I used to use a modified bucket to store and transport all my offshore lures, but the lures would still get tangled and lose their shape and color. So I made an offshore lure carrier out of a soft-sided cooler, acrylic tubing, floral foam and expandable foam.
I bought a soft cooler that measured 18 by 12 by 10 inches for $15 at Wal-Mart, then purchased a 4-foot piece of 1 1/2-inch-diameter acrylic tubing at a hardware store for $2 and cut it into 8-inch pieces. (Light-grade PVC pipe or the original lure packaging tubes also work.) I found a piece of foam used for artificial flower arrangements at home (you can purchase floral foam at craft stores) and cut it to fit the cooler bottom. I placed the 8-inch tubes in the cooler and pressed them down into the floral foam for stability. The tubes fit pretty tightly, but I sprayed filler foam between the tubes to make the package more solid.
The cooler holds about 60 tubes, but I partitioned off a corner with Styrofoam to create a spot for bigger lures and reduced the number of tubes to 50.
Andrew Smith
Charleston, South Carolina
