My Dad's Old Penn Squidder 146 Part 1

Life, family, work, teaching, Little League and all the other things in life get in the way of fishing. Not that I am complaining, but I’ve been itching to get back out on the water.

In the meantime I have not posted much in the past few months so I am going to try to catch up with some posts about the equipment I use. My dad was never one to have much equipment (even though towards the end of his life he literally fished on the half day boats everyday) and had two rods, two reels and a small plastic tackle box. Both rods were custom wrapped jobs from the early 70′s, one red and one yellow, and I still have the redone that I will post about in the future.

The two reels he had were a Penn Jigmaster and a Penn Squidder 146. When I would go out with him I would usually end up with the Jigmaster, and he would fish the Squidder with 15 – 20lb test. One of the things I will always remember was my dad standing on the rail with his brown rod and Squidder, alone on the Matt Walsh fishing ghost shrimp he picked up from Paul’s Bait and Tackle in San Pedro. Here is one of the few photos I have of him with the rod (it’s in the left of the photo leaning on the rail, the Squidder is on it)

From Old Fishing Photos

After my dad passed away in 1991 (he was only 34, about a year older than I am now) I ended up with the brown rod and Squidder attached. I used it a few more times, but as I went to school and other interests came and went the rod faded from memory and went into storage, outside behind a garage. Out of site, out of mind.

As I started to get back into fishing with my son I decided to find the rod again and see what condition it was in. Let’s just say 6-7 years of sitting outside was not kind. The rod had damaged eyes and cracks in the coating. The sun did a number on the wrapping, and it will never see the water again, even if I had it repaired the rod blank is to far gone. The reel was in just as bad shape.

From Dad’s Penn Squidder

It had old line still on it, did not go into gear and was damaged by the elements as well. Inside the reel it was rusted and a mess. The damage list is too long to go into here.

From Dad’s Penn Squidder

I need to find a replacement and started to look online for a new 146. This is a discontinued model in the Penn line of reels now, and is still popular today with surf fishing guys. The 146 model is sometimes called the “junior” or “baby” model because it has a much narrower spool than the standard 150. It is very easy to see why they are popular, it feels right in the hands and on the rod. It also has a one screw take apart feature that is great when you want to switch out line quickly.

I was able to find a new old-stock Squidder 140 for under $20 on e-Bay, but the 146′s were much higher or used. I did some more research and found that the Newell S229-5 (Photo Gallery) is a close replacement. I always enjoyed the Newells and found one new online for under $80. I will post about it in the future, it’s my new everyday reel matched with my new rod a Calstar WC-270-7C (once again another post for another day).

New replacement reel and rod.

Getting back to the poor old Squidder. I started asking around about repair/refurbishment at the local tackle shops and did some searches online. Ending up finding Mr. Alan Tani and his site http://alantani.com/

After some emails back and forth I sent off the reel to him for repair and tender loving care. What came back was more than I could ever ask for. I have a whole story about the “new” old reel I got back, and I will cover it next post, Part 2 of My Dad’s Old Penn Squidder 146. Just as a teaser, here is a quick after photo…