If you were ordering a reel seat to fit a blank with a diameter of .508" at the point you want it to fit at. Would order one with an advertised ID of .512, (13mm)or would you order the next smaller size (12.5 mm) and ream it to fit? The next smaller size has an advertised ID of .492.

The reel seat in question is an MVT reel seat. I ordered a 13 mm, and requested that the company I ordered it from make sure it fit properly at a specified point on the blank. They sent the reel seat, but the blank was back ordered, so the reel seat wasn't able to be checked for fit.

I just received the blank, and the 13 when slid down the blank to a snug fit, slides about 3/4" further down the blank than I had hoped it would. If I stop it at the point I want it to stop, it has a very slight wiggle. I guess what I'm wondering is .......... what's considered proper fit for that type of reel seat?

I put an MVT seat on my last build and a couple of Pac Bay Minima seats on two other builds I've done, and all of those were a snug fit where I wanted them to end up on the blank.

Is this slight wiggle something I should be concerned with? I sure don't want to end up having to deal with a potential loose reel seat problem in the future. Or am I just obsessing too much?

Any thoughts or opinions you guys can share will be greatly appreciated.

And while thinking about it .... does anyone know what grit the sanding cloth on a Dream Reamer is? I made my own reamers from old pieces of fishing rods, but I put 80 grit sanding cloth on them. I wasn't thinking about maybe needing to ream a reel seat with them when I made them. I'm thinking 80 grit may be a little rough to ream a reel seat with an exposed blank window in it like the MVT has.

I have visions of shredded and rough edges.

Once again ..... any help will be greatly appreciated!

David,
Actually, I prefer to have the reel seat a bit snug, and then use a reamer to ream the seat out for the perfect fit.

I would pick up a 12.5 reel seat and see how it fits. If, you have a perfect fit - great. If you have to ream the seat a bit for a perfect fit, also great.

I do agree that the size 80 grit paper is a bit rough for reaming a seat. Perhaps grit 100, or 120 would be a bit better.

Also, for reaming seats I also use a powered reamer that I insert into my drill for initial reaming. It goes much quicker. Just have to be careful not to overdo it.

[www.dx.com]

The cross handle in these reamers are removable. So, when I use the reamer in a 1/2 inch variable speed drill, I remove the cross handle and insert into the drill. I always have a reamer like this on hand when building for taking for odd jobs here and there.

By the way, when you put your caliper on the blank at the location where you want the seat, what is the diameter of the blank? If you don't own a caliper, purchase one. Many many times one can make good use of a good caliper when building rods. Your situation is one example.

One example of an inexpensive caliper that will help you with your rod building work.
[www.amazon.com]

Or a non electronic:
[www.amazon.com]




Good luck



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/24/2016 08:56AM by roger wilson.

I don't think the larger seat will be any problem at all. But since you need to prepare the inside surface for epoxy anyway, the smaller seat will work with a little reaming. One way to take a little off the ID (if you don't have the proper reamer) is to put sandpaper into a shotgun cleaning rod (the slot for patches) and run it through the barrel of the seat a few times with a drill-driver. Too rough a reamer can mess up the window edge.

Roger, thank you for the reply. It is much appreciated. As I mentioned earlier, all of the reel seats of that type that I've installed have all had a snug fit at their final position on the blank.

As far as measuring the blank with calipers where the reel seat will be goes. I did. I used a digital caliper to get the .508" measurement that I posted in my opening thread. And that reamer you supplied the link to? The taper looks to be much than that of a rod blank. At least the rod blank I'm using. I'm not sure how well that would work on an MVT reel seat. The MVTs have 4 splines spaced at 90 degee angles along the inside of the thread barrel portion of the seat.

I wish I could just easily pick up a 12.5 seat, but I'm going to have to ship back the size 13 seat that I was sent, and exchange it for the 12.5.


Michael, thank you for your response as well. It too is much appreciated. My concern with the 13 seat I have in hand right now, is that you mentioned. When I prep the inside for epoxy, it's going to cause the seat to be even more (albeit only slightly more) loose at the point on the blank I want its final position to be.

