Lew’s Tournament Pro Spool noise

[Tatulatard]

Here is an abu swing arm centrifugal spool.  See how the brakes are free to swing down and away from the spool?  They do that one by one as the spool rotates and smack the friction plate.  The abu spool has the hindge mounted on the outer spool rim so they fall out when they are near the bottom of the spool.  The lews swing arms are hindged near the center of the spool and fall down/away from the spool and strike the friction plate when near the top of the spool. With the lews, as the spool rotates a new brake moves to the top position and falls on to the plate making the noise.  Notice how its tied to spool speed in the video?  The time between ticks slows as the spool slows because it's taking longer for the next brake to reach the top position as the spool slows.

[PhishLI]

2 hours ago, Phil77 said:

throw my experience right out the window. 

Phil,

 

 Breathe in. Breathe out slowly. Nobody is disregarding you outright. K? Think about the parts in play once the clutch is depressed. Other than 2 bearings the only thing left to make any sound is the brake blocks swinging freely. Nothing else is part of the equation. If there aren't issues if/when the OP fishes with it then there are no issues. He won't burst into flames if he gives it a whirl, and as long as he doesn't drop it on concrete he'll be able to return it easily. Hopefully he's happy.

[Phil77]

49 minutes ago, Tatulatard said:

Here is an abu swing arm centrifugal spool.  See how the brakes are free to swing down and away from the spool?  They do that one by one as the spool rotates and smack the friction plate.  The abu spool has the hindge mounted on the outer spool rim so they fall out when they are near the bottom of the spool.  The lews swing arms are hindged near the center of the spool and fall down/away from the spool and strike the friction plate when near the top of the spool. With the lews, as the spool rotates a new brake moves to the top position and falls on to the plate making the noise.  Notice how its tied to spool speed in the video?  The time between ticks slows as the spool slows because it's taking longer for the next brake to reach the top position as the spool slows.

I have two of those reels, one just like the pic and the Ike version with the 6 arms and for the umpteenth time it doesn't make any noise. But hey you're the expert.

[Boogey Man]

1 hour ago, Tatulatard said:

Here is an abu swing arm centrifugal spool.  See how the brakes are free to swing down and away from the spool?  They do that one by one as the spool rotates and smack the friction plate.  The abu spool has the hindge mounted on the outer spool rim so they fall out when they are near the bottom of the spool.  The lews swing arms are hindged near the center of the spool and fall down/away from the spool and strike the friction plate when near the top of the spool. With the lews, as the spool rotates a new brake moves to the top position and falls on to the plate making the noise.  Notice how its tied to spool speed in the video?  The time between ticks slows as the spool slows because it's taking longer for the next brake to reach the top position as the spool slows.

On that type of braking system the brake ring\race is mounted on the palming plate, so when the spool turns the brake arms "fly" out making contact with it. So at high speeds the arms are already making contact with the brake race, not faling into it at the top or bottom of the spool rotation. If anything as the spool slows they would be moving back toward the spool (away from the brake race) as the spool slows. 

 

If that was in fact causing the noise, out on the water when all is quiet, and on a slow retrieve like dragging a jig or C-rig, all you'd hear is the clinkity-clinkity of tiny plastic brake arms?

[Tatulatard]

10 hours ago, Boogey Man said:

On that type of braking system the brake ring\race is mounted on the palming plate, so when the spool turns the brake arms "fly" out making contact with it. So at high speeds the arms are already making contact with the brake race, not faling into it at the top or bottom of the spool rotation. If anything as the spool slows they would be moving back toward the spool (away from the brake race) as the spool slows. 

 

If that was in fact causing the noise, out on the water when all is quiet, and on a slow retrieve like dragging a jig or C-rig, all you'd hear is the clinkity-clinkity of tiny plastic brake arms?

Yes.  You and I are basically saying the same thing I think.  

 

1. The brake arms fly out with centrifugal forces at speed and rub on the friction plate.  At very slow speeds like we see in the video the arms are brought out initially by centrifugal forces and but are also free to swing back in when acted upon by gravity as the spool spinning slows to a point no longer sufficient to maintain the centrifugal forces necessary to keep them out.  The noise is the product of either the brakes at the top of the spool falling into the friction plate or, more likely, when they pull off the plate at the bottom of the spool and hit the spool rim.  With the abu ivcb the noise happens when the brakes near the bottom of the spool hit the friction plate but abu brakes are hindged at the spool rim and the lews are hindged at the spool center making it more likely that the noise is occurring from the brake returning to the resting position.

 

 

2. Yes you will absolutely hear the same noise if OP turns smacks the handle and as the spool and handle slow you will hear the sound of the brakes that had flown out falling back into place.  You will not hear it steadily cranking on the handle because there is either enough spool speed to keep the brake arms out from the spool and in contact with the race or insufficient spools speed to swing them out depending of reel ratio and handle turning speed.

 

The noise the OP has been experiencing across two of the same reels (remember he exchanged one already for the same "issue") is the sound of the swing arm centrifugal brakes falling back into the resting position and hitting the spool side after having been thrown out by the centrifugal forces from the spool flick.  As the spool slows to the stop the brakes that were all flung out by the spool flick drop back into place one by one as they reach a position on the spool where gravity can pull them back down in the spools rotation because once they fly out, they are stuck out until they can fall back down.  Because they are hindged at the spool center they call fall back down only at the bottom portion of the spool.   

