lures. Props to you who make spoons out of spoons and ling bars out of flatware...

PVC bends nicely if you heat it. Maybe you can shape a cut piece of pipe.

https://www.tapplastics.com/product_info/videos

This video covers making a mold, the last minute covers making an odd shaped mold. This would seem to be the way to go, to keep it cheap IMHO.  Not that I have made that many molds (one in High School shop class to make a plastic screwdriver handle via injection molding, I think Jimmy Carter still President, so it has been a while).