Omoto KTB 300 underhead aka "what the heck is this" ..

[steelfish]

well, another local fishing charter guy contact me to fix some of their reels (mostly 500L, 113 and 113h) and saw a big box of broken reels and old greasy parts on a corner of the room and I saw this reel, asked the guy what it was doing this reel there he told me that was a box of parts that goes to the trash can. damn it, can I save it ? of course take it if you want it I dont even know where I got it, he told me.

Im pretty sure I have read about this reel on the web some where, I did a quick search yesterday and no luck I dont even know how to search for this model its not a casting reel, a baitcasting or a spincasting, its like a breed of spinnercasting or castspinner.
I dont know if it was a disaster as design or how bad or good perform on the fishing field but it will surely go to my collectibles reels and this will always start a nice conversation about it.

I only cleaned some oil and dust that was on some parts of the reel for the pictures, if you have any link or any comment about this reel please feel free to post it, this reel does no have any model number, name, etc other than omoto name, a nice logo stamp and the indications of "3 ball bearings"
the reel spins super freely and fast, on my all cleaned and serviced abu 6500c3 all I can do when a turn the handle fast is to run barely 2 runs of the levelwind one to left and then back to right at the starting point..on this reel the levelwind make 3 runs or even 4 runs, to left then to right then to left and one last time to right, awesome.

this is the way it was originally, no handle, I might drill the left material on the handle spot and install a nice handle knob for it later


body of the reel is 100% solid aluminum and side plates feel like thin aluminum over plastic side plates


omoto original logo on the left side


the free spool lever acts like the ones on the baitcasting reels (calcutta ) you turn the lever to free spool and cast as soon as you move the handle the reel goes to brake mode.



this handle belongs to a daiwa advantage freshwater baitcasting reel, not the best fit but it will work while working on the reel and try some casting later (wondering how to cast on this thing).




at least it was no made in china



I didnt continue with the teardown to see the guts because it was really late yesterday, hey, even my helper felt sleep before me this time
too bad I had to wake her up to take my tool box (pillow) and clean the mess before my wife wake up in the morning.



stay tune for the autopsy ........of the reel not the cat



update, aug 2020, found the correct name of that type of reels, they are called "UnderHead reels"

[johndtuttle]

This style of under the rod conventional reel is coming back. Accurate has got one in the works because the "fighting position" when bit heavy on  a private boat (low rail) is superior.

Kinda like and "acid wrapped" rod going one step further. It makes no logical sense for the reel to be on top of the rod for balance reasons when fighting a fish (assuming you have no practical rail to use) but for casting reasons it is more relegated to simple deep dropping.

[steelfish]

accurate has one on the works? thats sounds interesting, I would like to see the prototype

I agree with you on the casting issue, having the rod above the reel is going to make it hard to make long casts on this type of reels.
do you have an idea how this type of reels are named?  I cant believe there is zero info (or at least no easy to find) about this reels

[fIsHsTiiCkS]

I'm very interested to see the internals, nice post. I have started drifting toward spinners for certain things as it is much easier to get around ppl and cast on the crowded party  boats

[steelfish]

I'm very interested to see the internals

give me few days and I will show you the complete teardown

[fIsHsTiiCkS]

You can also probably just add a knob to the old handle and should fit nice

[steelfish]

this is the way it was originally, no handle (knob), I might drill the left material on the handle (knob hole) spot and install a nice handle knob for it later

you probably missed this part and my english didnt helped also,  I edited what I quoted and put in brackets what I should have said for be more clear.

if the internals looks promising then I will invest on a nice shiny aluminuim knob, if not they might just get some cheapos on ebay
the stock handle arm have no visual corrosion and have a nice counterbalance weight, it will worth a nice knob

[steelfish]

ok, here are the inside guts of the Omoto reel, no schematics anywhere so, no parts number or key part name, no even techical name, look at the pictures and enjoy seeing the guts and details of this Unique reel.


took the reel foot from the frame, good thing to dont find corrosion there, just salt accumulated



without the reel foot it looks like any regular baitcasting round levelwind reel



just like a though, side plates are plastic (graphite?) and cover with thin stamped aluminuim



this is open the left side plate out, nothing extraordinary here


notthing bad either, the spool wall looks like new



now lets go the the right side, star is metal, feels like Stainless Steel



spacer after the star



nice blue seal bearings



opening the right side plate... a lot of  Stainless Steel over there


the frame, a nice a solid block of aluminiun, not billet or 6061, but a lot better than plasting or graphite frame



levelwind plastic cover, 100% silver painted plastic with a copper tube


looks pretty sturdy here, all SS parts, main gear plate (sic), eccentric, yokes, spring


right side plate has the same thin stamped aluminium cover over the graphite




another great find,  dog is SS too and with a nice sturdy spring



the drag stack, yep, main gear is SS too


drag stack order


it has all the SS goodies already



drag washers, no sure which material is used here, but looks almost new, I will change them for Carbontex before closing the reel.



opened the drive shaft bearing and the lube job its not that bad, anyway I clean it with carb cleaner, compressed air and marine yamaha grease


really well packed with marine grease


and put the blue seal back


same procedure with spool bearings but instead of marine grease I used few drops of tsi 321 oil and dry the excess with a Q-tip


cleaned the levelwind assembly as you will do it on any reel, so no pictures, but this is how its the frame and LW all cleaned up




so, far this is the details of the reel and the internal guts, Im waiting to get some carbontex drag washers to put everything back on its place again, also I need a nice handle knob but I will get it in few weeks more, I have some expenses right now.


looks pretty promising, I read on BD outdoors  that some guy was using a reel like this for fishing school tunas, so it can handle some punishment.
Im not too convinced by the long reel foot and if I broke it fishing a nice fish it will be pretty hard to find a replacement for it.



so, what do you think guys?
put some carbontex and fish it on 20# mono line and hope to not break the reel foot or use the stock drags and save it for the shelf / collection?

[thorhammer]

i dont have a recco on whether to use it but that's interesting; never seen one before. Nice tutorial work!

[johndtuttle]

Fish it. It's no collectors item and it would be fun for the experience. I'd put a bigger handle on it.

Is the foot graphite or aluminum?


Here's a pic of the Accurate project being tested in New Zealand:

[Alto Mare]

Nice break down of that reel Steelfish, thanks for taking us along.
If I was the Boss, I would send you a wrench .

Sal

[steelfish]

@ John, thanks for the picture of the accurate mutant GT.. looks pretty good.

You're rigth, on this omoto reel,  I will fish it.
BTW, It looks odd on a rod, later I will post a pic with this reel in a rod



@Sal, thanks my friend, I already have an AT wrench but he can send me an AT signature handle knob for this reel 

[steelfish]

Is the foot graphite or aluminum?

sorry I didnt saw this question on first time

the reel foot is made on the same material than the side plates, feel like graphite.





another unique finding on this reel, the main gear thickness, I dont know what's the advantage of the side walls this thick


this is the reason Im getting new carbontex drags, the ones I have on hand have almost the same OD than stockers but the ID is way bigger.

[Alto Mare]

They would still work just fine.

[steelfish]

They would still work just fine.

are you sure, Sal? (no questioning your knowleage) but I just dont know if the ones I have even having less contact material work the same, worst or better than stockers)

cuz I have 3 sets of the same size than the one inside the main gear, they are almost the same OD size but the ID is bigger.
I wasnt sure to use them or getting some from Dawn at smoothdrag which are custom cuts almost identical to stockers to have more contact material