WD-40 On My Fishing Reel?

by Charlie

I was wondering if it's a good idea to use WD-40 as a lubricant for my fishing reels, freshwater or saltwater?

A couple friends said that I should, but I noticed that the reels I have started using them on aren't performing as well... I'm wondering if that's because they aren't the high-end top quality type reels, or if it's because of bad advice.

Jason's response to: "WD-40 as a fishing reel lube"

NO, NEVER, it's NOT a good idea to use WD-40 as a lubricant for your fishing reels. WD-40 will seem to work at first, but it actually wears down the reel faster, thus shortens the life span of them.

I myself have used WD-40 on a couple cheap spinning reels that I used to have a long while ago. Nothing but bad news with that experiment. The reels became harder to crank because the WD-40 literally built up a crud of nasty film around the moving parts and easily collected dirt. Eventually, one of the reels broke completely apart while reeling in a big catfish... I was so frustrated with that one.

I would recommend for you to use the proper products for cleaning your reels. There are grease lubes and oils specifically made for the mechanical parts of a reel.

To get a little better understanding of what to recommend for a fishing reel, have a look through our list of some of the different types of freshwater fishing reels section.

These lubes can be found at most fishing tackle suppliers near you. Or, if you would rather shop online, you can have a look into our Freshwater Fishing Tackle Amazon.com store, or look into our other recommendations of Fishing Stores.

Better yet, find one of the best fishing reel lubricants here with
Blakemore Real Magic Lubricant.