Did Mitchell ever produce a worm gear drive reel?
If not, are all their reels considered "B grade"?
Asking for a friend.
-Steve
Absolutely not —- Mitchell reels are excellent reels.
Not every reel needs to be worm-drive.
Best, Fred
So, is it more about the materials the gears are made of and whether or not they are cast or machined?
Careful evaluation and not jumping to conclusions by painting with too wide of a brush —- I think is important here.
While true that a worm-drive reel with bronze/brass/steel gears and an oversized main ball bearing assembly is an excellent choice for both reliability and longevity —- other reels are equally worthwhile.
A Mitchell is one example —-
However, not all Mitchells are created equal —-
Some have brass & steel components materials —- some are cast alloy.
So I think you are right —- it does depend on the material makeup of the components.
But even a cast alloy geared Mitchell 300 —- is a fine reel.
Best, Fred
Just opened up a 300 that I purchased a few years ago when this reel addiction first took hold. I got distracted by the DAM Quick German reels and never opened them up.
Just pulled out this 300 and took a look inside.
How do I determine the materials of construction?
Magnet?
All 300's have alloy gears —-
The larger reels, and the 408/308 are much higher quality materials.
The 300's are very good looking reels, and they sold millions and millions of them. Only reel that ever sold more than the 300's was the little Zebco closed face push button reels.
The engineering of the 300 is unique to the 300 reel, or any other reel for that matter.
Multiple gears, oscillator action that slides in a unique geared fashion, pinion connected to the rotor, baffleplate, and more.
I have between 400 to 500 Mitchells in bins that I want to get rid of. Lots of models, but mostly 300's, 304's, 400's, older half bails, large 302's, etc..
Best, Fred
Do they claim it is a high strength or corrosion resistant alloy?
Or what is considered a pot metal alloy of inconsistent ingredients?
I can't tell the difference other than obvious hardness and weight characteristics. The 300 I just opened seems to have many gears of different materials.
I can't tell what's what.
They obviously have withstood the test of time. If they were actually used.
This one is very smooth.
Sorry for all the questions, but gearing has just caught my attention.
My guess is that the main is aluminium, the oscillation gears are pot metal (zinc alloy?) and the pinions are brass. This is based off the colour of the gears btw, not any complex analysis.
From what I understand pot metal is a low cost alloy of variable composition with a low melting point. Thus, its easy and cheap to smelt. I think the name came from how metal scraps from factories were gathered into a large pot and smelted to make cast objects.
I'm guessing the pot metal gears are cast while the rest are machined. I didn't see circular sprue marks left over from casting on the main gear or pinions. I'm not an expert so take with a lot of salt. Can someone confirm or deny this? I want to know too.
Your best bet is to open a thread on the MRM forum. A few persons there have extensively studied the reels and their history and have spoken of the different aluminum alloys used to cast the Mitchell bodies. While I can't recall any threads mentioning the gear metals, I'm sure they once existed and those persons would have more information.
Here is one thread where Simone said "used very complex metal analyzers for the alloys of the various reels" I assume he meant for his studies:
https://mitchellreelmuseum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=25&sid=5fa2a9df3618b4be6da77a19902cae7c
Good luck with your research.