Tungsten tied

Tungsten technology is getting the lead out of professional bass fishing

Remember studying the periodic table of elements in high school chemistry? It was that crazy-looking chart with all those numbers and symbols that looked like a castle made of Legos.

What does this have to do with bass fishing?

On the periodic table of elements, tungsten is atomic number 74 or the symbol W. It is one of the heaviest, densest metals on earth. The hard metal has the highest melting point of all metals known. The metal is a good conductor of electricity, is resistant to rust and is less toxic than most other metals.

Because of its properties, tungsten is used in various industrial applications, from electrical filaments to temperature-resistant missile heads – and now fishing weights.

For years, the fishing industry has relied on lead as the primary element for getting a lure to the bottom of a lake. Lead, just a few doors down from tungsten on the periodic table (Pb-82), is familiar to anyone who has fished at all. The soft metal is used to make fishing sinkers of all types and is present in nearly every lure that sinks.

Lead, however, is toxic and is increasingly being labeled an environmental hazard. Scientifically documented cases of birds, namely loons, dying from accidental ingestion of lead fishing weights have threatened lead’s application as fishing sinkers. Many states are placing restrictions on the use of lead for fishing applications.

Fishing-tackle manufacturers who see the writing on the wall have begun to make more environmentally friendly sinkers out of less toxic metals like steel, tin, brass – and now tungsten.

Tungsten “drops” in

Wal-Mart FLW Tour pro Mark Pack of Mineola, Texas, founder and president of Lake Fork Trophy Bait and Tackle Company, pioneered the tungsten fishing-weight movement. The idea came to him while he was working as a guide on Lake Fork.

“I had a client who made parts for industrial machinery out of tungsten,” Pack said. “He told me the properties of tungsten – how it was dense, heavy and nontoxic.”

In 1999, Pack began to explore the possibilities of making fishing weights out of tungsten. He eventually found a company in the tungsten business that was willing to mold fishing weights out of the dense, nearly immalleable metal.

Pack made some prototype worm weights, but it was his timing with the introduction of tungsten drop-shot weights that ignited the tungsten craze.

About the time Pack was experimenting with the production of tungsten weights, the drop-shot train had left the station out West and was gaining momentum across the country. Drop-shotters were seeking an ultracompact weight for their finesse rigs, and Pack’s tungsten weights fit the bill perfectly.

While his drop-shot weights were in high demand, his tungsten worm weights hit a snag. Unlike the drop-shot weight, the worm weight had to be slipped onto the line. Pack soon discovered that tungsten’s best asset – its density – was also its worst enemy.

“The metal is so hard and abrasive that it was fraying line and causing break-offs,” he said.

Pack’s solution to the line-fraying problem involved inserting a slick Teflon sleeve into each weight to fully protect the line.

About the time Mark Pack was introducing tungsten weights to bass anglers, Sam Aversa, a tooling and methods engineer turned Florida bass guide from Hawthorne, Fla., was looking for a better way to penetrate the dense hyacinth and hydrilla mats for untapped bass in Florida.

In the late ’90s, Aversa relied on his machining background to design the “Penetrater,” a 1-ounce-plus lead weight with a unique squat shape for reduced profile and better penetration.

What burned in Aversa’s mind, though, was the idea of using a denser metal, such as tungsten, for a more compact sinker.

In his own quest to protect the line within the weight, Aversa took the evolution of tungsten a step further – he figured out how to paint tungsten with a special coating. By coating the entire sinker, including the interior line hole, with a smooth chip-proof powder coating, he did not need to worry about a line insert.

Once he released his compact, painted tungsten Penetrater to a handful of pros, the tungsten craze caught fire on the other end of the spectrum with heavy-tackle pitching and flipping. Since 2001, dozens of tournaments have been won flipping thick vegetation in Florida with a soft plastic pinned to a 1-ounce-plus Penetrater tungsten weight.

Now Penetrater makes a complete array of painted tungsten weights, from 1/8-ounce to 1 3/8-ounce.

Still not perfect

Tungsten has been on the market for a few years and has endured rigorous testing by the best bass pros across the nation. For now, it looks as if the tungsten technology is gaining considerable ground over lead in the business of catching bass.

Most pros agree on the advantages and disadvantages of tungsten; however, not all pros have been swayed to get the lead out completely.

Aside from the environmental advantages, tungsten is more compact. Tungsten is on average 30 percent smaller than its lead counterpart for the same amount of weight. This helps reduce bait profile and helps with hook-up ratio, especially in the larger 1-ounce-plus weights, since there is not as much bulk to force a bass’s mouth open upon hookset.

Because of its density and hardness, tungsten is noisier and more sensitive. When tungsten “clacks” against glass beads or rocks on the bottom, the noise produced is much louder than lead. The weight is more sensitive because movements are transmitted directly to the line instead of being absorbed by the softness of lead.

The most obvious disadvantage of tungsten is the price. Because of the painting process, Penetrater Weights represent the highest end of tungsten’s price range. Each weight costs anywhere from a dollar all the way up to $5.50 for Aversa’s biggest Penetrater, a 1 3/8-ouncer.

Even cheaper, unpainted tungsten products like Excalibur’s weights retail anywhere from 60 cents to $2 each depending on the size – a far cry from lead’s price tag, which ranges from a nickel to a dime.

Some pros are put off by the shiny metallic finish of tungsten, which cannot be painted like lead.

Another thing that’s difficult about tungsten is pegging it to the line with a toothpick. Some of the protective inserts are so small that a toothpick will not fit into them.

Whether you are unleaded or not, it looks as if tungsten is here to stay, especially since it poses a viable alternative to lead. On tungsten’s immediate horizons are more color options, screw-in sinkers, jigs, spinnerbaits and even jigging spoons.