Grease and Oil Questions

[DCrosen]

 I have read a lot of the posts on here about grease and oil and still have a few questions. What is the reason for greasing bearings over oiling them? Most of your manufacturers recommend that you oil them I think. Is it because it lasts longer? If you are performing maintenance on reels that will only be used in freshwater, do you need the marine grease? If not, what else can you use? Yamaha Multi-Purpose, other multi-purpose greases(not wheel bearing grease)? Whatever aftermarket grease you get, should it be always blue? If so, why?  Is it because it won't turn black and you can tell that you worked on the reel? I think I saw Cal's, Penn X1R, Lubri-Matic mentioned as well as maybe Daiwa and Shimano could be used for bearings and inside the reel. Do you not mention many of the manufacturer's greases, because using aftermarket grease is so much cheaper? How much are the bearing packer sets and grease gun needle adapters?
Thanks for any help.

[DCrosen]

I do see where it says the Yamaha grease won't harden. Will using the grease in the bearings affect the casting and reeling abilities much? I have a lot of ABU, Ardent and Quantum Hot Sauce greases. Will they be ok to use until I ran out for now. I have heard some bad things about the Hot Sauce. Has anybody used the Abu, Ardent and Penn oils? I also have Ardent Reel Supreme oil.

[TechTeach]

General consensus is oil if casting, grease if trolling or jigging where distance is of no concern.


The blue grease is basically for coorosion protection also. It sticks well and lasts long. I use the triple guard grease from Evinrude.

[johndtuttle]

I have read a lot of the posts on here about grease and oil and still have a few questions. What is the reason for greasing bearings over oiling them? Most of your manufacturers recommend that you oil them I think. Is it because it lasts longer? If you are performing maintenance on reels that will only be used in freshwater, do you need the marine grease? If not, what else can you use? Yamaha Multi-Purpose, other multi-purpose greases(not wheel bearing grease)? Whatever aftermarket grease you get, should it be always blue? If so, why?  Is it because it won't turn black and you can tell that you worked on the reel? I think I saw Cal's, Penn X1R, Lubri-Matic mentioned as well as maybe Daiwa and Shimano could be used for bearings and inside the reel. Do you not mention many of the manufacturer's greases, because using aftermarket grease is so much cheaper? How much are the bearing packer sets and grease gun needle adapters?
Thanks for any help.

The general idea is grease for long lived protection in areas that may not get serviced often and don't need to spin very fast. You can find grease inside 20 year old reels that is still offering some protection whereas oil would have evaporated long ago. Spool bearings that must spin very fast when casting always get oil.

Oil is perfect for freshwater reels however as grease can make smaller reels with less cranking power feel sluggish. Needless to say you are dealing not with saltwater but with fresh water which we use to rinse and clean our reels . You will also have to reapply oil more often.

Aftermarket marine greases are very cheap and typically you pay a bit of a premium for a "branded grease" from Penn, Shimano or Daiwa etc. However, they can be nicer in some regard as they are lighter than true bearing greases and can make reels spin freer. Typically the pro reel techs go with the Yamaha stuff because of price (they use huge tubs of the stuff) and effectiveness. The DiY guys are increasingly using Penn grease as we don't use as much.

Color doesn't matter at all, marine greases are best for the salt environment, any grease as long as it is plastic safe is fine in a freshwater reel if it's all you have.

Bearing packers and all that jazz are rarely needed for freshwater reels, imo, unless you are offering a premium reel maintenance service and are servicing many reels.

[Dr. Jekyll - AKA MeL B]

don't use lithium based marine grease, "been there done that"...

[DCrosen]

Thanks for all the info. Would you suggest taking off the shields and seals to oil them? I know that oil will still get in around them. It seems to me that you would be able to clean the bearing better if you remove them. I guess the condition of the seal and shield will determine if they get put back on, or would you suggest just leaving them off?
DC

[DCrosen]

What is the best to put on the screws?
DC

[DCrosen]

I guess I'll buy the Yamaha grease or something like it if I start repairing reels that will be used in saltwater. Can the ABU, Ardent, and Hot Sauce be used in bearings?

[TechTeach]

What is the best to put on the screws?
DC

Blue grease.

[Keta]

..... Can the ABU, Ardent, and Hot Sauce be used in bearings?

Yes.

[johndtuttle]

Thanks for all the info. Would you suggest taking off the shields and seals to oil them? I know that oil will still get in around them. It seems to me that you would be able to clean the bearing better if you remove them. I guess the condition of the seal and shield will determine if they get put back on, or would you suggest just leaving them off?
DC

It all depends on your and the bearing's needs. For a freshwater reel, and only if you are going to super tune the reel for max performance, would you pull the shields, clean, then lube with your choice of performance oil for max speed.

If your needs are simply for protection without an ultimate level of bearing performance then oil from the outside is fine. The freshwater environment is so forgiving I just don't over do it and any factory lube kinda gets "cut" by the oil over time though, I would expect many bearings in freshwater reels have no factory lube of any kind (seen it). Needless to say pulling the shields on those tiny little bearings is not that much fun and you can ruin the cage in the process.

With a saltwater reel the amount of salt immersion you can get and the depths the salt will reach is truly amazing sometimes. In that case, there really is no overdoing your preparation. Everyone has their own comfort zone/obsessive level as to how far they go or how much their customers expect.

[Tightlines667]

One reason I favor Penn Blue grease (other then the fact it is a little less viscous, holds up well in higher temps, and has marine protection properties), is that it will turn color when exposed to water.  This makes it easy to see where water and salt intrusion is occurring.

I will admit though that some more viscous greases (I.e. INOX red) provide better adhesion and long term protection, as well as have higher temperature ratings.  Everything comes at a cost though since the increased viscosity will typically increase 'felt friction' between moving parts.