Yamaha Grease

[foakes]

Hi caveirex --

John is right -- don't over think it.  Most greases will do a good job.

However, the Yamaha grease you purchased states -- "water resistant".

What is ideal is a Marine grade that clearly states -- "salt water resistant".

Big difference if you are using it in the ocean -- and not fresh water.

The Yamaha blue clearly reads salt water resistant -- as does the Penn blue grease.

This doesn't mean the grease you bought will not do a good job -- it might.  Although the reel may need to be serviced and the grease changed out more often.

Cal's Universal Reel & Drag Grease will also do a good job.  If you get the new purple, instead of the tan color -- it is a little less stiff since it is designed for colder weather applications.  So it may be just perfect for Portugal salt water fishing when applied to all insides of the reel -- not just the drags.  The Cal's states -- "Incredible salt-water corrosion protection".

Too bad you are not closer.  If you know of someone coming from the U.S. -- we could send them a pound of Yamaha Marine, Cal's, or Penn Blue.  Then they could just throw it in their checked luggage.  Easy to do, if needed.

Best,

Fred

[johndtuttle]

Yea, it may just be a packaging thing foakes. The tube clearly has an outboard motor on it so I assumed it had something in the way of marine additives.

regardless, I would use it as a temporizing solution until I found the ideal lube.

[steelfish]

hmm

thanks Fred for bringing the purple Cals grease to the talking.

I saw it some days ago and I was wondering how better or what was the difference against the tan color one.

time to get some

[caveirex]

Thanks for all the replies.

After a long and hard work online between the US and European Yamaha sites and catalogues for 2015 i realised that this Lical Grease is the "new" Yamalube Grease for Europe. It is saltwater resistant and anti corrosion, so i believe that will do the work as the old "blue one".

I talked with a Yamaha marine motors official mechanic and he told me that this grease is used in saltwater motors, so the components of the grease are the same, or very similar to the "blue one".

But as John said...no need to overthink...i will use this one, and the cal's grease for the drags.

In this fishing world, sometimes is harder to find the same things that you use on this side of the Atlantic and in the middle (Azores Islands) is harder!!!

Thanks guys!

[Rascal]

I just received my Yamaha blue grease from amazon.com. I made a mistake in ordering the wrong size. I ended up buying the 14 oz size which apparently requires a grease gun. Should have bought the 10 oz as it comes with like a hair gel type tube packaging and the grease can be easily squeezed out of the tube, but the shipping cost from that vendor is even more ridiculously expensive.

But, I do have a question for Alan though. Having received my grease, I now know it is in fact petroleum-based. Having done more research, people say petroleum-based is no good and the grease should be synthetic instead. Is that really the case? So far what I have found is the Yamaha grease is quite thick. If you use it on a baitcaster with a non-disengaging levelwind such as Abu Garcia, I would imagine it will be too thick and will slow down your casts and cuts distance quite dramatically.

[MarkT]

They finally opened a Harbor Freight near me. They sell tubes of Marine grease in tubes for mini grease guns. Anyone tried this stuff? I'm not sure I'd trust much from Harbor Freight.

[johndtuttle]

I just received my Yamaha blue grease from amazon.com. I made a mistake in ordering the wrong size. I ended up buying the 14 oz size which apparently requires a grease gun. Should have bought the 10 oz as it comes with like a hair gel type tube packaging and the grease can be easily squeezed out of the tube, but the shipping cost from that vendor is even more ridiculously expensive.

But, I do have a question for Alan though. Having received my grease, I now know it is in fact petroleum-based. Having done more research, people say petroleum-based is no good and the grease should be synthetic instead. Is that really the case? So far what I have found is the Yamaha grease is quite thick. If you use it on a baitcaster with a non-disengaging levelwind such as Abu Garcia, I would imagine it will be too thick and will slow down your casts and cuts distance quite dramatically.

2 cents:

Don't over think it. Any grease is substantially better than none and reels have been greased with petroleum based greases for over a 100 years and continue to work.

Petroleum based greases may (in great time) have their lighter distillates boil off leaving gummy residue. This is very usually the least of our worries. We worry about protection first because:

1. We regularly look at our reels and clean them of old grease and replace with fresh. It never really gets too old to work.

2. If a reel was greased and ignored for 20 years then yes, it might be gummed up. So what? Clean out the old grease and relube it. You are now gtg and the reel has suffered no damage in the interim.

3. Marine Bearing greases are outstanding protection, cheap and widely available. It is not used because it is perfect, it is used because it works in offering outstanding protection. If you find something you think is better, use it. If you don't have something better readily available use any Marine Grease with confidence. They all offer outstanding protection, some just are thicker than we like for some applications.

