The Daily Crank

Hi everyone!

I’ve had a lot of questions about the differences in the LV and LVR series.  So I’ve decided to create a chart that shows the two Lucky Craft lipless crankbait series side by side.  You can see the internal chambers are built and weighted differently.  This affects their action and posture when coming through the water.  Below is an article by Rob Newell that features Lucky craft pro Gerald Swindle talking about how he fishes the two different series.

Some years ago when Lucky Craft introduced the well-known LV Series of lipless rattlers, namely the LV 100 and LV 500, these two baits complemented each other in terms covering vast flats quickly to find concentrations of fish.

The LV 100 covered the shallow end in 1 to 4 feet while the LV 500 would pick up the 8- to 15-foot zone.

“The LV Series was all you needed to fish flats with uniform grass growth,” explained Lucky Craft pro Gerald Swindle. “As long as the grass was 1 to 3 feet off the bottom in 8 to 15 feet, the LV was perfect.”

Lucky Craft LV 500 (Ghost Minnow)

Lucky Craft LVR D-7 (Ghost Minnow)

But when facing trickier grass situations where grass growth is much longer and clumpier with scattered holes and voids over 6 to 12 foot flats, the LV 500 tended to ‘dig’ into the healthier clumps a little too much, causing the lure to bog down.

Of course it did not take Lucky Craft long to remedy this situation with the introduction of the LVR Series of lipless rattlers, including the D-7, D-10, and D-15.

Compared to the classic LV 500, which is nose-weighted, causing it to fall head first and run deeper, the LVR Series was designed with a bigger profile and even-body weighting for delayed, horizontal sinking, providing more hesitation and “hovering” with pauses in the retrieve.

The result is a lipless rattler that can be fished much more effectively in clumpy grass.

“The LVR D-7 and D-10 are fantastic for fishing places where the hydrilla does not die back as much in the cold-weather seasons like in Florida or other portions of the extreme southeastern U.S.,” Swindle said. “Tie a D-7 to 15-pound fluorocarbon or 20-pound braid and it hovers and hesitates in those open pockets and voids in the grass and snaps through the clumps much cleaner.”

“The LV 500 is still my primary choice when fishing huge flats on places like Lake Guntersville or Rayburn after a cold winter has knocked the grass back and it’s fairly consistent across the bottom,” Swindle summed up. “But if I go to a place like Lake Toho or Lake Seminole where the hydrilla might still be up and clumpy after a warm winter, I’m going to the LVR Series to keep the lure up and clean.”

Below is the color chart for the Lucky Craft LVR Series that features over 71 colors.

[View with PicLens]

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