Upgrading gear ratios and possible problems

[thorhammer]

I think this all gets back to using equipment within design capability. Ambassadeurs in all their iterations go from sloooow (red 5000's) to 6.3:1 and possibly higher- I seem to recall a 7:1 spinner bait reel somewhere, maybe not, but for sure north of 6, like the old Royal Express. The original design is dang near 75 years old, with some cosmetics and mag enhancements, but the main change being to ultracast format with spool bearings rather than side plate bearings. I have fished these for over forty years on mono within their class with ZERO issues besides replacing a pawl. ONE pawl, and I have north of 40 Ambassadeurs. Others have caught much larger fish than I- I saw a 40 lb cobia caught on a pier with a 5500C, and it was locked down to keep the fish out of pilings. Rod and thumb were used in concert with reel, and so the reel still worked as before. There have been untold trophy drum caught on them, and I mean 40 lb. plus fish pulling in inlet and storm currents. Directly winching no-stretch, high-test braid changes the calculus of what these reels were designed to do, just like our treasured Jiggy's and Senators. Upgrade drag, you have to upgrade frame. Upgrade frame with a power handle for braid, gotta upgrade to SS gears and sleeve, and may as well go to BB billet plates then. So, you have little left resembling the original stock design intent. This is the quandary with rodding a 505HS Jiggy. It was meant for 30 lb mono at ideal, and really excelled as a 20 lb mono king mackerel reel in its day.

Benni had a thread discussing hot-rodding cars, and he sagely stated to the effect of "keep it below 500hp. Once you pass 500hp, there are all sorts of things that can start breaking". The same applies in reels.

I can't see any issues upping to a 5.3:1 set, a bajillion Ambassadeurs are already in use at this ratio. Trying to winch a 100 lb ray stuck to the bottom with 80lb braid, yeah that might cause issues.

We can pontificate the physics and math all day, but at the end, load it up and go test-to-failure. That'll tell you what you need to know, and you either have a good fish pic or a good fish story.

My 0.10.

[handi2]

Just pump then wind. It's really not that hard.

[nelz]

Why is it that bronze gears shred at 15-20# in a conventional but seem to hold up just fine at more than double that on a spinner?

In star drag conventionals, the gears are turning under tension as drag is pulled. When a biggun's pulling drag on a modern spinner, the AR and rotor are handling all the stress, the gears are not in play until you turn the handle. (Not the case with old school spinners though, which had the AR situated on the main gear.)

[foakes]

Just pump then wind. It's really not that hard.

In the words of Lee (Keta) —- Yep...

Best, Fred

[jurelometer]

There is some very useful information here! I never thought about "winding load capacity", nor have I ever seen these figures listed alongside reels. Am I just not paying attention? My wife accuses me of "man looking" all the time so, maybe I am just missing that info on the box or website? Surely I would not miss it.

Never seen it or even heard of it. It is something that I thought about after shredding too many gears and starting to mess with reel designs.  But this is just basic mechanical design hygiene. Not really rocket surgery.

What I currently do is look at the schematic and see if the reel structurally has "good bones". I would be hard pressed to buy a reel without a published schematic.  Tutorials with photos, and reports from the members here that see a lot of reels can also help. But this is just an inaccurate approximation.  You can test a reel on your own, but if you push it to the limit, you will need some new parts, or maybe a new reel.

There could be an interesting debate about what an acceptable winding load capacity should be for a reel.  It would be something below max drag.  I would prefer something at least 50%,  but the old school crowd could get by with less.

We didn't hear much about drag capacity back in the day, but with the advent of braid, customers started asking about it, and now most reels of decent size publish numbers (even if many claims seem pretty dubious).  Designs started to get altered to improve drag capacity as well.  Now folks are using higher drag, and therefore tend to be in situations where they will also be  winding under greater load.

Maybe winding load will have its day, but I am not holding my breath.  But the reel companies have been improving winding load in some designs, and even advertise "new improved stronger gear sets", which mostly benefit winding load.

You can kinda get away with telling a guy who shelled out a grand on a high end spinner that he was "using the reel wrong" , but he will still be in the market for a reel that doesn't shred the gears so much.  The market is slowly responding.

-J

[DougK]

When you are pulling the fish head first toward you, you have a huge advantage.  Fish don't do swimming backwards well, so they either try to turn around (burns lots of energy for not much travel distance), or simply glide right toward you. The faster/farther you lower the rod to decrease winding load on your reel, the less force there is on the fish, making it easier for the fish to turn around and take your advantage away.

this is an excellent point.. have noticed this catching carp on the fly rod, they typically make really long runs 80yd plus. Usually if I pump the rod to get them back in, the hook will come away at some point, as they fight every foot of the way in. These days I'll crank them back in with the rod held low and they typically will just glide back. At least until they realize what's happening and power off again. The fly reel is direct drive so no gears to strip, ha.

