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Speedia Centrepin

G

Gareth Boycott

Active Member
Looking for a bit of advice if possible. Managed to get a second hand Speedia centrepin on Ebay this week. It's well used but seems to be in good working order. My question is, how long (roughly) should it spin? I haven't had chance to oil the spindle etc yet. It spins for around 10 seconds or so at the moment, I'm guessing it should be a bit longer than this? If anyone has any tips etc on how to restore/improve the reel it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Gareth
 
It should do better than that Gareth, my wide drum Speedia will spin for about 45 seconds with a good push.

Check the end float of the spool, if the grub screw is wound all the way in that may indicate a problem. Also check whether the spindle has been greased, I bought a Mordex Merlin last year that was so thick with grease it could hardly move. Clean the spindle with a good degreaser, and also the hole that the spindle fits in, and check for good clearance between spool and backplate. Then put on a couple of drops of very light oil on the spindle before refitting the spool, should improve things.
 
Excellent advice from Peter, Gareth. However, before calling up Garry Mills you can try the following:

Remove any line from the spool then get some white spirit and pour it into the centre boss. I have a compressor with an air blower and I use that to flush out any residual crud in the boss, though you could try a cotton bud and just keep pouring the WS into the boss. Get an old toothbrush and then dip it in white spirit and clean all around the centreboss, line lays, handles and then do the same to all the parts attached to the back plate. In fact, just clean the whole reel this way. Once your happy that it's clean, a couple of drops of sewing machine oil or 3-in-1 into the centre boss.

And then hey-presto, Robert should be your father's brother.

Works for me anyhow. Unless of coarse there's some spindle play or worn ratchet and then you back to where you were with peter's reccomendation.
 
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Hi Gareth,

Nice to see you have moved over to the dark side. It's a slippery slope my friend as Cat will assure you. I dread to think of how much I have spent on these things?

If you are using it for trotting purposes then it would need to revolve without too much resistance, say for 30 seconds at least. If you give it a clean up as above or with a good spray with WD40 and then wipe clean it should be ok. If not then Gary Mills it is!

I'll have to bring you down a selection of my home made trotting floats to try out.

Best regards,

Jeff
 
Hi Gareth,

I am sure Gary Mills will do a sound job but a little more local to you is Ringwood tackle. Drop it into Rich and ask him if he would pass it onto John Baldwin. Johns a local old boy who is a 'wizzz centre pin engineer'
He will sort it for you.

Regards John.
 
Apologies for jumping in on your thread Gareth, but I have a Speedia as well, and while mine spins well and is wobble free, the finish is a bit of a disaster. I left it for years in a standard plastic reel case, and the garage flat roof leaked (wretched kids :mad:) and the poor reel suffered. The black wrinkle effect paint is coming off the face and edge of the spool, with little areas of white corrosion where the alloy has been got at by the damp :(

Any decent fixes for this? I assume it is a very common problem. I am not into the 'rub it down, leave it bare metal' look, and besides, that would allow the corrosion to continue unabated....any ideas?.... finishers who can?

I don't believe they are aluminium, so they won't take anodising, and not ferrous, so difficult to powder coat, and the heat of stoving a decent paint would 'ugger things....Gawd :p

Cheers, Dave.
 
david
if you clean off all the loose paint and sand down to smooth the paint i would use is the smooth hammerite paint in black with a fine brush this dries really nice and smooth just dont put too much on in one go
test on a small area out of site first but it shouldnt react badly with it
id also practise with thickness on something else first ive painted over rubbed down badly corroded rough stuff before and have been well impressed with the finish after
let us know how you get on if you try it
 
I have two bare metal Speedias. I shouldn't worry too much about corrosion; so long as its kept dry ( apart from when fishing, obviously) then it will be fine. And a good polish every once in a while makes it look pretty smart.If you do paint it then personally I'd avoid gloss as this just shouts restoration and looks rather nasty, too. However, The draw back of matt paint is that it's not as durable as gloss. If you want it too look as good as possible then a full strip down and sprayed finish will be as close to original as possible but then the cost of doing is would far exceed the value of the reel.

SNC10923.jpg


This one was stripped about 5 years ago and there is no corrosion, despite being used constantly.
 
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Thanks guys, I will give it some thought. I guess the original...how can I describe it...'elephants scrote' type wrinkled look is a special process that is impossible to reproduce by brush :D I wonder if there is a spray can version of it though, or at least some sort of textured look ? More research required methinks.

