Critical parts for maintaining your reels
Here are some tips, if you decide to take your reel apart for cleaning and maintaining yourself.
These are the retaining clips that hold the bearings in place. Usually octagon shaped. Removing the clip is fairly simple. Put your forefinger over the bearing clip, use a pair of tweezers and grab hold of the clip, slide the tweezers ends toward the open end of the clip and pull the end of the clip in and lift out the clip. All the while, keeping your fore finger over the clip. Be careful, they sometimes take on a life of their own.
Same principle applies. Put your forefinger over the bearing cavity, using tweezers install the back of the bearing clip and one side and then slide the tweezers up towards the open end of the clip pull in and push down. That's all there is to it.
Unfold a paper clip, bend one end at a right angle, small enough to fit inside the bearing. Now, you have a bearing puller. Insert the right angle inside the bearing and lift out. Paper clip makes a great tool.
Position the bearing over bearing cavity. Using your forefinger apply even pressure to seat the bearing. Never hit or use heavy force to seat the bearing. The tolerance between the outside of bearing and the inside of the bearing cavity is very close.
Cleanliness and care of bearings is very important. Clean bearings in a bottle cap with Lighter fluid or Acetone in it. Swish bearings around until clean. Air dry on a towel. Spin the bearing on the end of a screwdriver to ensure they are spinning freely. Apply one drop of oil per bearing.
It is not a good idea to use chemicals on reels and this is why....The use of harsh chemicals such as gasoline on plastic parts in reels may not show up until later. The chemicals can corrode parts. Use of a bio-degradable cleaner is highly recommended to clean reels and parts.
These are located in the left side plate of the reel and inside the Cast Control Cap, they may be round or rectangular in shape. From time to time, they will get dented due to the tightening of the Cast Control Cap causing the spool shaft ends to indent the insulator. Check them and turn them over so the smooth side will be in contact with spool shaft ends.
They are actually called Drag Spring Washers. These two washers should always be mounted like this ( ) one curved up and one curved down. This is necessary for compression when the star drag is tightened down.
These clips are shaped like an E. Remove by positioning your forefinger over them. Insert one tip of open tweezers into the back of the E, pull out just a tad until you are able to grab hold of the clip with the tweezers completely to remove it. Be sure to hold your finger over the clip until you get a good bite on it with tweezers.
The application of grease is important. Grease should be applied at the base of the gear teeth so when the teeth of the gears mesh together, the grease is being used as intended. Wiping the outside of gears with grease will cause the grease to splatter inside of the reel and not be on the teeth where it is supposed to be. Grease with a good temperature rating is preferred. Never use Vaseline.
Line Guide
It is the piece at the front of reel with an eyelet that line is threaded from the reel spool to the rod. The line guide travels back and forth on the worm gear. It holds the line guide pawl.
This small piece is mounted in the cavity on the line guide and held in place by a cap. The pawl travels between the flattened teeth of the worm gear. If the pawl is hanging up or stopping on one side of the reel, remove and inspect it. Examine the sides looking for scratches and gouges. The tips will be worn and not sharply pointed. The worm gear may have burrs or scratches also on the flattened teeth. Generally, it is a good idea to replace both of these at the same time.
With braided line on the spool, and if the drag will not tighten down like you want it to. The solution to this problem is to spool at least 10-15 yards of mono-filament line on the spool first, then tie the braided line to the mono-filament.
It has some very unique properties not found in ordinary reel oils. Its low viscosity allows for an extremely free rotation of the crank handle and a lightning-fast Free Spool that may scare you. Special additives cause the lubricant to bond at the molecular level with the base metal providing superior corrosion protection and a lubrication bond that remains.
As the handle is turned in the retrieve mode, the pinion sets down on the spool shaft. If retrieve is started prior to lure landing, the pinion doesn't get a chance to seat on the spool shaft. After a period of time, there will be a clatter click and that is the pinion trying to seat on the spool shaft. The pinion stops the spool rotation, if the pinion does not seated correctly, the fish will be hauling off and you probably can't turn or stop the get-away.