4. If the marine grease you have is too thick for your taste, cut it to your desired thinness with your favorite oil.

5. The only parts on a baitcaster that affect casting are the spool bushings/bearings, the pinion bearing in some designs and the levelwind bushings/bearings. You should be using an oil on these. Grease for everything else that needs protection. Remember, cast controls are often used to slow the reel down. Ultimate speed is not critical 99% of the time.

6. Bearings that do not affect casting get grease for max protection, oil for convenience or for something that will attract sand and you don't want grease for that.


It's pretty simple really and in the final analysis we put our faith in keeping an eye on things and not letting some part corrode from neglect. If you are lubing your reel with nearly anything and keeping that watchful eye out (ie opening up the reel from time to time to be sure all is in good shape) that is all you really need to keep your reel in great functional shape.

If you want any other kind of super tuned performance then that really is another topic and an interesting one to be sure...but for routine use, don't over think it.

Reels are never ruined by grease. They are ruined by not being greased.

[johndtuttle]

They finally opened a Harbor Freight near me. They sell tubes of Marine grease in tubes for mini grease guns. Anyone tried this stuff? I'm not sure I'd trust much from Harbor Freight.

I gotta admit I finally went in one the other day and was kinda appalled at the amount of junk I saw in there.

The marine grease they sell might not be as good as others in some kind of an empirical test but it more than likely is fine protection all the same.

As above, I have used random generic stuff when that was all I could find locally, but settled on Penn Blue for it's nice thickness for medium and light duty reels (its not too heavy).

[handi2]

I just received my Yamaha blue grease from amazon.com. I made a mistake in ordering the wrong size. I ended up buying the 14 oz size which apparently requires a grease gun. Should have bought the 10 oz as it comes with like a hair gel type tube packaging and the grease can be easily squeezed out of the tube, but the shipping cost from that vendor is even more ridiculously expensive.

But, I do have a question for Alan though. Having received my grease, I now know it is in fact petroleum-based. Having done more research, people say petroleum-based is no good and the grease should be synthetic instead. Is that really the case? So far what I have found is the Yamaha grease is quite thick. If you use it on a baitcaster with a non-disengaging levelwind such as Abu Garcia, I would imagine it will be too thick and will slow down your casts and cuts distance quite dramatically.

Is the Yamaha grease you received an Aqua color or dark blue. The new Yamaha Outboard grease is a blue/green Aqua color and is much thinner than their older grease.

I do use it on bait casting reels but it doesn't take much at all. 90% of the grease is pushed off the gears after a few turns.

I have also used the Cal's Purple on these reels. I like it much better than the Penn blue grease. It's thin and lubricates very well.

[Reel 224]

They finally opened a Harbor Freight near me. They sell tubes of Marine grease in tubes for mini grease guns. Anyone tried this stuff? I'm not sure I'd trust much from Harbor Freight.

I gotta admit I finally went in one the other day and was kinda appalled at the amount of junk I saw in there.

The marine grease they sell might not be as good as others in some kind of an empirical test but it more than likely is fine protection all the same.

As above, I have used random generic stuff when that was all I could find locally, but settled on Penn Blue for it's nice thickness for medium and light duty reels (its not too heavy).

John: I agree with you about Harbor Freight. What they sell is at best sub standard junk,but if you are looking for a bargain and aren't concerned with the quality then there you have it.

[SteveL]

For people who use Ebay,  I found Yamalube marine grease from a seller that turned out to be Boats.net, which was previously my first choice for Yamalube.   Turns out the Ebay price is essentially the same as directly from the Boats.net website, and the shipping on Ebay is a little less.  $6.69 + $3.38 shipping for the 10 oz tube (a little more for the 14 oz).   UPS tracking says I should have it next day (shipping from Georgia to Georgia, your mileage may vary).

http://www.ebay.com/itm/181660898232

http://www.ebay.com/itm/161584717041

No affiliation with these people.   I just found this to be a good price as well as very quick and easy to order.

[Rancanfish]

Thanks SteveL!   I may be able to slow down my use of Cal's now.

[handi2]

Boats.net does have the best price for the Yamaha Marine Grease.

[SteveL]

Boats.net does have the best price for the Yamaha Marine Grease.

Yes, and buying from them on ebay was a snap.   I ordered late at night, so really the order started the next business day, and received the package the following day (shipping from Georgia to Georgia).  Price plus shipping through ebay was a little less than through boats.net, with the understanding that I was buying one tube.   They do not combine shipping on their ebay store until you max out around $25 in shipping charges, so that $3.38 shipping charge is per tube.

[Ryan_J]

It has begun......step 1 of starting to give my reels some personal love