Black Bart's are a fair bit pricier than Richter lures. Get both, but Richter for me...value for money.

Bart's are very good and i have accounted for many Billfish on mine.

Same deal with Richters, they are virtually half the price, and catch very well.

I'm also a big fan of Polu Kai skirts aswell, made in Hawaii and the finish on them would hands down be the best on the market.

Hard heads/Soft heads debate...have caught fish on both heads, i tend to use harder heads in rougher conditions as they're heavier and hold the water better.

Richters are nowhere near as expensive as Black Barts unless something changed dramtically in the last year or so? Generally the Richters are around $50 unrigged v +$100 unrigged black barts.

I'm no expert but the soft heads are better suited to calmer days and resin heads for rougher days. But I wouldn't hurt to run a combo of the two in your spread regardless of the weather.

Jet heads are generally better suited to attract tuna I believe? I know we ran the xmas trees for tuna and they have a jetted head.

Yeh I agree. Black Barts are top shelf products with great details but value for money, cant beat Richters and proven fish catchers.

I've been running the Richters for a while with good success but have recently been trialling mbt lures sof heads. Genuine Aussie company, quality product and choose whatever colours you want. They are cheaper than Richter and have been consistantly getting more hits out of my spread than the Richters.

HAHAHAHAHAHA tnuc what a name sooo gold

second the polu kai's, we are recieving a big order this week of them in some new styles, these are the premium of game lures

Richters are great value for money and they work very well

The reason for softies is supposed to be so when the billie whacks it it doesn't get put off when it feels something hard. That's the idea at least but obviously a lot of marlin are caught all around the world on hard heads.

I went with richters for my set. Cheaper and lots of people run them so advice is easy to get and local specific. E.g. If lots of people are using specific colours in specific places sp being the same brandbits the exact same lure and colour. Only used them a small amount of time but my lures have had two hookups so far at least :p

And yeah, jet heads for tuna (or better, solid cone type heads ;) ). Though, don't know why marlin wouldn't hit them given a nice smoke trail. Also, looking at that new richter lure (is it heavens gates?)

Yeah there are two new richters out, and maybe a new colour for some as well;
Richter Soft Oscar XL (one big softy!)
Richter Holy Gates (machined nylon head?)
And UV Blue

go the Richters, they've always worked real well for me, and come in a lot cheaper than other brands too.

Jamie, when are the Holy Gates going on the website? Be keen to check one out.

Richters for me, there prices are phenomenal considering the results. Just no reason to buy a more expensive brand.

Just have a look at the fish Captain Bernie and his crew have pulled over the last few years.

favourite lure and most succesful for us is a Richter zulu in medium lumo. i cant seem to get the barts to swim straight. Price wise the barts are about the same as richter if you get them direct from the Balckbart website.

Agree richters for value for money. Polu Kai finish is superb. Also like hollow point - good quality & value for money

I was using a combination of polu kai, black bart and richter lures out in the spread last week but unfortunately didnt have any hits, another guy was using a 6" richter dorado 93-Luminous in the spread and got a hit every time it went in the water including the small marlin caught.

Ill be getting a small and medium richter lumo as my next purchase after seeing the success that skirt had in both sunny and overcast conditions.

Reckon you cant go past richter for value for money - they are just as good as anything else in my opinion.

On a side note a lure i leant to other fishermen onboard was a rapala xrap magnum 20 (red head / whiteish silver body) i regretted lending it as it got so many fish trauling - tuna and mackerel one after the other, on day two i put it on my line and had instant success with a yellowfin tuna, it was brand new and now looks like its been through a war zone so a second shiny one of them is also on the list of next purchases :)

I'd happy run Jetheads in my marlin spread. Swelly didn't come second in Gamex trolling Richter Tornadoes for no reason!

If you haven't already there is a huge amount of info to be found on www.pakula.com.au .  I don't think any other lure manufacturer's website will provide you with anything like the information that can be found on this site.  Whilst Pakula lures are no longer manufactured in Australia, why not support an Aussie.

What can you fish for with Richters???

What they are talking about is Richter (and other) skirted lures or pushers. Mostly aiming at fast pelagic fish like marlin, sailfish, wahoo and tuna, but they do (unfortunately for the lure) get belted by the toothy brigade (so called razor gang) including the wahoo mentioned. These destroy the lure pretty quickly. You use them for trolling at speed for these fast fish.

Hope this helps

Neels

ahh ok, i wont worry about them then... lol

Don't forget the richter surface plugs, they're handy for tailor and salmon.

Was only mentioning the skirts. Plugs are a very simple lure, but deadly. They are great for tailor and other species. Just cast and retrieve. Easy as and they have some weight so you can belt them out miles.

Neels