River Monsters Reel ID

[redsetta]

I've had a couple of Policansky Monitors over the years.
The design is fantastic - very considered and reflective of a 'form follows function' ethos.
The drag is indeed cork and requires only the slightest touch of Cal's/PTFE to work very smoothly.
Cork doesn't like getting wet, however, and becomes 'grabby' if it does.
They were designed and manufactured by Hymie Policansky.
His son David is still around and has posted some reflections on the South African Sealine forum.
Here's a couple of his posts, pulled from a thread on Monitors:

"The 2B [Monitor] had a gear ratio of 4.8:1, as I remember. jb2 wonders if it's fast enough to jig for yellowtail and I think so.
"I used to use a Penn Squidder for bluefish here in the eastern US where I live (they get well into the teens of pounds and sometimes more than 20 pounds/9kg here) and the 2B was more than fast enough for them, which the Squidder wasn't.  
"I caught a lot of fish on them, although I did switch to the much smaller, lighter, Shimano Speedmaster II reels with 6:1 ratio.
"My father used cork because it was the best material available for drags then--some people think it's still the best.  
"He saw big Penn reels left smoking after big yellowfins spooled them and also the plastic spools of Penn 49 reels--widely used for casting to yellowtail in those days--sometimes burst on big fish because the monofilament we used would stretch and then put tremendous pressure on the spool if you weren't doing things correctly. So he wanted something better."
"Many decades ago, while we all lived in London and while my father was still designing the reel, I told him that the friction between two surfaces depends only on the pressure and the material, but not on the area in contact.  
"He didn't believe me, although he'd paid for me to learn physics--it's not intuitive--so I got two sizes of my mother's place-mats with felt bottoms and put some books on them and dragged them across the living-room carpet with a spring balance.  
"Even I was slightly surprised to see that indeed my physics books were absolutely right!  
"The size of the mat made no difference to the reading on the balance. But a bigger area allows for better cooling.
"I think the main advantage of a lever over a star for setting the drag is that you can see exactly where the drag is set by looking at the position of the lever.  
"It's a bit more direct to set but that's countered by how easy it is to move the lever by mistake."

Hope that's of some interest.
Cheers, Justin
PS Incidentally, high-end Japanese custom reel maker Studio Ocean Mark (SOM) also use cork drag washers, as they believe they're the best product for the task.
Their Blue Heaven L120 is a conventional single-sided lever drag which produces 20kg of smooth drag from the cork washer (and an angular contact bearing, of course).
I've worked on a couple and they're sublime (though not far off US$1000!).

[jurelometer]

Great stories!

A bunch of comments here:

First of all,  cork drags that are properly lubricated should work when wet.   The water won't absorb into lubricated cork. Unshielded cork drag fly reels are routinely used wet wading. Works fine for me.  They get slightly grabby when contaminated, and unusable when dry.  Maybe the difference is that fly reels stay drags usually stay engaged while fishing (no water getting in), while a lever drag is compressing any water into the grease when you engage the lever.



I did not find the SOM reel descriptions from their web site very compelling.  The reels are good looking, but I am turned of by the nonsense marketing (high temperature cork - what?  A  special species of cork  trees with high temperature bark?    ). And questionable design choices like a one way bearing in a reel that supports 20kg of drag (no, a rubber seal is not going to save you here- it will help keep the salt out for awhile, but then will mostly keep salt in).  And angular contact bearings are not some sort of special component that you work with a bearing manufacturer to develop.    

I still would like to see a schematic, though.

Finally, I used to be a cork hater myself, but have found that I am happy with the stuff in my saltwater fly reels.  The advantages of cork are vibration absorption, that slight stretch before it starts slipping (helps prevent break offs), and a high coefficient of friction requiring less clamping force.  

But there are downsides.  Cork must be fully lubricated or the material will abrade, overheat, and even ignite.  Cork has a very  low max operating temperature (it will fry with some high RPMs if already at around 200F,  probably best to keep well below 150- the elastic cork fragment binding material -usually an acrylic - needs to be heat protected as well), and cork will permanently deform/compress at extended and/or higher clamping loads.    If they actually need angular contact bearings in that SOM reel to handle larger compressive loads, they probably shouldn't be using cork.

I guess it is possible that the SOM reels do a good job at higher drag settings, but their component choices are working against them.

While properly maintained cork works well within its load range, I can't see how it would be the drag material of choice for any modern reel designed from scratch, but especially not with a high drag requirement.

My $0.02,

-J

I've had a couple of Policansky Monitors over the years.
The design is fantastic - very considered and reflective of a 'form follows function' ethos.
The drag is indeed cork and requires only the slightest touch of Cal's/PTFE to work very smoothly.
Cork doesn't like getting wet, however, and becomes 'grabby' if it does.
They were designed and manufactured by Hymie Policansky.
His son David is still around and has posted some reflections on the South African Sealine forum.
Here's a couple of his posts, pulled from a thread on Monitors:

