Corrosion Corrosion - Extreme measure to reduce it? - A unproven possibility

[JGB]

What can we do to reduce the chances of corrosion in and on our reels?

Here is a rehash of the basics to bullet proofing your reel during service:

First keep the salt off and fill the voids with a corrosion inhibitor. That means add corrosionX, TSI or grease to all the joints/cracks on the reel exterior. Be extra mindful for contact between different metals like SS screws, harness lugs and reel seats. Salt + water + dissimilar metals = corrosion through galvanic action (very fast and damaging). Coat all internal surfaces with a protective film of grease or oil (corrosionXHD thicker so it will stay put).

What about bearings? Keep them clean lubricated and free of water and salt. Packing with grease is a good for bearing that do not need to be extra free. Degrease and treat with TSI works well for those things like spool bearings. If you remove the shields then the bearing can 'breath' and allow air circulation in the spool bearing bore to allow standing water to evaporate. Remember Salt needs water to become corrosive.

Avoid using steel wool, copper, brass on aluminum parts. You can leave imbedded pieces of the material in the aluminum that can result in severe galvanic pitting. Stick with SS and synthetic brushes and scotch bright pads. This is why it is a bad thing to use copper bearing anti seize and and head gasket sealer on marine engines.

What about EXTREME measures?
Disclaimer - improper use of chemicals can cause serious bodily harm as well as damage your reel!!!

General info about corrosion in SS:
SS bearings and parts are made from alloys  like Iron, Chrome, Nickle and are optimally designed to form thin (molecular) protective oxide films to prevent structural corrosion. What this means is that the corrosion starts as oxidation in the presents of oxygen and then the corrosion process halts. This works great except where there are contaminants on the surface of the parts. These contaminants form seeds of corrosion pockets that form pits and oxide deposits (rust) when exposed to salt and water. The higher the quality of the SS the fewer contaminates there are. Hardening of SS will also cause contaminants to collect at the surface making SS part more susceptible to pitting.

Here is the extreme part:

If we were able to remove the contaminants from the surface of the SS parts we could increase the resistance to corrosion and pitting of the parts. Well this can be done but I have never seen it applied in the salt water fishing industry. We call this decontamination process 'PASSIVISATION'. For our limited resources we can simply acid etch the parts (hydrochloric acid _ pool acid and less effective but safer Vinegar). The idea is to quickly remove the most reactive (susceptible to oxidation corrosion) from the surfaces while causing minimal damage to the desirable material. Timing is critical - too long and you get pitting and etching and too short and you get incomplete passivization. Once the part is treated the acid needs to be removed and neutralized ( baking soda works here). Keep in mind that neutralizing with backing soda produces salt so though rinsing is needed. Treat with TSI to fill all the cracks and micro pits where the contaminants have been etched away.

Nothing is perfect and there are trade offs right? Here is what I see as a trade off - Passivization is not 100%. Passivisation will leave voids (very small) where the contaminates were removed that can hold water and allow corrosion to get started. The surface smoothness will be affected. Wear of the part will expose new pockets of contaminants.

Passivisation is mostly used in extreme environments where high reliability and service life is needed. Places like nuclear reactors, satellites, high purity applications like semiconductor fabrication.

I would not go and acid dip all my reels but  might consider treating a bearing or two to see if there is any real life benefit and if there are unforeseen complications.

Jim N.

[ReelSpeed]

Know anyone making titanium bearings?  Completely inert to saltwater up to 600 degrees... 

Passivation will help with corrosion.. I have seen test samples where 304 stainless, once passivated or better yet electropolished, had better corrosion resistance than 316 stainless. 

Although I think you could do better by just buying some shimano or daiwa anti-rust bearings.  They seem to hold up pretty well.  I could do the same coating, but I would need the individual bearing parts and it would probably get expensive and time consuming..  Could also go with full ceramic bearings so there is no steel to rust to begin with..

[Bryan Young]

Thanks Jim. 

By the way, are you still serving reels again?

[JGB]

Bryan,

Yes I'm still at it but it is a bit slow right now. That's why I have time to ponder things like passivization of open spool bearing. 
Trying to get the guys to get their reels serviced way before they need them for LR trips. For now it seems the East coast guys have a earlier season to get ready for. At least we have Salmon opening in 2 days

To get more back on topic: I did some experimenting with ceramic hybrid spool bearings and found that they spin very well but make a lot more noise. They also do not hold up to high drag pressure as well as SS. It seems the Ceramic balls are so hard that they damage the edges of the races where the SS balls are more elastic and distribute the load over a larger area. Maybe full ceramics are in order - very high cost and when they fail they either shed layers off the balls or totally self destruct.

Jim N.