Fresh carbontex, weak drag

[woodeye]

I just cleaned up, lubed, and put in fresh Carbontex drags on a Newell P332-F with a Tiburon 322 conversion. I haven't worked on reels for quite awhile. As I tighten the drag it begins to adjust, then stays at about the same resistance until I'm crankin' down hard on the star. It suddenly gets pretty strong and there is a little range, but the star locks down hard within about four points of the star spokes. I barely touched on a little Cal's grease, but maybe it was too much? Also, the spring washers seem pretty tired. Hell, I'm guessin', but I want to use it Friday so I could use some suggestions.

[doradoben]

Don't worry about too much Cal's grease. If there is extra, it will just squeeze out of a star drag washer stack.

[wallacewt]

try bending the spring washers a bit
may get you by on friday
cheers

[alantani]

is the star bottoming out?

[woodeye]

Alan, no. I can get about 10lbs of drag with the solid tight star; it's not bottoming out. It's that the drag stays weak through 2 full revolutions of star, then suddenly it goes from maybe 2 or 3lbs to 5 or 6lbs, then I have about 4 or 5 star points before the star shouldn't be cranked on any harder and I have MAYBE 10lbs of drag resistance. I'm wondering if the "Belleville" washer is weak. It seems pretty worn.

[woodeye]

I'm sorry Alto Mare: your suggestion "while open" isn't showing on your reply. What did you have in mind? You're prolly right; I probably missed something. I'll open it up again. Is there a handy place for the Newell 332 schematic?

[Alto Mare]

Sorry Woodeye, I pulled it, I realized that it wasn't what you were asking for. Yes it is a good idea to open it up again, we all miss things every now and then.

[Bryan Young]

Sounds like your washers are not in the right order.  Look at smoothdrag.com.  The have a diagram showing the star drag configuration.   

[gstours]

Hello and yes I,ve had a similar problem, it seems like maybe the eared steel washers might be the problem, I used the 7-1 thinnie washered set and they may have slipped, or grabbed the gear sidewall and stuck somehow.   as there was a little drag, but cranked down hard nothing more ,,,,ya about 6-7 lbs.....even cranked down,   the gear was an accurate main gear.....so I replaced with a stock penn set of steel washeres for a 5-1 and everything was fine again........I think it was the thin washeres binding or slipping, spenning,,,, the ears looked ok, just no drag..........

[franky]

Hello,

In addition to checking your drag stack, you should also look very carefully at your big belleville at the top of the drag stack.  Make sure you dont have any hairline cracks in it.  Just a slight hairline crack and you'll have a very weak drag.   

[handi2]

I have found that with some of the aftermarket SS gears the first eared washer doesn't go all the way down inside the gear unless the ears of the thin washer are sanded just a bit. Make sure the eared washers are fitting correctly before assembly. This is for the 7+1 stack of thin washers.