Reel Repairs

[Relentless Charters]

I have been using different reels for deep watrer jigging on Stellwagen Bank over the years and want to continue to provide the best quality tackle I can for our clients. We use to use the Penn 113 (Old Reliable) which many customers liked but wanted a higher gear ratio. We shifted to the Torium 30 but had some issues and started using the Avet LX gold reels 6/1 ratio. Overall liked the reels but after about 20 trips the bearings would start to grind. Avet has a good program where we sent them out and a rebuild was $35.00 and now $39.00 plus shipping. The issue was the time they were away from the boat.

Last year we shifted to a Daiwa Saltist BG40 which is also 6:1 ratio and initially held up good. However we are finding these are failing after about 20-25 trips of deep jigging.

I am going to start to work on my reels myself. I have been all over Alan's website and have ordered new drag washers and bearings for the Avets and Daiwas. Once I get them I want to measure all of the bearings so I can obtain locally. My goal is once a reel starts to get stiff I will be able to take apart, clean, replace or clean bearings, grease and put back together. The ultimate goal is to continue to hand out the best tackle for customers who are paying me to take them fishing.

Has anyone here done these reels themselves and do you have any advice you can offer. We will not tolerate inadequate equipment on board RELENTLESS.

Thank You,

Dave

[dfish28]

One thing I can chime in on here is with the saltist LW is that sometimes with a good snag you my find that you smoke the level wind gear opposite the handle side(it's plastic gears from small to large) and get bits of teeth jammed up in the housing, called daiwa and explained the problem and they sent me a new one free of charge!! Can't really complain with that, knock on wood no other problems yet, and if it weren't for heavy braid , probably wouldn't have that problem either... Touriums - bad races on bearings... Still have a 16 apart in my shed cuz of such... My 975 after 15 years finally stopped having infinite anti reverse - imma send that out this winter, good luck with the service, let us know how it works out!!

[tropics]

Capt. Dave You have Richie from Jersey Hooker does a great job and George from G&B both sponsors here.
The biggest problem with your Avets could be someone is over tightening the drag.

[Gerry Zagorski]

Dave - check your PMs.

Gerry

[MrAC1980]

I strip down all my Avets even brand new ones right out of the box. I grease the crap out of the entire reel and dip all the bearings in TSI oil really good. I'd even recommend that stuff on any reel bearing! You can get away with just dipping new bearings, but ones of a used reel you'll have to remove the shields and clean out really well with brake cleaner or similar and blow out with compressed air, then dip in TSI oil. Then coat the carbon fiber drag with Cal's Grease and rub off as much as you can, when you think you've gotten enough off, rub them even more, haha. I've found a good microfiber towel works really well for this. And have never had a problem!

http://detectorbuy.com/TSI-301-11-8-oz-Can-301-11.htm?categoryId=-1

And Adam, I'll buy all the Toriums off of you, even in pieces! I've had very good luck servicing them as well. I do the same as above, but I also upgrade the ani-reverse dogs to the Ambassador style dogs. It adds a clicking sound to the reel, but they will never fail again!