If you had wider laminate jaws you'd maintain blood flow to paw. This opens up the live capture and release market. A lot of bio's foothold wolves and release them. The pan looks small to me. You are a talented guy.

How many hours into making one once you have it figured out. Is it cost effective to make a doz. after tooling up and buying the materials. If it is like anything else, making snare etc it would be. But then again plasma cutters etc are not cheap.
What are the main tools used to make it that would not be readily available in a guys shop?
plazma cutter?
What are you cutting the metal with?

I would like to see someone put together a detailed how to on making such a trap.

Very intriguing. I would love to make a trap and catch a wolf.
That would be totally awesome.

I am in the process of setting up some jigs to help make things go quicker and smoother. I'm not sure how many I will be able to produce in a day once set up. I'm sure most people with good metal shop tools can build one, but it does take quite a bit of time through trial and error. I cut the parts out with a plasma cutter, and bent the jaws and spring levers using heat and jigs.

I wasn't sure about laminating the jaws..they are already made from 1/4" steel. Would they need to be thicker than that?

The pan measures 4" by 2 and 3/4". I can make this bigger if necessary.

This trap is legal in Montana and Alaska. Both states allow the inside jaw spread up to 9". This trap is almost 1" larger diameter than my first attempt which gives it about 20% more surface area.

Hopefully a wolf will be introduced to one this winter!

I think laminating the jaws would be a good idea,meaning with rod,so as not to add a lot of weight.I would also say laminate a rod on the dog to reinforce it or make a rod type dog,otherwise you will have to straighten it out after a catch.

I've never worried much about pan size on most predators.A smaller pan just centers the foot better and I'm sure you don't want toe caught wolves.MB750 pans are 3" and yours is considerably bigger than that.I bet you would be OK as it is but looks like you could go a little bigger if you wanted to.

Having that pan level with the jaws or a hair below is a big deal,especially with canines and dirt sets.A high pan requires a thicker layer of dirt over the jaws and in freezing and thawing conditions,stuff can happen.And on high wind days,like we get,the pan will be the first thing to be uncovered by the wind.Nothing like coming up to a beautiful canine set and seeing the pan completely exposed saying"don't step here".

Anyway,truly beautiful work.I look forward to seeing the finished product.Do you plan to make some drags?

I may try to make the pan a bit wider. I don't plan on making any drags at the moment, but mabey in the future. Was thinking of anchoring the chain solid, but adding a couple heavy springs. Not sure what would be the best.

Isn't Montana's jawspread limit also 9"?

In the Trapping Equipment Requirement section (Page 4) of the MT wolf regs, it states: "The inside jaw spread of foothold traps must not exceed nine inches."
Link to Regulations: http://fwp.mt.gov/eBook/hunting/regulations/2012/wolf2012/index.html

Got it,thanks.

Just my opinion, but I would not laminate the jaws. They are already 1/4 inch thick
which is strong enough to hold without bending. Any more weight will only slow down the
trap and make it harder for them to come up through crusted snow and ice. When you have
freeze/thaw conditions keeping the set traps in working order is one of the primary issues you will encounter, and is something that needs to be kept in mind in the designing and building of a good wolf trap.

I don't think you want the pan any wider than the gap between the jaw levers. If it sticks out over the jaw levers, when the trap fires the levers will hit the pan and knock it upwards pretty violently. Not something you want happening when a foot is setting on top of the pan. Could mean the difference between a pad of the foot catch or just a toe catch, or maybe even a complete miss.
As far as the length of the pan, the first ones I made were patterned like the ones you have there, but I have since cut them down about 3/4 of an inch. Basically all that does is give them a better appearance, and has no functional advantage. If you place the trap right and direct their foot placement then pan size is kind of meaningless. It
could be the size of a dime and still function just fine. But idealy you want their foot to land inside the jaws, and when that happens, with their big feet, any reasonable size pan will be suffiecient. Anyway, just my thoughts on those two items.

Can I be the first to say I want to buy one! Beautiful trap, PM me if you are willing to sell one. I'll do my best to field test it for you

thanks

I had an email from him awhile back. He said he wasn't making his kill springs anymore. I'm not sure if he is still making the traps.

Wow. This is absolutely incredible. I'm blown away by the talent and skill this would require. Kudos to you sir.

Power plant ? Home brew ? What are you using the #16 for ?

Thieves and trespassers. I know if I start having problems with that I'd be burrying some 330s flat!

I jokes, I'm not sure what he uses them for, but I do know what I would use them for if it ever became a problem...

Ditto for me.

Osky

FYI. Remember a proper nyloc has at least 2 or 3 threads showing through it.

I built a bunch of something once and learned that lesson the hard way.

Great looking though. Nice job.

Nice job.Building your own equipment,like fishing rods or bows or axe handles, is quite self satisfying,whether original idea or not.

There is no money in building wolf trap's.It is to please your self and sell to other trapper's cheep . So they can get some wolf's to.That is the way i do it . GOOD JOB .it is a lot of work for no money.

I bought one from him, it's a nice trap. He also cut a wolf paw into the pan. It's almost too nice to use.

Very nice looking trap.