hey guys ,,just got me reels out to give em a clean and service cause most of em will go sleepies for winter ,,,i have 4 viva reels ,when i pulled them apart they didnt have a skerick of grease or lube in em ,,,so all you guys should check all your reels just in case they are the same ,,,

I check mine on a regular basics and I am not going to store them away but try and go fishing during this time.

Reels should not have grease in them !

Only a very fine smear as the grease hinders performance by obstructing parts from moving.

Instead of grease to service reels use a few drops of machine oil

jason if you're refering to those pink reels I sent up for the girls ??

Well they're only part of a cheap kids combo set & not a very well put together reel

no can't agree J.G.with the modern bearings they are using in reels today a great deal of care needs to be taken with them so a good coating of grease is needed to keep the salt water out a thin coat oil is not good enough in my book

Umm, I was assuming that jas was talking about the gear drives and not the bearing??

Yes he was Rumpus cause there's not much chance he could see what's inside the bearings

poly fishing reels dont operate @ high temps as do bearings on a car & there's no need to pack them up with grease all you need is a lubricant cause if you back to much gease into a reel it's about as usefull as tits are on a bull.

Reels dont have seals in them to stop the grease from escaping

I would have thought the grease would also trap any dirt / contaminments inside and cause more wear..

Bearings, even in high speed and high temp applications should also have only a smear of grease, enough so that the bearing runs on it and not metal to metal contact but it should never be over used.

Yep the grease on bearings inside the reels do trap foriegn matter.

The other month I pulled apart a few 100 reels & was shocked @ the condition of some of them.

Guys treat their tackle like sh*t found sand particles in alot of the bearings & inside the reels as well & these guys have a big bitch if warranty is deny'd to them

every thing said so far is very true, and as u say j.g the reels are not sealed, so salt water can get in as well as grease getting out, now don't get me wrong i am not saying that u have to pack the reel full of grease just a good coating on the parts to protect them from the salt, as for reels full of gunk, to me thats bad maintenance is it not ???????

poly I to open up brand new reels all the time just to see how they're put together & how they work.

None of those reels a packed with grease & with good reasons only a light smear & nothing more.

As far as salt getting in ??

Well I learnt my lesson many years ago esp with those Shimano Baitrunners I'd go through @ least one every season due to salt corrosion

Haven't pulled any of their newer models apart but the older models were bloody hopeless

One thing I can say for the Browning/Viva reels though is they do have covers added to them to make them a lot better to resist salt from getting into the reels body.

Again this is only good if peeps take care of their reels & not treat them like crap.

Biggest prob I think is that peeps tend to just hose down their gear after use.

I just got back from my oldies place & the reason I was their was to wash down all the gear from yesterday as I was buggered last night.

I sponge down the outfits with warm soapy water to remove any salt , then the hose is turned on with only a fine mist spray coming from the hose & that's only to get rid of the suds.

If you hose down your gear with a hose under pressure all you do is force the salt into the reel itself & that's when they start to corrode

i was talkin about every moving part in the reel ,,i agree with poly ,,,but all bearings should be sealed anyway ide rather have my bearings full of grease so that they keep the sand and dirt on the outside not let it get in and wreck everything else ,,yeah i realise the pink reels were only cheapies but if ya look after them they should last ,,,,when i pulled apart the viva baitcaster you gave me nearly half of the gears were plastic ,and that worries me a little ,,

That reel is not a baitcaster nor is it a viva made reel but a bad venture gone wrong

I also told you this as well as telling you the reel was only good for droping a bait down & by no means was it a baitcastor even though it may have had baitcastor written on it.

For starters a true baitcaster does not have a ratchet setup & that one did
Baitcastors are meant to cast lures etc with so dont have the need for a ratchet

well did i get it wrong then ,,,oh it dont have a ratchet no more ,plus it has the viva name on it ,,,wouldnt do much for sales if it was as bad as you say then

Yeah viva lost some money on those reels

Still new ones on the shelves but they wont be sold

Suppose it's all in the learning curb & with expirience you get wiser & better

When you've got retailers screaming @ you for cheap products that's what happens you give them crap & in the end pay for it.
Those reels aren't that bad think there's a pic of me fighting a fish using that reel in one of the reports.
Drag system is pretty smooth & so's the reel but I only ran 4 kg line on it prob is people who buy them would run say 20 lb line & lock them up & that sort of punishment can rattle even the better quality reels.

yeah i disconected the ratchet and it casts great as a baitcaster ,,,