[crackedglass]

I've got several of the above reels, one of them had an issue with the main shaft circlip falling off, I didn't notice it till I opened the reel for other service. Not being able to get the circlip back on, I had to nearly completely tear down the reel to get the main shaft to come far enough through the bushing. I actually had to sand the washer behind the circlip a bit to get the clip to fit and spin freely.
I reassembled the reel, but now have a tight spot and some gear noise in the reel. The noise was not there prior to this problem. I've now had the reel apart many times, swapped every internal part with another reel but cannot get this reel to run smooth. It feels like a bent shaft but the spool spins free in neutral, as does the handle and main shaft. The reel has very little use, there is no wear, and as I said, I've swapped every moving part with a good working reel. The problem seems to follow the main body of the reel? (The spool, mainshaft, gears, levelwind, etc. all work fine in the other reel). I've even removed the levelwind idler gear to eliminate that.

The reel isn't that bad, but just enough to be noticable. I've gone so far as to put a dial indicator on the spool and mainshaft and found nothing wrong there. I did clean up the area in the main body where the main shaft bushing sits to make sure it was completely seated but all is fine there. I've even swapped that bushing to another reel and no change.

At this point I can't see how a main body can cause a reel to feel like it's got a tight spot. I could understand gear noise if there was an alignment problem but that don't seem to be the case. There is always some backlash in the gears, they never go tight and I can feel the bind in the reel even with the right side cover off and only the gears set in place, but they don't appear any different than the other reels in comparision. The other 5 of these I have. All of the other 5 reels spin super free with no issues. These reels don't get a lot of use, I only use them for an occasional bridge fishing outing late in the season. I don't suppose any one of them has more than a few days of fishing on them.
If I hadn't taken the spool out of this reel just to check for any dirt or salt corrosion after an outing, I'd not have ever known that the circlip had fallen off, it may have been off for some time. I found it stuck in a bit of grease just away from the shaft. The washer was still on the shaft.

Any ideas?

 

[Dipsay]

Just curious. has that spool been dropped? Check to see if it has a dent in it. could explain the noise and friction..

 

[rodworks]

I have a few of these myself, all of these spin super smooth. I've had each one apart and am pretty familiar with these, maybe the spool shaft is bent at the very end?
They are also sensitive to too much grease or too heavy an oil.

 

[crackedglass]

I thought it may be the spool from the start but have already swapped in a spool from one of the good working reels with no change. I've also swapped in every other moving part with no change.

I didn't ad any lube other than a small shot to the bushings from the OEM tube of oil that came with the reel when new. I've got a few dozen of those little tubes on hand from various reels as well.
The tight spot and gear whir occurs at the same handle position every rotatation, not the spools rotation. I've even tried flipping the main gear, swapping a complete right side assembly from another reel, and even assembling it nearly completely dry with no lube on the gears at all but no change.

The one thing that I keep thinking is that it was fine until I put the circlip back on. Its not an assembly issue, I'm sure everything is back where it belongs, especially since I've had two of the other reels apart swapping parts to try to figure this one out. All of this reels internals are now in another reel and work fine yet this reel is still the same. It don't make any sense to me.

Even if I hadn't swapped out the spool with another reel and saw it made no change, the fact that the noise and bind follows the handle rotation not the spool rotation sort of eliminates that. But again, swapping out the whole right side assembly including the gear set and main shaft also made no change.

 

[Bantam1]

The rough spot in the gears could be from fishing the reel with the c-clip missing. This will allow the main gear and drag stack to be misaligned vertically.

The gear "backlash" is because the reel does not have an instant anti reverse. It uses a ratchet design that will allow some backplay until the ratchet locks up.


Without seeing the reel in person it will be tough to make a proper diagnosis as to what exactly is happening. I suggest sending the reel to one of our warranty centers or directly to us for service.

 

[rodworks]

The rough spot in the gears could be from fishing the reel with the c-clip missing. This will allow the main gear and drag stack to be misaligned vertically.

swapped all of this from another reel and nothing changed, the other reel works fine and this one with all the swapped parts still binds.

The gear "backlash" is because the reel does not have an instant anti reverse. It uses a ratchet design that will allow some backplay until the ratchet locks up.

What I meant was that the reel does not bind due to a lack of backlash in the gears, if there was no backlash in a real like this it would mean that the gears are too close or too tight.

Without seeing the reel in person it will be tough to make a proper diagnosis as to what exactly is happening. I suggest sending the reel to one of our warranty centers or directly to us for service.

What would they charge me? Keep in mind these are fairly cheap reels to start with. I think I only paid about $50 or so for each of these when new.

 

[crackedglass]

"swapped all of this from another reel and nothing changed, the other reel works fine and this one with all the swapped parts still binds".

"What I meant was that the reel does not bind due to a lack of backlash in the gears, if there was no backlash in a real like this it would mean that the gears are too close or too tight".

"What would they charge me? Keep in mind these are fairly cheap reels to start with. I think I only paid about $50 or so for each of these when new".

Well I paid a bit more than that for mine, but I agree, if the charge to fix is much more than $20 it's probably not worth fixing this reel to me either. If memory serves me right I paid about $90 for my last one.
Having been through this thing so many times, there's not much left but the housing to be damaged somehow, I just don't see how. Like rw said, what I meant by backlash is the normal gear tooth spacing or running clearance.

I'll probably take it fishing for something on the heavy side and see what happens after it gets a good work out, maybe the gears or shafts will work out the problem spot if its put under a real heavy load.

 

[Bantam1]

We charge $25 + parts per reel to service them. Typically we do not charge for all the parts we use.

 

[crackedglass]

It sounds like my best bet is to just forget about it.
The way I see it, it's going to be $25, plus shipping and insurance so that puts it over $30, then most likely a spool and or body replacement, which is likely another major expense, that makes it more than half of what I paid for the first TR100Gs that I bought. I believe the first few were around $59.99, the last were in the $90 range. It looks like that one reel is now a parts reel.