I'm also with you on the rough reamer messing up the window edge. That's wby I was inquiring about the grit of a Dream Reamer. I was going to buy one to ream out the smaller seat. I hadn't thought of the shotgun cleaning rod and sandpaper thing though. I've done something similar to get aluminum winding checks to fit. I'm thinking your suggestion may work well enough to where I wouldn't need to get one of the Dream Reamers.

After all, if the advertised ID of the 12.5 reel seat is accurate, I'd only have to take about .015 of an inch to get a nice snug fit. Looks like I'll be contacting customer service to get an RM#. I'd rather exchange the 13 for a smaller size and ream that to fit, than risk having reel seat problems down the road.

I'm building this rod with the CFX grips from Mud Hole. Don't want to have to deal with trying not to mess them up. And then there's the whole wrapping the rod again.

Once again, a thank you to both of you for your replies. They are very much appreciated.

I usually order the closest size undersize and then ream to fit. On blank exposed seats it seems easier to ream a little than to shim up.

RJH

I agree slightly smaller is better than slightly larger. Reaming works with no problems. I have not used the MVT seats, but the ID of these exposed blank types of reel seats are relatively uniform throughout their length. So you just need to ream the butt end a little to get it to fit snugly. An 80 grit reamer will work fine.
Norm

Shimming up can be as simple as a couple wraps of tape on the blank, and any gap at the window will be filled with epoxy and can easily be smoothed out. It's almost automatic since you're going to have epoxy being forced out at the window anyway. Either way, in using the rod, you'll never have a bit of a problem, won't be able to tell the difference.

Rob, Norman, and Michael. Thank you all for your replies. They truly are appreciated.

A bit of an update. Either I was having trouble with my digital calipers because the battery was almost dead, or I just messed up measuring the blank. As I could barely read the read out for my caliper I went and got a new battery for it yesterday. Checking the measurement on the location on the blank I quoted earlier, I now come up with .521" or 13.24 mm.

Seeing that measurement and still having a 13 mm reel seat slide 3/4" further down the blank before it starts to get snug, I measured the ID of the reel seat. The ID at the rear of the seat measure .530" or 13.46 mm. The reel seat is larger than the 13.0 that is marked on the inside of the reel seat. The seat doesn't appear to have been reamed. It's evidently mislabeled from the factory.

Michael. I had thought about just putting some masking tape on the blank, but I have yet to do that with any of the rods I've built thus far. I've used foam arbors (some of them reamed extremely thin) to install any of the reel seats I've installed thus far. Even on the thread barrels of the Pac Bay Minima reel seats I've used. I know what you said about epoxy filling the gap at the blank window, and it not being a problem, and not being able to tell the difference. But I'll know it's there.

I'm not saying using masking tape is a bad thing. It's just something I've tried to avoid doing. Anyhow ..... I've sent an e mail to the company I got the reel seat from requesting an RM# so I can exchange it for a seat that actually measures 13 mm (or as close as possible) so I can exchange the one I have. Our water is frozen here, so I'm not in a big hurry to complete the build.

Once again thanks to all for your replies. If this were a different type of build or a less expensive reel seat, I'd probably just go with a wrap or two of tape. But it's a $40+ reel seat. I don't want to mount it on tape.

Thanks again guys !!!!

David,
In spite of your trepidation about using masking tape for a shim, thousands of fishing rods are built every day around the world using masking tape for a reel seat arbor. Use rows of masking tape to create an arbor, with a 1/16th gap between the rows of tape. When you glue up the reel seat, insure that epoxy fills each of the cracks between each masking tape arbor row and you will never have issues with the arbor coming loose.

Good luck

p.s.
An electronic caliper is great, but one does need to keep spare batteries on hand. Or you can use one of the analog calipers with either the slide measurements or the dial measurements with no need for batteries.

For slightly large exposed blank reel seats dry wall tape woks very well. This stuff weighs almost nothing, and the holes in it gives an extremely secure bond between blank and reel seat. A single layer is about al you need. However, exchanging the reel seat for a new one is also a very good option.since you have the time to spare. I have both digital and vernier calipers and micrometers. The digital ones to me me tend to drift, and are not nearly as accurate as those with the vernier scales. Plus you do not need batteries.
Norm