redmeansdistortion

I like your style. I'm all round reels myself.

Exactly. Most reel designs are usually reinventing the wheel with a pinch of sugar to sweeten it up. From what I can tell, the only real standout innovations the last 2 or 3 decades have been with braking systems like Daiwa Magforce and Shimano FTB. Truthfully, the manufacturers are mainly focusing their efforts on 4 fronts; speed, drag capacity, bearing count, and lightness. Those are the primary factors that push reel sales because of the "more is better" mentality. Super fast retrieves are good for some things, not so much for others. Drag capacity is overrated because it only matters to people that don't understand how drag works. How did we land musky and Chinook salmon 30+ years ago on reels capable of a measly 6-8lb of drag? Bearings are important, but what's more important is how and where they are implemented. One can find endless examples of off brand reels with a very high bearing count. Lastly, being lightweight is nice, but how it balances with a given rod is more important. Balance will always be favorable to total weight.

Understood, no judgement felt on my end. To add to my above post, frugality doesn't mean buying the high end stuff either, lots of great value reels are in the sweet spot, that $100 to $300 range. In general, that is where you strike a happy medium between durability and parts availability. Even then, some manufacturers, like Daiwa and Shimano, will only keep stock of parts for the higher end stuff long after production ends or the model gets revised. Abu Garcia, prior to being bought by Sycamore Partners in 2018, still kept stock of parts for every Swedish made reel in their catalog. Now they don't reproduce parts for reels designed prior to 1997, so this eliminated production of parts for reels from the classic era, pre-1979. That said, it is worth mentioning the BFS crowd. Lots, and I mean lots of them buy seemingly every reel from the fly-by-night manufacturers in China. In the same breath, they will proclaim they can't afford a JDM or USDM reel, while posting a picture of a dozen $50-$100 Ming Yangs, Tsurinoyas, or something along those lines. Some of them will then spend another $10 to $20 on a set of bearings plus other parts. At that point, they could've had 2 or 3 reels from more reputed manufacturers. Granted, I don't see any of that going on here, that's more of a Facebook thing. I won't mention any YouTube channels, but some are influencers who drive sales of those reels. One I talk to regularly supplements his income reviewing and doing open box videos of CDM BFS reels. Some of them do perform well, but durability and parts availability are questionable. I've serviced some of them on occasion, and there are almost always corners cut somewhere.

I feel we must include that frugality doesn't equate to cheap. Frugality is buying something you know will last, even if it comes at a price premium. Essentially, you're getting what you pay for as value is the bottom line, not price. One of my customers still regularly uses the same Zebco Cardinal 3 he bought new back in '76. He paid almost $80 for it then, or about $450 today adjusted for inflation. He saw the value in his purchase and got nearly 50 years of service and counting. By this time he could've spent much more constantly replacing cheap models every 2 or 3 seasons.

I hear you. I have a guy local to me that makes dubious claims about doing 20 reels per day. I let him bask in his self perceived glory and go through reels he supposedly did a full service on. He was bragging about getting a booth at the fishing expo here next month. He was turned away because he isn't a registered business or doesn't have a DBA.

Me in my natural environment. It's much more fun upstream of there though 😃

I used Cal's for some years but I'm not totally sold on it. I much prefer the way ACE-0 sticks to the gears, great stuff. Cal's is better for saltwater due to it's higher temp capability, perfect for fish that run hard and long distance. ACE-0 is good to about 200° less, but in freshwater it that isn't going to matter.

Some guys don't actually clean anything, but instead add more lubricant on top of the old stuff, then charge $20+ for a 10 minute hack job and claim they did a full service. It's quick and easy money, but it isn't going to build up the customer base. There are a lot, and I mean a lot of those guys out there.

A little bit of service this morning. I got some Shimano ACE-0, many of the Japanese swear by it with their small Ambassadeurs so I had to see what the hype was all about. I'll say, pretty impressive! The gearbox is now exceptionally quiet and the cranking action is super smooth. I emailed Shimano this morning to see if I can get it in a one pound tub, thinking this will be my go-to for the foreseeable future.

There's a risk of damage using any tool incorrectly. I can say I've serviced countless reels with these, never damaged a thing. As I stated above, they are not for short shaft spools like the examples you have provided. Of course there will be risk of damage in that case. There are other proper tools for those. Reels with a long tail shaft are what the pliers are used for.

You can get the bearing packer on eBay. I paid $35 shipped, but they can cost double depending on seller, so keep your eyes peeled. You can also use 90W gear oil. I opted for grease since I don't have to wait for thick gear oil to work its way past the bearing shields. If you look on YouTube, you can find the bearing packer in action.

KC Tools specializes in German hand tools. I buy most of my punches, pliers, and drivers from there. Knipex are by far my favorite pliers. All the way to the right is the pliers wrench, it fits perfectly to any nut or bolt. The flat jaw pliers on the left I use for forming metal, similar with the round nose which also work great for reinstalling torsion springs. The grabbing pliers on the middle are excellent for E clips or installing/removing parts in very tight spaces.