Another thing that I find daunting is the fact that all the pins, handles, in fact pretty well everything is riveted on the front face, meaning that stripping it down...even removing the handles...looks pretty difficult. Mind you, I have only given it a cursory look, so perhaps there are ways?

Cheers lads,

Dave.
 
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hayden
that looks really good did you use wire wool or fine wire brush and wet and dry paper to get it that clean or carefull use of paint stripper.
im realy tempted to get a battered one now and strip it down after seeing that
if you wanted to permanently seal that finish you could always mask the handles and spray with a can of clear lacquer
although if it is ally a good wipe dry will stop it from corroding....keep away from salt though

david are you sure they are not aluminium it looks like ally to me although ive never actually had one in my hands and you mentioned "with little areas of white corrosion where the alloy has been got at by the damp" thats what aluminium does when left wet if untreated
 
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They're aluminium, definitely.

I used a paint stripper on mine. After that you will need to neutralise with meths and then polish up with t-cut or brasso. To be honest, I much prefer a bare metal Speedia.
 
Gary Cream said:
david are you sure they are not aluminium it looks like ally to me although ive never actually had one in my hands and you mentioned "with little areas of white corrosion where the alloy has been got at by the damp" thats what aluminium does when left wet if untreated
Click to expand...

Hi Gary,

No mate, I am not certain that it's not aluminium, it just didn't look quite like it to me...could well be wrong though. Mind you, there are a number of other metals that have similar white oxides....that 'orrible zinc based die-casting alloy for one (a possibility here?). Titanium is another...though I rather doubt the Speedia has a lot of that in it's make up :p:D

Cheers, Dave.
 
Gareth Boycott said:
Looking for a bit of advice if possible. Managed to get a second hand Speedia centrepin on Ebay this week. It's well used but seems to be in good working order. My question is, how long (roughly) should it spin? I haven't had chance to oil the spindle etc yet. It spins for around 10 seconds or so at the moment, I'm guessing it should be a bit longer than this? If anyone has any tips etc on how to restore/improve the reel it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Gareth
Click to expand...

a good clean and oiling should improve things ,but anywhare from 30sec upwards should be ok ,alternativly 1BB-3BB (or less) should be enough to start up the spool .

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David Gauntlett said:
Apologies for jumping in on your thread Gareth, but I have a Speedia as well, and while mine spins well and is wobble free, the finish is a bit of a disaster. I left it for years in a standard plastic reel case, and the garage flat roof leaked (wretched kids :mad:) and the poor reel suffered. The black wrinkle effect paint is coming off the face and edge of the spool, with little areas of white corrosion where the alloy has been got at by the damp :(

Any decent fixes for this? I assume it is a very common problem. I am not into the 'rub it down, leave it bare metal' look, and besides, that would allow the corrosion to continue unabated....any ideas?.... finishers who can?

I don't believe they are aluminium, so they won't take anodising, and not ferrous, so difficult to powder coat, and the heat of stoving a decent paint would 'ugger things....Gawd :p

Cheers, Dave.
Click to expand...


they're alluminium ,not the best grade and its cast alloy at that ,and would take adonising (hard adonising) but you'd have too strip all the brass bits off ,and the old paint ,thats a big job and not really worth the expence ,much better too just remove the paint all together then use autosol polish (avaiable from all good car shops/petrol stations etc) to clean & protect them from further oxidisation ,you could soak it in coke (pop) which is 99% sugar and 1% phosphoric acid ,which will eat the oxidation ,soak overnight then wash off .



if you must paint it again go for a satin black ,matt looks wrong and gloss is against the natural order of things .
 
Thanks for all the help and advice chaps, very much appreciated!

After removing all the line (full to the brim,6 different lines all on top of eachother) and cleaning out all the muck I managed to get the spin time to around 25 seconds. Fished with the reel on Sunday (4x4 stickfloat) and the moderate flow wouldn't take line from the reel. Looks like it needs a service so that will be my next step. The reel itself just felt 'right' - size/position of handles etc etc so I think it will be worth it.

Thanks again,

Gareth
 
Quick update - sent the reel to Garry at Mill Tackle. He confirmed that the spindle is 'gone' and will need to be replaced, bumping the full service price up to around £52, making the reel £80 in total (with what I paid on Ebay).

Let's hope it's all worth it!!
 
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