Idea I had to upgrade my spool Spool / Reel

[Paul Evans]

must be shit line. I coloured in a mark at 6m on my reel line about 20 years ago and it seems fine...

Crayon?

[Paulo]

When I decided I wanted to mark a fingerspool lengths I used tiny tags of duct tape about 10mm x 5mm. Lastwd maybe 5 years before I decided that I no longer wanted to mark depths on the line

[Energy58]

No idea how an Aluminium spool can ever cost £82. Mind you it seems like that is the case for a lot of diving gear. Even for the line to use with your reel - £22 for 15m up to £45 for 60m on a popular diving store compared to the first comparison when googling for braided nylon line where you can buy various colours for about £18 (including postage) for either 280m (2mm) or 180m (3mm).

Is there some unknown diving tax I don't know about?

Buy builders line from Screwfix - other tool stores are available - same stuff about £7 for 300m in orange, £4 for 100m in yellow - they also do pink if that floats your boat

[Energy58]

must be shit line. I coloured in a mark at 6m on my reel line about 20 years ago and it seems fine...

It wasn't nylon thats for sure as nylon only dissolves in really nasty stuff that won't go anywhere near a sharpie, thats really the whole point of nylon - it is largely inert:

nylon is considered soluble in only a few solvents such as phenol, cresols, and dimethyl formamide (DMF)

None of that is likely to be in a sharpie

[jturner]

Have you seen how much Apex charge for for Ali??

Apeks are a premium price-point, tech brand nowadays apparently. I'm not sure what the marketing plan was but if you have a reputation for straight up great valve, bomb-proof, no nonsense kit, you would have thought that keeping that reputation going and ensuring your stuff was always the first choice (and the benchmark that others are compared against) was a good idea. Trading on the name alone ala Padi doesn't seem to be a great idea to me. The fact that I don't understand the move is probably evidence as to why I'm not in marketing.

[notdeadyet]

Apeks are a premium price-point, tech brand nowadays apparently. I'm not sure what the marketing plan was but if you have a reputation for straight up great valve, bomb-proof, no nonsense kit, you would have thought that keeping that reputation going and ensuring your stuff was always the first choice (and the benchmark that others are compared against) was a good idea. Trading on the name alone ala Padi doesn't seem to be a great idea to me. The fact that I don't understand the move is probably evidence as to why I'm not in marketing.

Apeks is now the Canada Goose for diving neds. I don't understand it either. I have no idea why 80 quid for an Aliexpress spool is appealing to some divers any more than I understand why orange women with hair extensions and trout pouts spend £1200 on a coat (from a company that used to supply Canadian bin men) for dropping the weans off at school and walking their ugly wee dugs.

[witchieblackcat]

Buy builders line from Screwfix - other tool stores are available - same stuff about £7 for 300m in orange, £4 for 100m in yellow - they also do pink if that floats your boat

Don't. It's very weak and snaps easily.