For what it's worth, those E clips can be bought in bulk from McMaster Carr. Abu Ambassadeurs use a M3 x 0.8mm. Daiwa driveshafts use a M4 x 1mm as does the kick lever in the clutch assembly. I ordered them about 5 years ago in packs of 50 for ~$7 each. I keep other sizes on hand as well. Another tool I love is the Arc Hobby bearing cleaner/packer. With some reels I like to use a NLGI 00 grease in the support bearings. This makes packing small bearings a breeze. The grease doesn't run out as quickly as oil and gives a very smooth feel. You aren't going to watch the handle spin forever, but you get a very smooth and connected feel.

The best is no longer made, they were made by a now defunct company named ReelSpeed. I was lucky to grab a set when Dawn at Smooth Drag had them in stock. They work great with any spool that has a long tail shaft, so this rules out some Daiwa models. For those Daiwas, I have the SLP tool, and also have a Hedgehog Tool just in case.

According to Palms, large trout in Hokkaido. I take it they're implying sea run rainbow (steelhead), Dolly Varden, white spotted char, and cherry salmon. All of which regularly approach the 30" mark. I got it primarily for fishing migratory steelhead, brown trout, and coho salmon in skinny Great Lakes tributaries.

New rod for fishing skinny creeks for big fish. Palms Egeria Native EFVC-53L+ 3-18g 3-10lb. This little bugger has tremendous backbone and a tip that'll throw whatever I need.

That's exactly how I do it too. Another tool I find valuable, round nose pliers. They're excellent for reinstalling torsion springs and reforming damaged spool edges.

This entirely depends on the person seeking service. Some people love a certain model so much, they want to keep it maintained since it's out of production and they can't get another. Others are buying higher end stuff and to them it is worth the cost to keep it maintained. Then there are the heirloom people, who are much like the first group I listed. They have something that was passed down to them that they would like to use and/or preserve. Occasionally, you get a guy that wants a bargain bin model serviced, and they get told every time to go buy another. If it won't be worth it to them, it isn't worth our time either.

Since you're using them for trolling, you should consider multicolor braid since you'll be able to get a rough calculation of how much line is out. This will let you find a happy medium between depth and speed so you can pull bait past suspended fish. You'll also get a much better calculation of how much line is on the spool. Much of the multicolor stuff is metered and will change color every 5 or 10m. Most of the Great Lakes guys use multicolor in the absence of a line counter.

I'm not DVT, but I'll chime in. The glaring things I often see are missing parts or parts not installed correctly, usually shims missing or the drag stack put back together incorrectly. I've also had some come in that were missing screws, or worse yet, screws forced into a spot it wasn't intended for. Then there is over greasing, and sometimes the wrong grease used as well. When I say the wrong grease, I'm implying white lithium. This was a popular grease used by reel services folks decades ago, some of the old timers still swear by it. It's messy and it hardens over time. It's fine in a pinch, as some lubrication is better than nothing, but if you leave it in there for a prolonged period of time, it will cause a headache.

Clinton River, from Dodge Park in Sterling Heights to Bloomer Park in Rochester.

I wouldn't be so quick to blame Pure Fishing, but who owns them instead. Outdoor Technologies Group was founded by Berkley as they started to acquire other brands, and changed their name to Pure Fishing in 2000. Outdoor Technologies Group, and by extension, Pure Fishing wasn't the devil we make them out to be. They still let their companies innovate and mostly stayed out of the way until Jarden took it over in 2007. That's when we started seeing concerted effort for outsourcing design and manufacture to other places and quality beginning to decline. Fast Forward to 2018, and Sycamore Partners purchased Pure Fishing from Jarden, putting us where we are now. When Sycamore took over, they mandated Abu stop producing parts for reels made prior to 1997, this made the lifetime warranties that came with some Abus null and void. Sycamore also made Abu scrap contracts with all small business partners that made unique Abu models or parts. For those not aware, Sycamore is a private investment firm with a reputation for selling off portions of companies or minimizing operations in order to generate income, sometimes leading to liquidation and bankruptcy. The most well known brand they bled dry was Bed Bath and Beyond, among others. Unfortunately, with the announcement that the Svangsta factory would be laying off over half of their workforce, I get the impression the goal is to reduce Abu to a brand only and do away with most anything coming out of Sweden.

I'm still fishing. I hung up the bass gear a few weeks ago, now it's steelhead time. Nothing more surreal than a quiet morning with the snow flying waiting for that bobber to drop.

I like my short rods, just ordered this Palms Egeria last night, should have it next week. I bought it for fishing skinny water for big lake run brown and rainbow trout, but it will work equally well for smallmouth in similar environments. I'll be running an Abu 2500C with an Avail 2540R spooled with #1.5 and an 8lb leader.