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Final finish problems during fishing reel manufacturing

 

Last year we made 200 fly fishing reels in Canada, 4.5" dia x1.00 thick, using 6061T6. They were anodised to MIL-A-8625 / MIL-PRF-8625 [on DLA] TypeII, Clear and Black.

After machining (turning, milling and drilling) the parts were deburred by hand, burss were gone but many scratches were made. The parts were then polished using bench mounted buffing wheels and brown tripoli buffing compound ⇦ this on eBay or Amazon [affil links] . Then anodised.

The anodised finish was dull and in the case of the Clear was very uneven inside the spools. Black covered most defects. The anodizer blamed this on the Aluminum Oxide from the buffing compound, saying it had been embedded into the surface or there were heat in the polishing.

All this hand work cost a fortune and the final result did not match the finish of the off-shore reels.

We see the need for very careful handling of the parts and our next batch will see better in-process boxes and operators wearing white gloves when handling the parts.

We need help going from the machining to the Anodizer, and would to like to eliminate the hand de-bur and hand polish. I look at lots of reels and they shine, golds, blacks greens and grays, they are objects of beauty. (Most manufacturers list 6061 and anodise for their products). What must we do to achieve the same standard?

Barrie Sawbridge
fishing tackle - Quebec, Canada

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Your anodizing contractor is correct to point out that wax coatings remain on the part which has been polished. If you can remove the wax, without marring the mirror polished surface, then you will have higher success for a good looking component, after anodizing.

We are in the process of testing this out now. I have discovered that, maybe too not very efficient results, but seems to work, is that we put on a clean wheel after the wax polish process, and then sprinkle some powder onto the part, and then polish away. This seems to remove the wax quite efficiently.

Adrian Chin
- Juru, Penang, Malaysia