Kevin Van Dam Forums

Anyone replace stock bearings with ceramic ones?  I was looking at these:  http://www.bocabearings.com/bearing-inventory/Radial-Bearings/17028/FR008COSLD—xx-

I replaced the bearings in a TDA reel, but I used hybrids. They improved the casting quite a bit, so I assume real ceramics would make a world of difference. The only reason I did it was because I was using it for walleye fishing and needed to throw a light lindy rig with it and it was a little tough to do, but after replacing the bearings it threw a 1/8oz rig perfectly. If you make a lot of casts a week I suggest you do it, it really makes casting easy.

If you do try those, let me know how they work. I have an accurist in front of me and the bearings are shot. So if those work well for you I’ll just upgrade it to ceramics.

I have Orange Seal ABEC-7s in my CU50E & it does cast just super easy. Got mine when they had half-price with free shipping about the same time I purchased my CU50E, so they were installed right away, so I don’t know how big of a difference it is between stock & upgraded, but from reading around it’s a pretty noticeable difference for most models.

Im using Boca’s in my Revo Premiers and Smoke 150PPT’s. I also had the Smokes supertuned. Very nice mod to your reels for the money. If you have older bearings that are wearing out, go with the upgrade. Easy to install and makes casting much smoother.

i never saw one way or the other but do you lube these bearings just like the stock bearings or are they sealed?

CincySid - 15 July 2012 08:06 PM

i never saw one way or the other but do you lube these bearings just like the stock bearings or are they sealed?

I’m thinking no lube.  I love to put some in my Curado E7 and Citicas.  I guess the folks there a very helpful.

i ordered bearings for 2 Daiwa Advantages I bought off of Twitch’s Uncle. love the reel but the bearings are going. we’ll see how it does. if these bearing work, i got a lot of bearings to change out. I’d like to change the bearings in the PQ’s i have. i sent them an email asking if they have any that will work.

What bearings did you buy cincy? The abec 7?

no since these are older reels and not worth much i ordered the ABEC 5’s. i just wanted to see if they made any improvement and for it to be worth upgrading some of my other reels. these are like test bearings.

The 5’s are what I put in my TDA, they do not free float like the 7’s so they cause a little more drag.

I priced out my replacement bearings for an old accurist PT last night. $22 with shipping from quantum for stock steels. $31.95 for abec 7 orange seal ceramics from boca. For $10 I’m upgrading to the full on ceramics as soon as I can.

yea, you are probably right about the 5 and 7’s. i’m using this for a test bearing replacement. if the 5’s do good the 7’s should do better. if the 5’s don’t make an improvement, i might not change the bearings in these 2 Daiwas, i might just retire them, we’ll see. Right now the 2 TDA’s are dragging pretty good. i should see an improvement with the 5’s. i really like the 2 TDA’s, strong, simple reels without all the bells and whistle, just solid workhorse reels.

If anyone is interested, i contacted Boca Bearings and got a link for the replacement bearings for the BPS Pro Qualifiers. here it is:

Thanks for contacting us for your bearings. If you’re looking for the orange seals here is a kit that will work for your BPS Pro Qualifiers.
http://www.bocabearings.com/bearing-inventory/Radial-Bearings/17386/FR093COSLD—xx-

Cincy that would be for spinning reels.

Edit: maybe not.. but it the dimensions sure do look off. Take them out and use calipers to double check before ordering those.

got my ABEC 5’s from Boca today and changed out the bearings on the TD-A’s. Before i did it i put the reels in freespool and spun the spool with the stock bearing and then the ABEC 5’s. the ABEC 5’s spun at least twice as long as the stock reels. especially one of them. the other one still spun farely well and i’m soaking them now and going to keep them for emergency. From what i’ve seen so far, i am happy. i won’t fish again till next week and i am anxious to try them out. i asked BOCA if the bearings should be oiled and he said you don’t need to oil them but if you don’t the ceramic bearings will start to wear out the races. so i put a drop of oil in each bearing.

Maybe next month i will get the ABEC 7’s for the PQ’s i have.

update on the ADEC 5’s i put in the Daiwa TD-A’s. First few cast were not good. few more after that still no good and i was throwing a spoon which you can launch for miles. Couldn’t cast it 20 yards and was getting po’ed.

i tied on a Horny toad and started to fish the scum. after about 20 or 30 more casts i was launching it acrossed the pond. MAN, once the bearings got broken in it was sweet. cast forever and reeled in smooth and effortlessly.These reels have never been better since i got them from Twitch’s uncle, so they were heavily used. They don’t look it but they perform like brand new reels, and better than some new ones .

these TD-a’s are now better than some reels i had bought brand new. i am totally impressed with these bearing and will buy more for sure. Guys if you have a reel you like and it’s starting to bog down on you, spend the 20 bucks for these new bearing and it will bring it back to life. The ADEC 5’s i bought were only 19 bucks for 2 bearings. better than spending 100-200 for a new reel. I’m stoked.

Had a few blowups on the frog and i missed them, my fault, wasn’t expecting anything to hit. i’ll be ready tomorrow.