Im sure,like myself,there are many of you who bought these things five or ten years ago thinking they were going to be the ducks nuts,only to be dissapointed when deployed as by time there was enough brease to make them spin,the amount of waves etc meant the added movement was moot point...
we tried them on high pole,tried on low pole so close to ground..we tried them out on point nearby and in reality the only time they worked the plurry thing blew over and fell in the lake!!!!
well after years of trying every lube known to mankind and numerous different washers between wings and body of decoy I had had enough and got serious. I drilled two 8mm holes on opposite sides of the body in right place.poked a nice straight (straight VERY important ) piece of #8 wire right through body and out both sides..reattached wings onto said bit of #8 with tiny grub screws through the holes provided but previously unused..... so now both wings hooked up in tandem and I set them opposing each other so one half,if you like was always going to be getting breaze weather up top or down below centre line...
did it work??? like a charm. any half decent gust of wind and its away,any steady breaze and it spins happily away.

Let's see if this works

Take two

What changes did you make to move the “wings” back an inch or so? I take it you did something to the internal mechanism.

Zero internal mechanical assistance anymore just pure wind power now.i ripped out the motor and threw it away.

It makes me happy to see "used" decoys with a bit of wear and rubbed paint. Around here, people spend ungodly amounts of money for incredibly realistic decoys... flocked finish instead of painted, replacing decoys yearly... its nuts in my opinion.

Back when I hunted ducks, I couldn't afford more than the cheapest decoys at the local store... and they were well used, mud stained and worn. But man it didnt seem to matter, we killed alot of ducks and Canadian geese over them.

Your spinning wings are great. I bought some Dove "fliers" a few years ago, motorized etc etc. They worked ok, but not all that much more than the dumb static ones we'd stick on barbed wire around the watering holes. Doves would come in for the water, didn't seem to care about the decoys.

Animated ducks would work much better to give ducks a random place to set down, I wish I'd thought about it back in the day.

My duck decoys were sold off / disappeared 40 years ago. Amusingly, a single duck decoy found its way back to me, complete with my phone number in red Testors model paint written below. I was probably 12 or 14 back when I wrote that. I have it in my garage now and it brings a smile when I notice it, thinking of all the quality time I spend with my father hunting those nasty tasting fowl (LOL).

-DallanC

I enjoy the repainting of decoys almost as much as the shooting of ducks!!.