I’m relatively new to yoyoing and have read many guides on cleaning bearings.
I’ve used white spirit to soak my bearing, but I haven’t applied lubricant yet, so in other words, I currently have a “dry” bearing. I did clean it once before but poured too much sewing machine oil (I don’t have thin yoyo lube), so I had to start again.
The question is, how long is a clean dry bearing supposed to spin for? I’m kinda lost as I haven’t managed any “out of the box” bearing spin times (flicking it on a pencil) after I cleaned it, so I’m guessing that I might not have washed out all the excess oil I used before, but seeing as I left it overnight, I’m pretty sure that the oil’s all out. I’m going to wash it all out with white spirit again to be sure
1: Your throw is the biggest issue. The better and stronger your throw, the longer it will spin. This is by far the most critical.
2: Condition of the bearing. Is it broken in? Lubed or dry, a bearing needs to be broken in. If the bearing is well broken in, I know flicking it with your finger can result in some impressive spin times right there.
3: Lubed vs. Dry vs dry lubed…
4: Weight and design of the yoyo.
If you’re new, don’t sweat it and don’t obsess over spin times. It will come and it will improve. If you can get through what you’re trying to do, you’ve got all the spin you need for now.
