Aldi bag - Perfect lure bag

Aldi Lure bag video review

Aldi aren't known for their fishing tackle, in fact they're not known for much else other than a cheap supermarket shop.Every now and again though they get some bargains in, from computers to fishing tackle. I will admit that in my opinion, most of the fishing tackle they get in isn't the best but every now and again there's a bargain to be had. Today they had a few items in, fishing socks, trousers and vests plus rods, rod bags, bait and tackle sets, go here for a look. Most of the stuff didn't take my fancy but I did pick up a few packs of small spinners which were spot on for £2.99 and will surely catch me a perch or two in the future. I noticed the rod bag which looked good too but I have little use for it. The one thing I'd come for specifically was the shoulder bag they had for sale at £9.99.

For ten pounds this is a handy bag, with a few extra side pockets for your bits and bobs and a handy bottom pocket/tray which conveniently holds long pliers, cutters and forceps with room for a few more things if needed. I was well pleased they fit in there because I already had plans for the rest of the bag. The top and side zip pockets hold my small boxes, one containing small spinners and the other which has all my spare hooks, split rings and swivels.


My Savage Gear lure hang bag is a bit big for carting around and so I've been looking for a smaller bag to use to put in just the essentials for when I'm fishing places where I know beforehand which lures I'll be using or on venues where a bit of walking might be needed. Browsing the PAC Facebook page I noted a tip off that Aldi would be selling tackle today and while scanning their web page I spotted the bag and it's potential. Many lure anglers have already done this to other bags and I now had this bag marked down for a spot of modification.


I was sure I had some drain pipe in the hut but upon searching found none there, except some smaller diameter pipes which were no use to me as they wouldn't fit my lures. I then realised that the local DIY shops were closed so I couldn't go buy what I needed. I scratched my head and had another look around and then I finally found what I wanted, those rod tubes should do the job perfectly. I grabbed a couple and set about chopping them in to 18cm long pieces to fit nicely into my new bag. I figured I could fit fifteen of them in at a squeeze and the bag would still close perfectly. Incidentally, the diameter of the tubing is 6cm. You can obviously use larger tubing or possibly even square plastic drain pipes would fit nicely and could even make more efficient use of the space. Have a look and see what suits you best.

That looked spot on. I was thinking I could maybe think of a way to secure them in place but decided against it since I then had the flexibility to take them out later if need be. Next I needed to cut some notches in to the tops of each tube so that the hooks from the lures would sit nicely and help prevent tangles even further. Using the saw I cut a random number of notches in each piece of tube and then quickly cleaned up the mess before the missus spotted what I was up to. I would have done the whole job outside but another one of those thunderstorms had made me come in out of the rain, and boy did it rain.



I chucked the tubes back in and then put some lures in to see what it was like, not bad at all. I then set about doing the hardest task of them all, deciding which lures I wanted in and which I wanted out. That's a tough task for a lure hoarder. Every lure I picked up I wanted in the bag, even though I mostly use that one rainbow. Damn this lure obsession.

But I wasn't quite happy, it wasn't quite right. The last few sessions I've been out I've travelled light and then found that I wanted to use spinners and small lures to have a go at the perch and I hadn't brought them. So I wondered if I could fit a small lure box in, the usual standard sized small storage boxes you get and yes my Savage Gear lure box fits in perfectly. Without the tubes you could easily fit three of those boxes in possibly four making the bag also perfect for your small lure sets. By removing one row of tubes it still left me ten slots for my larger lures and I could fit all my smaller lures in too now. That's spot on is that.

Get yourself to Aldi now and pick up a bargain lure bag before they're all gone. I'm already considering going for another one tomorrow. I have no idea what I need it for, I just hope it's not a bag addiction to go along with my lure addiction! Oh my god, what is happening to me?


EDIT - I've used the bag as my main lure bag since this DIY job was done (nearly five months), but I've since made a slight adjustment to the inside. The cut up pipes work, but I found that I was getting the lures snagged in the bag itself sometimes. The bag has a mesh compartment in the lid and when this is closed it was getting caught on the hooks. I also managed to keep getting the hooks caught on the side of the bag too. This became annoying and wasted time on the bank.

So i've removed all the pipes and now I just throw my lures in the bag. Wait, that's got to be a bad idea. All those hooks getting tangled up with each other and surely stuck in the bag and my fingers every time I try to grab a lure. I missed the other bit of DIY I did. Again, not my idea, but grab yourself a bit of pipe lagging and cut it in to pieces about half an inch to an inch thick. These will make for excellent hook protectors. You will never again get them stuck in the bag or wrapped around each other. A bonus of this feature is that if you drop a lure in the water, the hook protectors make the lure float rather than sink to the depths out of sight. I always attach the lure to the trace before removing the hook protectors just in case I drop the lure. Cold hands don't always work how they should. One negative of the hook protectors is the fact that they will hold a bit of water. So make sure you dry your lures in the house after a session or you will open your bag a week later to find rusty hooks! Another plus is that you can seemingly fit more lures in your bag than with the pipes, but this is also a negative since you'll end up carrying around lures you will never use! So here's a tip. Pick your favourite lures, pick a few that will work the depths or something to change it up and then leave the rest at home. You'll find plenty of space then for a pasty and a brew!

