Maintain Your Fishing Gear

Maintain Your Fishing Gear

If you have not done a quality maintenance check on your fishing rods in a while, you may want to spend some time and look them over. Damaged fishing rods can lead to lose of bait and tackle, a nice reel or worse, a beautiful large mouth.

Just like any thing else, maintenance and inspections on a regular basis is important and will most certainly allow your fishing gear to give you the finest fish fighting performance and some great casting chances as well.

So do not make haste like an inexperienced angler and take the time to see if your fishing rod has enough life left in it before you head for the water; take advantage of the following tips.

Guides – if the line is not running smoothly through your guides you could cause line damage and could possibly lose some tackle as well as a nice catch. Run a piece of nylon through your guides… sticking could mean there is damage and the guide should be replaced.

Guide wraps – although you may not lose any tackle if you have a bad or worn wrap, you could end up with a rats nest if they are too worn. If they need to be rewrapped and you are not comfortable doing it yourself, head over to your local bait and tackle shop to get some help or to hire a professional.

Grips – cork grips are best cleaned with warm water and a soap solution. In the event that they are in real bad shape, take a piece of fine steel wool to them and that should do the trick. EVA foam grips are best cleaned using a soapy dish rag and rinsed thoroughly.

Reels – typically you need to check the reel seat as there can be some corrosion and a residue buildup and this will stop the reel from setting properly. The sticky gunk on a reel seat can usually be cleaned by rubbing it with a soapy rag or sponge. Be sure to rinse it properly and dry it with a towel afterwards.

Ferrule – Rubbing a light coat of paraffin onto the ferrule of a two piece rod will make it easy to separate the two sections and also ensure a secure connection.

Blank – if your blank has any dings, cuts or slices on it, it could break when you are using it. All you really need to do is to slide your hands up and down on it to make sure that it is smooth and you should be fine.

Storage – when storing your fishing rods, never lean them up against a wall where there is tension on the blank or on the tip. Use a rack and your rod will stay straight and give you many happy fishing trips.