Fishing is a pastime or a job for so many around the globe. In order to find success while fishing, it is important to understand the mechanics of how a fishing rod truly works. There are many components that make up the mechanisms inside of a fishing rod, like the fishing gears. The gears in a fishing rod help protect the fisherman using the rod from doing all of the hard work and getting too tired. Think of the gears as being similar to the gears in an automobile. As a car is traveling up a hill, the gears themselves inside the motor are working hard, not the driver. That is similar to how gears work in a fishing reel.
How Do Reel Gear Ratios Work?
If someone wants to be a successful fisherman, it’s important to understand the objective of fishing gear ratios. Just like the car traveling up a hill and the driver not working very hard to maintain the speed, the same is important for the person who is fishing. After casting a fishing reel into the water, the spool of the fishing line is extended.
To wind the line back in would be extremely taxing for an individual if there were no gears in place to help make this process a bit easier. With every revolution of the fishing rod handle, the spool inside the rod is spinning much faster than a person thinks. The goal of a fishing gear ratio is to try to get the maximum effect from the smallest amount of effort. Fishing would be a lot more tiring if the fisherman was actually doing all of the work constantly reeling in the rod. Everything within a fishing rod is connected; therefore, it is important to pick the right gear ratio depending on what type of lure is being used.
It is also crucial to pick the right gear ratio depending on the job at hand. There are different ratios that work with different types of fishing. It all depends on the type of fishing that someone wants to accomplish. Some of those types of fishing can include deep water fishing or casting and reel quickly, or it can be based on the type of fish wanting to be caught all together. The numbers that a person sees on the rod are the gear ratios that rod offers; sometimes, you are able to switch to a different gear on the rod.
Commonly Used Reel Gear Ratios
There are a number of different ratios out there, but a common ratio on a reel is the 6:4:1 ratio. This ratio means that for every single turn of the fishing reel done by the hand, the spoke on the inside, in reality, is actually turning 6.4 revolutions at that time. Some fishing rods may have slower gear ratios such as 5:1, and some can be as fast as having a fishing ratio of 10:1. It all depends on the fisherman and what type of fishing they prefer.