Savage Gear lure hang bag modified.

As many lure anglers have found before, I had the problem of lure storage. I was using a bucket to hang the lures in, but I was forever knocking it over and then spending the time untangling the mass of hooks. Often my sessions are short so this was even more an annoyance. I'd also acquired a few larger lures and my B&Q tackle boxes weren't big enough. Time to ditch them and the rucksack and get a bag that was built for the job. I'd read and seen on the net how people had modified camo-cool bags and put in a few short sections of pipe in, which is a great idea in my opinion. After some thought I decided I needed a little space also for a couple of lure boxes and a few bits and bobs so ruled out the cool bag idea. I saw a Savage Gear lure hang bag which was often priced around £60 but spotted it on Glasgow Anglings, www.Fishinmegastore.com (top site!) for £45 so took the plunge. Incidentally, I've since spotted it at http://www.mullarkeys.co.uk for £35 all though I've never bought from that site so can't comment on their service.

As you can see the bag has a few side pockets so that's what tipped me in it's favour. The front pocket even comes complete with a Savage Gear lure tackle box which was a bonus. The bag arrived and I chucked all my lures in. Something wasn't quite right. As every lure angler knows, you end up with loads of lures and what ever you leave at home you find you want when you're out on the bank. I couldn't quite fit in all my lures, well at least not all the smaller ones. The front pocket I already filled with small lures but I also had another small box I could do with fitting inside. The two side pockets were full with tools, trace wire, crimps, scales, trebles, split rings, camera and more and are too small anyway for the standard sized lure boxes so I had to think of something different. When you first get the bag, the centre compartment is empty and you have to fix the lure hang storage bit together. It's not too tricky if you have three hands, the plastic sections basically slot over each other to make a square grid. Each grid as deep as the bag, that's 11inches for the old guys and 28cm for us young ones, and each grid can hold two savage gear 19cm lures comfortably, you could probably squeeze another in but they'd be prone to tangling. There are 25 compartments for the lures, you don't need me to do the maths. When this bag is full it's a nice weight to carry around, so beware. A decent fit bloke shouldn't have too much of a problem though to be honest. As I said though, it still wasn't quite right for me.

So I grabbed some tools and started modifying the bag. Yes, my brand new bag was being operated on. The missus was calling me an idiot but I was a man on a mission. I worked out that I could lose one row of my five by five lure compartments, still have a good forty large lures in, and in that empty row I could squeeze another tackle box for spinners and small lures. I pulled apart all the compartments and cut the end off a few, which then when I slotted them all back together gave me compartments 5x4 and one long end row equivalent to 5x1, if that makes sense. In this row I slotted another lure box and had space to stand up my extra long pliers, forceps and cutters for easy access.

 The quick knock up in Microsoft paint on the right shows first an idea of the gridded lure storage area as it comes and then one cross piece (there are 12 in total) which you simply slot over another. The red line shows where I cut off on four of the cross pieces, which now when you slot them together leaves the last row one long row, as the photo of my modified bag below should show. You could of course use your own initiative and cut other sections to what I did so that your extra large compartment is in a different place, not as big or bigger. Whatever you decide you need to sort your needs. I would suggest though not to remove too many as you will at some point make it too weak, plus of course what's the point of buying this particular bag if you have to change it too much in the end?

After all that I had one final problem. The problem was that the depth of each compartment was longer than plenty of my lures. There's a good deep groove on every compartment and there's also plenty of grooves for each of the hooks to hang on, but should you clumsily miss then the lure would fall to the bottom. To get the lure out then you needed to use your forceps but that was fiddly and if you can stop the lure falling down in the first place it would save all that hassle. That's where that large white cube comes in. It's simply packing foam. My mate Fisky had already given me some to make a trace rig or whatever but instead I used it and cut it in to cubes which nicely fit in to each lure compartment. Packing the compartments out to various depths, now my lures can only ever fall a few centimetres and so even if they're not dangling from their hook I can easily grab them. The foam also doesn't even weigh anything and is easily removable and adjustable unlike my hacksaw job on the plastic compartments! Another benefit of this is I've found that some lures don't quite fit in the bag, they stick out. Because of their tail or diving vane length, on some lures such as the SG Low riders they protrude up above the top of the bag but now I can just drop them into the compartment instead of hanging them and save them being broken in transit. My bag is now perfect for me and currently has thirty two large lures in and still space for me to put in another ten at least. Everywhere I go now I only need one bag, my rod, net and unhooking mat. Easily manageable and saves me having to make sure I have everything each trip, now I know I'm sorted before I set off.

Hopefully this may be of use to someone out there in the fishing world. It may help you decide if this bag is right for you or even help you decide to go for the DIY camo-cooler bag and pipe lure bag. You may even already have this bag and be inspired to modify it or just put in the bits of foam to cure your own problems. Unfortunately it will not help you in any way catch more fish, sorry about that. If anyone can cure that particular problem then make sure you leave me the solution!