Service with a Smile

We have all been on a trip and hooked what we thought to be the fish of a lifetime and as it gets to the boat and takes one last desperate dash “zzzzzzz” the drag seizes and “SNAP”, your line pops, leaving you with a slack line and a heavy heart.

Reel maintenance is of vital importance and even more so nowadays with the current economic crisis we are in with even basic tackle becoming really expensive.
Servicing fishing reels for many, is a time consuming, confusing, and frustrating pastime which often gets neglected and very often leads to expensive parts needing to be replaced or even worse having to throw your lucky reel away. A lot also depends on the type of fishing you do, rock and surf, hard-core wading to those outer sandbanks, kayak fishing, estuarine boat angling or bank angling in freshwater. 

I make specific reference to kayak angling here which basically means that at some stage during a fishing outing your reels will be subjected to an extra soaking of salt water (or fish blood at times) either when you launch, paddling in conditions when there is a bit of swell around or when beaching with fish in the hatch. If I have been fishing particularly hard then I open my reels up and do a full service at least once a month, the same will go with those mad keen folks that wade and where their tackle spends more time under water than above.

(By full service I mean a thorough going over of all working parts, bearings are checked and corrosion inside the main body removed and a total re-grease of drag washers.)
Salt water is particularly damaging to anything metal but there are a few things that require very little input, that go a long way for basic equipment care, and also that make the life of the guys that do service reels a little easier. One of these is a simple spray bottle with a very small amount of dishwashing liquid or salt assassin mixed with fresh water, as soon as you are done fishing for the day, tighten your drag to almost full lock and spray the reel body and other external moving parts (taking care not to spray your fishing line or braid). Once this is done loosen the drag almost fully and let the reel air-dry. This to prevent drag washers from being compressed. One thing to keep in mind is to never store your reel in a damp container or inside its protective neoprene cover if it is wet, as even a slight amount of moisture could prove disastrous for your next fishing trip.
Lubrication is also used to prevent or slow down corrosion, and to seal against the entry of water and debris.

When reels are used in particular in a saltwater environment there tends to be a lot of salt residue build up inside the reel housing and even if the reel is well greased this build up will find a spot to work its way through the metal housing.