"The 2B [Monitor] had a gear ratio of 4.8:1, as I remember. jb2 wonders if it's fast enough to jig for yellowtail and I think so.
"I used to use a Penn Squidder for bluefish here in the eastern US where I live (they get well into the teens of pounds and sometimes more than 20 pounds/9kg here) and the 2B was more than fast enough for them, which the Squidder wasn't.  
"I caught a lot of fish on them, although I did switch to the much smaller, lighter, Shimano Speedmaster II reels with 6:1 ratio.
"My father used cork because it was the best material available for drags then--some people think it's still the best.  
"He saw big Penn reels left smoking after big yellowfins spooled them and also the plastic spools of Penn 49 reels--widely used for casting to yellowtail in those days--sometimes burst on big fish because the monofilament we used would stretch and then put tremendous pressure on the spool if you weren't doing things correctly. So he wanted something better."
"Many decades ago, while we all lived in London and while my father was still designing the reel, I told him that the friction between two surfaces depends only on the pressure and the material, but not on the area in contact.  
"He didn't believe me, although he'd paid for me to learn physics--it's not intuitive--so I got two sizes of my mother's place-mats with felt bottoms and put some books on them and dragged them across the living-room carpet with a spring balance.  
"Even I was slightly surprised to see that indeed my physics books were absolutely right!  
"The size of the mat made no difference to the reading on the balance. But a bigger area allows for better cooling.
"I think the main advantage of a lever over a star for setting the drag is that you can see exactly where the drag is set by looking at the position of the lever.  
"It's a bit more direct to set but that's countered by how easy it is to move the lever by mistake."

Hope that's of some interest.
Cheers, Justin
PS Incidentally, high-end Japanese custom reel maker Studio Ocean Mark (SOM) also use cork drag washers, as they believe they're the best product for the task.
Their Blue Heaven L120 is a conventional single-sided lever drag which produces 20kg of smooth drag from the cork washer (and an angular contact bearing, of course).
I've worked on a couple and they're sublime (though not far off US$1000!).

[richard]

i think Alan is right..the pic is reversed...
you can switch to LHW by reversing the AR gear , BUT that means the drag lever goes backwards for more drag .
in the pic JW has the lever in the free spool position for LHW yet is playing a fish...
so that would be full drag in RHW( but reversed image .)
I had three of these reels , but they were a bit fragile tho nice to fish with , screws and cross bars were smaller than those on a senator and frames twisted on big fish .
i dont get the bit about the pressure on the table mat referred to by his Son .
Surely if you double the surface area on a drag washer but keep the drag pressure the same , you have simply halved the pressure per square inch ? isn't that the reason
the two table mats showed similar readings ?
Perhaps Jureal could expand on this 😁

[jurelometer]

i think Alan is right..the pic is reversed...
you can switch to LHW by reversing the AR gear , BUT that means the drag lever goes backwards for more drag .
in the pic JW has the lever in the free spool position for LHW yet is playing a fish...
so that would be full drag in RHW( but reversed image .)
I had three of these reels , but they were a bit fragile tho nice to fish with , screws and cross bars were smaller than those on a senator and frames twisted on big fish .
i dont get the bit about the pressure on the table mat referred to by his Son .
Surely if you double the surface area on a drag washer but keep the drag pressure the same , you have simply halved the pressure per square inch ? isn't that the reason
the two table mats showed similar readings ?
Perhaps Jureal could expand on this 😁

For the purposes of us laymen, I believe that you got it right, and I think that is what the son was trying to say.  I think that there is some more fancy stuff going on at  the molecular level, so a real (tm)  physicist might quibble a bit.  

The diameter matters in the sense that the leverage changes, and the amount of braking distance per revolution increases with diameter.   If you look at a disc brake on a high performance car vs a standard sedan, you will see how the designs get optimized for more braking capacity.   But larger discs require more rigidity and tighter tolerances, so there are tradeoffs involved. Same principles apply on reels.

BTW, I think the son missed on the major benefits of lever drags over star drags, but that's OK, so do many of the reel companies

Thanks for sharing your firsthand experience with these reels.

-J

[boon]

That clip is such a mess of editing. At one point the reel turns into something smaller with a level-wind and a counter-balanced handle. Pause it at 2:29.

Personally I can't stand that show.

[nelz]

That clip is such a mess of editing. At one point the reel turns into something smaller with a level-wind and a counter-balanced handle. Pause it at 2:29.

Yeah, I've seen the same thing in a different episode, it shows a totally different reel in the middle of fighting the same fish. I still enjoy the show though.

There's also another similar show called "Chasing Monsters" which is pretty good. On that show the reels are clearly shown close up, and he uses high end gear, Van Staal, Stella.

[richard]

I still have the small version of this reel , about ABU 7000 size .
The drag works on a thread on the spindle , rather than the usual cam .
Spindle was hollow with a small oil hole and wick inside.....add a drop of oil for the plain spool bearings .
Pre set was a small gear on the tail plate that turned a larger gear to draw the spindle and compress the cork .
Two thrust bearings inside  , i think , made of nylon with steel balls , but you still had that handle resistance...( Avetnesia ?) .
Drag range was restricted by the fine thread on the spindle....you often had to add pre set with the left hand during a fight , then back off afterwards to get free spool again .
( no cam to provide that jump )
Lightly greased as Redsetter said they were smooth , and you could adjust in fine increments via the pre set and get a sort of cast control that worked very well .
Gears were nicely machined Bronze ?....pinion was tiny dia to get the high gear ratio .
505 size but longer ( strength ?)
Made in South Africa , the green and gold is the colour of their flag i was told .
I bought my reels last millennium so its a bit unfair to compare them to modern stuff,
the high gear gave that nice" galloping "feel you get with a 505 or speedmaster .
I used the size that JW is using in Cabo for Tuna at first , but found that 113 's were easier to live with in the long run . I like old gear and its not such a worry to leave on the boat . People tend to nick gold reels rather than red ones LOL 😁