These are some very good questions! Is there such a thing as a bad plug, yes absolutely. Can you fix them if they are bad? Sometimes.

Number one with any wooden bait, if it does not track perfectly straight when you retrieve it fast, you should tune it. Use a pair of heavy needlenose or vice grips and carefully bend the eye of the plug. Mike Shaw wrote up a little spiel on how to do this here:

http://www.msslammer.com/caretuning.html

Some lures even when tuned just aren't fishy for some reason. It's one of those inexplicable things, just like why is one Tady A1 great and another one you may as well throw in the garbage. I know what you are talking about believe me. If you get a really good plug, it could probably be painted blaze orange and still get bit most of the time. I have one particular 9" Slammer in mind when I say this... It caught my 15, and 8 and a good number of other fish. For whatever reason it just has the characteristics that trigger strikes. I have some other 9" plugs that I haven't gotten bit on yet. I don't know exactly why, but there is a reason for everything.

I won't really comment on the AC plug thing other than to say that AC Plugs do catch a lot of fish, and I have caught a lot of fish on them, especially the AC Minnow. I am sponsored by MS Slammer and I don't fish my AC stuff at all any more.

Best of luck to you, and I hope that the plugs that you have are good ones. Give it some time and see how it goes. Plug fishing is not quite the same as throwing the iron for barracuda :-) It takes a little longer to find out which plugs are the good and which are the bad.



-Rob