 

Notice how the intervals between ticks increases as the spool slows?  Thats because it takes longer for each brake to reach the position where it can be pulled down by gravity and back into the resting position. 

 

Notice how you hear no more than 6 ticks at most per OP's spool flicks?  That's because there are 6 brakes.  Also notice how there is an initial soft tick right after OP flicks the spool?  That is the sound of the brakes flying out in unison and hitting the race.  As the spool slows you then hear the 6 ticks of the brakes falling back down one by one.

 

If you really wanted to anyone with this brake can remove the side plate from the spool and give the spool a good hard flick (careful not to let it fall out) while keeping the reel level and you can observe the brakes flay out and then fall back down as the spool slows to a stop just like in the OP's video.

 

Edit: maybe flicking the spool without the bearing support of the side plate is not going to work.  Will likely just drive the spool into the frame opening.  You can quickly turn and stop the handle to get the brakes to fly out then very slowly rotate the handle and watch the brakes fall back down.  Be careful to not allow the spool to pull out and lose pinon support unless this model has that pinon support bushing.

[PhishLI]

31 minutes ago, Tatulatard said:

The noise the OP has been experiencing across two of the same reels (remember he exchanged one already for the same "issue") is the sound of the swing arm centrifugal brakes falling back into the resting position and hitting the spool side after having been thrown out by the centrifugal forces from the spool flick.

I believe you've nailed this.

 

Last night I began by just fishing, not doing detective work, but decided to look into this before I quit. While I was just fishing I began with doing short work. Maybe 60 foot casts into a pad field and crawling my baits. By the time I went into detective mode at the end of the night the 30 lb J8 braid I have spooled on was already saturated. Slow reeling with very little line out revealed nothing. However, after I bombed out a 1 oz Dark Sleeper into open water which nearly spooled the reel, and with the reel held near my head and cranked at different speeds I could hear the blocks returning to rest against the nearly empty spool. Without wet line filled to the rim to dampen the spool this is detectable. It's a big "so what" to me. My TP LFS casts fine, works, fine, and is fine.

 

So that's that. 

[Tatulatard]

8 minutes ago, PhishLI said:

I believe you've nailed this.

 

Last night I began by just fishing, not doing detective work, but decided to look into this before I quit. While I was just fishing I began with doing short work. Maybe 60 foot casts into a pad field and crawling my baits. By the time I went into detective mode at the end of the night the 30 lb J8 braid I have spooled on was already saturated. Slow reeling with very little line out revealed nothing. However, after I bombed out a 1 oz Dark Sleeper into open water which nearly spooled the reel, and with the reel held near my head and cranked at different speeds I could hear the blocks returning to rest against the nearly empty spool. Without wet line filled to the rim to dampen the spool this is detectable. It's a big "so what" to me. My TP LFS casts fine, works, fine, and is fine.

 

So that's that. 

I want to try a lews reel and this, comically named "quiet cast" centrifugal brake has caught my interest.  What is the best time and place to get one of these for as close to $100 as possible?  I'm in no hurry.  I can wait months until a seasonal sale.

 

Also @newapti5 nailed it on the 2nd post.  

 

[PhishLI]

32 minutes ago, Tatulatard said:

I want to try a lews reel and this, comically named "quiet cast" centrifugal brake has caught my interest.

It's actually very quiet on the cast though. No zip. Aside from a situation where this "sound" is barely detectable with a near empty spool, it's a quiet reel.

32 minutes ago, Tatulatard said:

What is the best time and place to get one of these for as close to $100 as possible? 

The best deal on a TP LFS, which AFAIK is the entry level ACB Lew's reel, was $139 at the place that outfits sportsmen, but that was 2 years ago. The lowest I've seen them since is about $160. Well worth it, IMO. If I were forced to bring only one centrifugal do-everything reel I own on a trip this would be the one. If you're expecting Zillion G tomb-like quiet and smoothness you won't find it here, but it's such a fantastic caster across a range of baits that I really don't care. Whatever it isn't is forgivable. It's hard to beat. Personally speaking, if the shiny brand had this braking system I'd be totally on board. Perhaps they'll fix that one day. In the meantime my next reel with be a Custom Pro SLP.

[PhishLI]

On 4/20/2022 at 12:59 AM, newapti5 said:

That's normal. Tournament Pro's brake shoes can't be locked, so when you spin the spool, all six brake shoes will spread out because of centrifugal force. When the spool slows down, those six brake shoes will fall into resting position one by one, making that "noise."

Yup.

 

No further need to speculate about this phenomenon, or to become more unraveled than usual.

 

I stopped into the best place around here for gear. They have everything on display. There was a Hypermag on sale, so I fiddled with it. I decided to browse the instructions and found the insert pictured below. So that's that.

 

[MiceNReets]

2 hours ago, PhishLI said:

Yup.

 

No further need to speculate about this phenomenon, or to become more unraveled than usual.

 

I stopped into the best place around here for gear. They have everything on display. There was a Hypermag on sale, so I fiddled with it. I decided to browse the instructions and found the insert pictured below. So that's that.