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Fly Reels

Wow, I saw this image you posted on the lube thread.
reelinternals.jpg

Looks to be akin to watch making.

How many hours go into making one of your reels?
 
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Sweet! My relationship to fish is confined to eating them LOL. Buddy of mine was into this. I just enjoyed fondling them. I remember him showing me some tricked out features that you couldn't readily buy in a commercial reels & they had the latest in exotic ceramic bearings & bushings before they were more commonplace.

Are you doing the (assume) anodizing yourself?
 
I've never kept track of the time required to make a reel. The time spent designing the reel is probably more than the time spent machining.

No - I don't do my own anodizing. I found a great shop here in Calgary after the first shop I was using botched a job and then threw me out of the shop when I took the next job to him.
 
Again, nice.
- care to divulge the anodizer? (#2 not #1 LOL)
- did you have to do any gear cutting yourself?
- how about hardening, any components require heat treating?
- how did you make the engraved pattern on the decorative brass medallion?
 
Peter

The anodizer that I use (#2) is Alberta Base Anodizing Ltd. - located just off Edmonton Trail. The story of anodizer #1 is long and convoluted - best discussed over coffee sometime. I can forward the info by private message if you want to know who to avoid.

I used to cut some small gears but found it more cost/time effective to buy them. I get all my gears and springs from SDP-SI. Their shipping time is great and prices are reasonable.

None of the components require heat treating and with judicious material choice I can keep wear to a minimum. I use a lot of Ampco45, 642 Bronze and Tufmet T3 for parts that may wear. The reels should last at least a few more decades with average use.

The "engraved pattern" on the brass medallion is actually the centre of either a Mexican 10 peso coin or the centre of an Argentine coin - sorry don't remember which.
 
Not all my reels are anodized.

These two bi-metal reels are just natural 360 Brass and 6061 Aluminum. They should develop a nice patina over time.
BI METAL PAIR.JPG

Here a couple of clones of an old Malloch's design circa 1890. Again just 360 Brass and 6061 Aluminum left au naturel.
MALLOCHS CLONE-001.JPG
 
Nope - all manual. It does have a 3 axis DRO which takes a lot of the tedium out of making the myriad of small fly reel components.
 
Wow, cool. Are you reverse engineering some existing reel's or plans available or roll'n your own?
What is your CAD weapon of choice?
Would love to see some machining pics one day, you must have some interesting setup son some of those large diameter + skinny pieces.
 
The plans for the Fortuna are “roll your own” based on archival photos of the original . There are a few basic reel plans around but they are primitive at best. I used AutoCAD from ‘82 till I upgraded to AutoDESK Inventor in’99. Inventor rules!! The setup for the large skinny parts is actually pretty simple. I use a 6-1/2” 6 jaw set-tru chuck. That’s why I made a 7” reel - 7-1/4” is about all the chuck can grab. I’ll post some photos of my powered compound that I designed to turn shallow angle faces (32 surface finish) on some of my other reels.
 
Looking forward to the pics.

Coincidental you mention 6-jaw Set-Tru (Bison assume?). I've decided I am going to spring for a 5C Set-Tru here shortly. My D1-4 direct mount collet chuck has served me well but I have finicky parts that need to be more concentrically repeatable than I can presently achieve. I looked at machinable collets but they are expensive & basically 1-shot use. Other options but kind of PITA. In hindsight I wish I just ponied the bucks & bought the S-T from the outset, Oh well. Anyways I was oggling the 6-jaw while on the website but it will have to wait. Gator makes something close called Tru Set for less $ but I will research user feedback first.
 
Peter

Yes - Bison 6 jaw.

I use this Hardinge 5C collet chuck (1-1/16" max collet) for small concentric parts.IMG_2353.jpg
I found it at a surplus store new in grease/box for a ridiculously low price. I machined a D1-4 backplate for it and have about .0002" runout on the nose. The only problem with these speed chucks is that if you're turning at high speed, then stop the lathe, the inertia of the outer handwheel will loosen the collet ever so slightly - can be a problem with part length if you're not careful.

Maybe you can find one of these used??
 
I've always lusted for a collet hand wheel chuck. Obviously the Hardinge must have a very accurate back to fit your in-situ back plate machining with a nice low runout.

I'm sitting at ~0.0025". Actually I was mulling over how I might modify my existing chuck/adapter interface to get it dialed in. The back plate engages the nose lathe spindle nose profile once the cam locks are tightened so that's established. The recess in the chuck back engages a matching boss on the back plate. I have had them apart, tried different orientations & the fit is nicely tight. So unfortunately this assembly combination gives me the resultant runout I'm seeing. I want it better. I was thinking of reducing the chuck boss diameter by a couple thou, coating the lip with machine tooling epoxy like that Moglice stuff, mount the chuck, dial in the runout to zero, secure the bolts & let it cure. Theoretically it is now matched to my lathe. And its probably permanent, or at least I'm on uncharted waters if they will ever come apart easily even with a release agent. The Set-Tru system is of course mechanically set-able. So I'm leaning towards getting it & selling my chuck to offset the wallet owie.
 
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