Spooling Problem?

[Brett's_daddy]

Okay, I took my new reels to my local tackle shop. I told the girl behind the counter I needed 3 casting reels spooled with line. She acted like she knew what she was doing and said no problem, i can do that for you. So we took the reels out back and she set the first reel up on the machine and clamped it down and then put the spool of line on the other side where a bar holds the spool on. After she was finished she said that it didn't spool on even and instead there was a bit of a cone shape to the line on the spool (more line on one side), she said that she did everything correctly and that the reel wound the line on. Is this going to be a problem for me? Should i take it somewhere else and have them re-spool it?

[kylek]

I would redo it if I were you.  Just do it yourself.  There are plenty of videos out there that show you how to do it.

[Brett's_daddy]

1 minute ago, kylek said:

I would redo it if I were you.  Just do it yourself.  There are plenty of videos out there that show you how to do it.

I hate to because I paid to have this done but if i have to I'll take it back and have the guy she said spool most of the casting reels do it again when he's in. Can they re-use the line? It's new line and wasn't cheap so if there's saving it I'd like to.

[kylek]

I imagine if you take it back to them and show them the problem they will get it taken care of.  As far as saving the line, I would tell them to replace it with fresh line at no cost.  

[Jon G]

Start spooling them yourself. It's pretty easy and you'll know that it's spooled correctly.

[rangerjockey]

The line is fine... walk it out and rewind it. The level wind will even it out.

[NHBull]

The football field down the road doubles as my spooling station.  It will take you 10 minutes and learning to do it is well worth it

 

[fishnkamp]

Yea spooling it yourself is best. However you purchased a reels worth of line. Fix it the easy way. Go to your local baseball field. Tie the end of the line to a pole, backstop or a seat.  Now loosen your drag so the line will come off the reel without hitting the spool release button ( this will make sure the line does not backlash all at once). Now walk backwards and lay the line on the grass.  Once you get to the knot reset the drag and walk forward and let the reel lay the line onto the spool correctly. This will give you a chance to add line conditioner on your line if you want to. 

I really like my old Berkley line station because I can spool my reels by letting the reel put the line in place correctly.

[WRB]

Most tackle shops offer free line spooling with line purchase. It sounds like the clerk didn't know to use a tool with a wire loop the assist the machine to keep the line level, there is a technique to doing it properly.

Just tie the line to something and walk off all the line on a lawn down to the spool then wind it back on using your reel

Tom

[new2BC4bass]

1 hour ago, rangerjockey said:

The line is fine... walk it out and rewind it. The level wind will even it out.

 

Usually, but not always.  I have a thread I started some time ago because a reel of mine stacks up on one side.  Straighten it out and the very next cast the same thing happens.  None of the suggestions I was given worked.  Nor were any of the things I was told to look for the cause....as far as I could see.  The reel had been tuned and upgraded and the professional said he didn't notice anything wrong with the reel when he went through it, and he is a very good guy.  So it will be going back for someone with more knowledge than I have to look at.  Hasn't gone back yet because I want to send a few other reels at the same time, but life has been taking my money for things other than fishing lately.

 

Please don't tell me it is my fault because I don't know what I am doing.  I have quite a few other reels and have absolutely no such problem with any of the others.  Any that came to me without line were spooled up by yours truly.  Actually the line that came with this reel still may be on it, but I have stripped most of the line off the reel and rewound it a couple times.  I've taken enough line off several other times and got it to wind evenly.  First cast it would still stack up on one side.

 

I hope to eventually know what the cause is, but can't help the OP at the moment.

[beardown34]

Brett is it braid/superline? Or something with memory like mono or fluoro. It sounds like you're not terribly comfortable respooling yourself. If it's braid there's nothing to worry about. But if it's line with memory,  and you're not comfortable spooling a reel, you can definitely end up wasting a bunch of line. 

 

In general i agree that it will be well worth it in the long haul to learn to spool your reels on your own.

[WRB]

The only thing that can cause line to pile up on one side more than the other is the spool isn't in,ine with the level wind. The level gear could be off to one side or the spool is off to one side. You can assist the level wind with your fingers by push the line towards the side that is smaller dismeter on the spool for a short term fix.

Tom

[Catt]

I worked as an in-house Pro at our Local Academy, the kids they hire know only what their training manuals tell them about hunting & fishing. If a problem raises when spooling a reel they have no experience to rely on to correct the problem.

 

Do it yourself... It aint hard

[Catt]

Berkley® Portable Line Spooling Station 

[Brett's_daddy]

On 7/3/2017 at 9:16 PM, beardown34 said:

Brett is it braid/superline? Or something with memory like mono or fluoro. It sounds like you're not terribly comfortable respooling yourself. If it's braid there's nothing to worry about. But if it's line with memory,  and you're not comfortable spooling a reel, you can definitely end up wasting a bunch of line. 

 

In general i agree that it will be well worth it in the long haul to learn to spool your reels on your own.

The worst one is spooled with a 12lb. Big Game mono base of about 30yds. and the bulk of the line is Seaguar Invizx 12lb. fluorocarbon. The next one looks better although still slightly uneven and that has a 30yd base of Big Game mone and the rest is Sunline Shooter Armilo Defier 17lb., The one with braid looks fine although to me it seems like the sales clerk didn't get enough braid on, again it has 30yd Big Game mono base with the rest being Sunline FX2 50lb. braid. She only got 75yds. of braid on plus the 30yds of mono base...that's only 105yds. of total line on a Daiwa tatula CT Type R which supposedly holds 160yds. of 12lb. mono but she showed me the spool and it looked pretty full, she asked if I wanted her to continue putting line on but I didn't want her to over-fill it so had her stop there.