I don't catch anything big enough to trouble my gears otherwise, seems to me that's a good problem to have..

[borntofish]

When you are pulling the fish head first toward you, you have a huge advantage.  Fish don't do swimming backwards well, so they either try to turn around (burns lots of energy for not much travel distance), or simply glide right toward you. The faster/farther you lower the rod to decrease winding load on your reel, the less force there is on the fish, making it easier for the fish to turn around and take your advantage away.

this is an excellent point.. have noticed this catching carp on the fly rod, they typically make really long runs 80yd plus. Usually if I pump the rod to get them back in, the hook will come away at some point, as they fight every foot of the way in. These days I'll crank them back in with the rod held low and they typically will just glide back. At least until they realize what's happening and power off again. The fly reel is direct drive so no gears to strip, ha.

I don't catch anything big enough to trouble my gears otherwise, seems to me that's a good problem to have..

There is a reason that game reels often have to gear ratios - a lower one for cranking power. Regarding beach fishing with ABU's I think 4.1:1 is ideal on the 7000 reels (unless you are spinning). You do notice a difference in recovering line on a stubborn fish compared to 5.3:1.

[handi2]

This picture was taken a couple of years ago on my boat showing my friend and pastor Pompano Joe Prestridge catching Bull Redfish in Pensacola Bay with his Ambassaduer 6500.

He uses Ambassaduer reels surf fishing also.

[jurelometer]

When you are pulling the fish head first toward you, you have a huge advantage.  Fish don't do swimming backwards well, so they either try to turn around (burns lots of energy for not much travel distance), or simply glide right toward you. The faster/farther you lower the rod to decrease winding load on your reel, the less force there is on the fish, making it easier for the fish to turn around and take your advantage away.

this is an excellent point.. have noticed this catching carp on the fly rod, they typically make really long runs 80yd plus. Usually if I pump the rod to get them back in, the hook will come away at some point, as they fight every foot of the way in. These days I'll crank them back in with the rod held low and they typically will just glide back. At least until they realize what's happening and power off again. The fly reel is direct drive so no gears to strip, ha.

I don't catch anything big enough to trouble my gears otherwise, seems to me that's a good problem to have..

Agree.

Fighting stronger fish on a fly rod requires us to learn a lot more about how to play fish effectively.  Same techniques mostly apply to conventional gear too.

I can turn a willing rookie into an effective saltwater fly rod fish fighter in a couple of fish. The more experienced old-timers tend to stick to what they were taught back when the equipment was less capable.  The old school "pump and wind, use the rod, the reel is just for storing line" technique.

Ironically, the folks that have the greatest depth of experience to share are often the least willing to change.  Human nature, I guess.

-J

[Gfish]

I like it!
"Winding load capacity".
One other technique on a big'un comes to mind; loosen the drag as it comes close. When you see each other, they sometimes make that sudden desperate lunge.

[handi2]

I like it!
"Winding load capacity".
One other technique on a big'un comes to mind; loosen the drag as it comes close. When you see each other, they sometimes make that sudden desperate lunge.

That's right! Ease up when when you get them off the structure.

[JasonGotaProblem]

Max drag= total drag the stack can produce. Sometimes this number in marketing materials is theoretical

Max Cranking load= max resistance you can retrieve line against before something breaks or deforms

Right?

Opinion: a reel that can't use a majority of its drag range for risk of failure is about as bad as a "heavy duty" reel that nerfs the drag to decrease the risk of failure.

[Ron Jones]

I am confident that learning to be much more aggressive on the wind has improved my results.  Less getting rocked, sawed off, or sharked.  Better for quickly landing and releasing fish.  Better for shortening the time to finish and be free to chase the next fish.  And we all know the adage "the longer the fight, the longer the odds". 

Being more aggressive does require being more picky on choice of reel. I think that we sometimes pay too much attention to drag load capacity and not enough to winding load capacity when evaluating reels. 
-J

I wholeheartedly agree with this, although I would submit that being more aggressive increases the number of pulled hooks and broken line. There is something that is missed with this, though...
IT"S NOT AS FUN!

One of the cultural shifts I have noticed in fishing is a desire to minimize fight time. This makes no sense to me, the whole point of being out there is to fight a fish. If you look at the "reasonable" extremes, you can always bring a Penn International 80 on a trolling rod and drown the white sea bass coming to the boat in 30 seconds; or you can hook into a 50+ tuna on trout gear and experience the fight of your life.

Neither is correct or wrong, it just depends on what you're looking for. I'm looking for burning biceps, exhaustion, and the creation of an environment where I have to do everything right.

The Man

[jurelometer]

Max drag= total drag the stack can produce. Sometimes this number in marketing materials is theoretical

Max Cranking load= max resistance you can retrieve line against before something breaks or deforms

Right?

Correct.