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Old days


noelm

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These headlights were part of the collection of reel turner Barry Langley of Kyogle- my original ones were pretty much the same. They ran on heavy batteries -mine were 4 or 6 x "D" cell and you had to wear a belt, otherwise they'd pull the old "stubbies" off, which happened the first time I wore the light climbing the Mattens cliff face about midnight- shorts came down while on the ropes about 80 ft up- had to "rope-burn slide" to "safety" on widest (15 inch) ledge. Scary moment!

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Back of spool shot showing why these "Nottingham style" reels were known as "Star-backs", probably thousands of these reels, from many,many makers, all over the world. Certainly heaps of different varieties made here in Aust. Used from Trout in freshwater to even deep sea game fishing (which usually had leather palm "brake-pad") - plenty of star-backs were home made

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It took literally about 5-7 days to produce split cane rods (per rod by small batch at a time) and builders were genuine crafts-person's to do the number of different processes involved, which also included turning/shaping foregrips, butts etc. Some builders 'signature mark' was actually the stylishly turned grip. No soft grips on most, until cork started to become utilised. Pre cork, heavy duty rods like game rods were leather bound for grips

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Last one for today- they don't look like much, but most of these are 60+years old- the red and yellow and green and yellow ones in the centre are roughly 50 years old- I used to "spin" for Long Toms with them and a bait trailing about 18 inches behind- float attracted the 'Tom's' like a popper and they'd grab the bait. Great fun when I was a kid!

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Some great stuff there, some bringing back memories, some just fascinating to see, I guess modern day newcomers would find it pretty hard to believe what was made, adapted and modified to try to catch fish. I remember a great big hand spool thing that was supposed to be the best thing ever, you used the spool in your hands as a kind of drag, I think the name was "maxi catcher" 

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17 minutes ago, noelm said:

Some great stuff there, some bringing back memories, some just fascinating to see, I guess modern day newcomers would find it pretty hard to believe what was made, adapted and modified to try to catch fish. I remember a great big hand spool thing that was supposed to be the best thing ever, you used the spool in your hands as a kind of drag, I think the name was "maxi catcher" 

Hi Noel here is something sort of similar- had a handle on the back making it like holding a rod without guides- 'drag' was your palm!

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The maxi catcher was just a big spool, kind of like a bike rim on its own, no spokes or hub, and you held the spool vertical in front of you, and you just wound in by turning the spool with your hands, the diameter was supposed to give you "power" and if the fish ran, you just let it slide between your hands, I did try one once, almost completely useless, I guess that's why they never took off?

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