Right, tested the araldite - not working very well. So pulled skirt off. Can show you pic of actual lure head and the new skirt - which is as close as I can get to original. Have spent hrs/days looking for original replacement. But the equivalent now has eyes painted on it. My mate who made them also checked thru original supplier lines - all have eyes on now. Have tried removing them, no luck, tried painting over them, no luck. This outer is close but not exactly same. This lure has caught more fish than everything else in boat put together. Got to the point if we had this one out, waste of time having the other 4 rods out. So we got down to fishing just the one lure. Saved hauling in and putting out the other 4 after each strike. Mahi (deadly) marlin and wahoo. Was loosing skirt but still worked. Finally a wahoo totally shredded it and it lost its mojo.
The plug at back of neck is parallel - measured with verniers. So was meant to be glued - and I know he did use glue. I will check with Saltwater fishing guys Friday, but I am guessing they are whipping their skirts on. This head was made some 30 yrs ago. Back to NZ in a couple of weeks. I have a lathe there, so will cut a couple of tapers so I can whip it as Jaapie has described. Meantime I have some epoxy glue. Will try de-
greasing, sand paper and glueing, again. I think my mate did use a loctite product (30 yrs ago).
Regards
Alan