submerged fishing reel - treatment?

[cooky]

I was out fishing on Sunday morning with friends and my boat came with two of those Berkley quick release rod holders. I stopped using them because almost lost a rod/reel while bottom fishing - even on tightest setting the pressure would pull the holder down. Anyway was trolling and wanted a wider spread so thought I'd use these to have a rod each side of boat sticking out at right angles - I tested with hand the horizontal pull and seemed fine. Well I'll be f**ked but after about 20 minutes my mate says "what was that" - I look back and see rod / reel in water about 5 metres behind boat and we're heading at 6/7kts - yell to other mate to swing us around and hit the MOB on GPS. After my initial panic I remember that I;m using 3 Halco Laserpro lures (they float). Funny enough we retrieved the other 2 lures immediately (one bright blue and one gold), but this one took over half hour to find - murphys law picked the white one with red head. Apart from it being choppy (whitecaps) there seemed to be Cuttle fish remains in the water everywhere (white). Didn't help that I hadn't had it far from the boat so it was just under the water not floating on top.

Learnt a lesson, but have rod/reel back. Is there any recommended solutions now? is my reel now buggered or should I just take it in for a service?

[mjc85]

Well what sort of reel is it ? Best solution would be to open it up and leave it open to dry out and get to a service person ASAP. If you leave it closed and there is water inside, there is a much greater chance the internals will start ot rust and corrode.

[szopen]

First flush it generously with fresh water.
Open.
Flush inside with fresh water again.

Use compressed air to dry the insides (it actually blows the water out), use some WD40 (it remowes the moisture), leave it for a day and than relubricate the reel.

Should be as good as before, not a big problem.

[Duyz72]

Depends on what type of reel you have.

On the weekend my Egg Beater type reel took a few dunks in the surf.
I have opened it all up and taken it completely apart, every screw, nut, plate and gear and taken off all the line. I washed it all in warm soapy water (I used napisan) gave all the parts a darn good scrub with a face washer, rinsed in plain water and let it dry. Then I washed it all in Mineral Turps to dissolve any grease or oil and shift any salt, sand etc caught in it (this is awesome for bearings, mine had a bit of sand in it, you could hear it as it turned and now it spins like there is no tomrrow! You just plonk what you want degreased in to a plastic container with turps in it, lid on top and shake it all about!) Then let it dry, used a paint brush (new not used) to brush out any dust or small sand particles which may have been missed.
Then I sprayed it all with WD40, wiped it all down. Put it all back together, repacked the bearings and internals with grease, WD40'd all the screws etc as I put the remaining reel back together and is good as new. I also respooled.

But I am very comfortable with Spinning Reels, if I did it to my overhead I'd just give it all a good wash and take it in for a service. Maybe in a few years after I tinker with the overheads I will be more comfy with pulling one apart lol.

[szopen]

I am also much more comfortable with spinning reels maintenance but overheads are not that much more complicated.

Good diagrams help a lot.

[mjc85]

Well yeh it depends what reel he is talking about, some reels can be a complete nightmare with those stupid little springs etc. that all pop out. Just make sure you have the schematics or you know what you are doing. Also watch for them little springs and the other little parts, they can fall out without you noticing leaving you with a reel that doesn't work properly and those little bits can be a pain to get another one and costly

[Jeremy87]

Strip the whole thing down asap, soak it in shelite, do not wash it with water and don't let it dry cause you'll get salt crystals in the bearings. Manufacturers strongly advise against flushing any reel with fresh water (see shimano warrenty form) as it only pushes salt thurther into the bearings.

[Duyz72]

Jeremy - do you prefer shellite over turps or even thinners for any reason in particular?

[Duyz72]

By the way, if you do lose a tiny spring, screw etc put a message up on the chat board, you will probably find someone has one around. I've got a few containers of internal workings, bail arms, rollers, screws, gears, cogs etc salvaged from old and unwanted reels, all preserved for possible future use. All sprayed with WD40 and sealed.

I dare say many people here do too.
I figure that most things like screws would be pretty much transferable to other reels so I keep all that is in good condition and store well.

[land-lubber]

yep, most of the above will work, when repacking the reel with grease, make sure u use reel grease from ur takle shop and NOT CAR BEARING GREASE. this will make the reel sluggish as it is not viscous enough for the more finese/ less friction applications. also, u should probably use bearing oil for th bearings with a light coat of grease, as even reel grease will make the bearings sluggish.
i do this with all my reels at least every 6 months as i abuse the s@#$ out of my reels in the surf and off the rocks (clean after each session of course) anyway, hope that helps

BTW, anyone feel free to correct me if im wrong, id love to hear ur ideas too

[Jeremy87]

I use shelite as i was recommended it initially but turps would do fine, thinners is probably a little bit too potent for my liking. Light oil for gears and bearings cause grease will just slow your reel down dramatically. I've finally managed to kill my samarai 7i as it keeps ending up in the drink when i'm canoeing.

[banshee]

I'm with Jeremy,Shellite/White Spirit is the best thing I've found to clean reels down (also what Jack Erskine recomends for cleaning drag washers) it leaves the metal bits and other pieces perfectly dry,oil free and clean once it evapourates ,this in turn will have any lubricants used adhearing to gears etc and not being flung off.Open bearings can be packed/oiled after the shellite has evapourated and closed bearings can be placed in a tablespoon of fine machine oil and heated on the stove top (must have understanding or absent missus),bubbles can be seen comming out of the bearing in most cases when the right temp is reached,just be carefull not to go to far if there are any non metal seals,remove the spoon and as it cools it will suck in the oil.In my opinion any reel that you value should be completely striped down and scrubed out with shellite and a tooth brush if it's gone to the bottom,Alvey's would be the only exception.

[gunna]

Also make yourself up some lanyards to secure the rods to the boats when trolling. Bit obvious now - sorry .

[cooky]

thanks for the help - baitcaster is the type.

lanyards for trolling - think i might in the future, either that or tie a little float on the butt.

[nonibbles]

Also make yourself up some lanyards to secure the rods to the boats when trolling. Bit obvious now - sorry .

Yeah and don't let a mate convince you that you don't need 'em. A mate of mine did that and the next time we went fishing together he borrowed my rod and reel and something took it for a swim. Lucky the float was still on it, hey Pete?

A full strip down of the reel, good workout with the wd40 and tooth brush to get everything moving again, degreaser assemble inners (so not so slippery when putting the bugger back together - especially those little circlips that abu like to use) and wd40 again put the outers on and wind a few times to work it all through. Make sure that the felt/teflon drag washers dry before reassembling though - no oil or moisture of any type otherwise you'll get bumpy drag syndrome!