[Brett's_daddy]

On 7/3/2017 at 7:11 PM, fishnkamp said:

Now loosen your drag so the line will come off the reel without hitting the spool release button ( this will make sure the line does not backlash all at once). Now walk backwards and lay the line on the grass.  Once you get to the knot reset the drag and walk forward and let the reel lay the line onto the spool correctly.

What do you reset the drag too?

[fishnkamp]

I always set my drag on a baitcaster around the 3/4 range. I need it to be able to release line if I pull hard on it but not so that I can not fight a fish. I never lock it all the way down or the fish can break off easier.  I run it a little looser on a reel with braid due to no stretch in the line.   It is almost a "feel" thing after years of fishing.  The only time I would lock the drag all the way down is on my punching rod. 

[Brett's_daddy]

4 minutes ago, fishnkamp said:

I always set my drag on a baitcaster around the 3/4 range

But you said to loosen the drag so the line comes of without having to push the spool release and once you get to the knot reset the drag...reset it to what? I should already have it to where the line can come out with a little tension on it right?

[fishnkamp]

I said to almost totally loosen the then so that is unspooled without hitting the release button. My purpose was only for the purpose to walk out the line and the put the line back on the reel smoothly using just the reel itself.  If you did not tighten up the drag you might turn the handle but the spool might not turn.

 

The reason for using a super light drag setting to accomplish this instead of hitting the release button is to avoid a major backlash. If the uneven line on the reel caused a problem while laying out the line you could easily create a bad enough backlash that your might have to cut it out.

This trick of laying out the line by loosening a drag and walking it out is useful not only to correct a line stacking issue ( what you have) but also I will do it if I have a reel with fluoro, copoly or mono that has not been used in a while and is causing memory issues. In that case I will loosen the drag, set the rod in the V of my front yard tree and walk out the line. i will then reset he drag to about where it was and I will apply line conditioner on a rag. I will walk the line applying conditioner and keep using a different par of the rag. This technique can clean and condition any type line. By doing so I can run the down the line really tight the last time and remove most of the line memory. I have been doing this for years. Remember I own over two dozen rods just for me. I normally have around 10 to 12 baitcasters and at least 2 or 3 spinning rods in my rod locker at any one time. Some of my rods do not get used often.

 

If you ever want to talk fishing issues on the phone we can do that sometime.  Sometimes it is easier.

[beardown34]

All he's saying is if you're going to strip the line off yourself, do it by loosening the drag until you can pull the line off easily by hand, as opposed to pushing the thumb bar and causing 125 yards of fluoro to go springing off.

All he's saying is if you're going to strip the line off yourself, do it by loosening the drag until you can pull the line off easily by hand, as opposed to pushing the thumb bar and causing 125 yards of fluoro to go springing off.

[Bucky205]

I think your normally better of doing it yourself on freshwater stuff.  I'm high tech, I've got a soda bottle cap with a 3" bolt run through it. I screw the cap on to an empty bottle and use a cordless drill to remove the old line, I unscrew my cap and throw line and bottle away.  You can buy a piece of bunji cord for less than $1 to use as a spindle. Insert the bunji through the new  line spool and you can find tons of places hook it to feed line. If you want an automatic line tensioner adjust the bunji. If for whatever reason your saving your line, put a piece of tape on the line bottle and store it, bottle can be converted to spindle to re-spool. Did I mention I'm cheap?

[MickD]

The level wind guide on most reels is about 6mm diameter, 1/4 inch, much larger than the line diameter.  What she did was not pay attention to the process and the line was against one side of the guide or the other for the whole process.  This is really not a big deal.  I'll bet if you fished it for a few days it would all even out.  But if you simply go to a ball field, take it off, and reel it back in, what happened to her could happen to you unless you pay attention and correct the line lay a few times while reeling it in.  By correcting the line lay I mean consciously making the line run against the side of the guide that is coming up lean on line.  This is not difficult and will work fine.  Regardless of reel brand or line type.

 

This thing is getting really "overthought," in my opinion.

[Brett's_daddy]

Going with the soda bottle and I bolt idea but putting a twist on it. Instead of tying my line to a goal post or something and walking until I have unwound the whole spool and start to re-spool it by reeling in slowly and moving with it until I get to the goal post again where it should be theoretically respooled the correct way...how about drilling a hole in a bottle cap, putting an I bolt in the cap, fillthe bottle completely with water and screw on the cap with the bolt, tie my line to that and walk it out until I get to the knot but instead of me actually moving towards the end of my line just standing there and reeling the bottle full of water in to me...would that create enough tension to spool the reel correctly or should it really be me moving towards the end?

[WRB]

Just run the line between your thumb and index finger tips to put enough tension on the line. You should be doing this whenever you rewind line back on the reel after a backlash or whatever. Move your finger at the same pace the level wind is running back and forth to keep the line even. With braid wear a cotton glove to prevent the line burning your fingers, not needed with mono or FC.

Tom

[beardown34]

 

If you've seen my recent posts on wacky rig and chicken rig modifications, you'll see that I've been accused of making things too complicated. But this discussion is barreling off the rails! I agree with MickD, you're probably overthinking it. Practice with the braided line reel first. If I need to unwind and respool some line, I usually just sit down while watching tv and do it during commercials. Takes a couple minutes.