Mitchell Riptide 4/0 GL drag help!

[mitchman]

A friend gave me a Mitchell Riptide 4/0 GL conventional reel to do some service on. Well took me a bit but I finally got her back together! Anyways, after spooling the reel up and checking the drag I realized that it is not getting very much drag at all. One thing that isn't clear for the schematics online is the order of the various spacers & washers as there are 2 where it shows 1 spacer in several locations along the gear shaft. Does anyone have any experience taking one of these reels apart? Any ideas on the low drag #'s? The only thing I can think of is there may be grease in the drag stack....

[Keta]

Did you fill the reel with Spectra?

[alantani]

the drag washers alternate "fiber/metal/fiber," etc. and the metal washers alternate "keyed, slotted, keyed," .......  schematics, anyone?  as lee was alluding to, spectra slipping on the spool is probably the most common cause.  alan

[Keta]

 as lee was alluding to, spectra slipping on the spool is probably the most common cause.  alan

Common and hard to figure out if you haven't seen it before.  The first time I delt with this I took apart the reel far too many times.

[mitchman]

Thanks for the quick replies! The reel is filled with 50lb big game mono and I installed the drag washers alternating metal/fiber/metal/etc.

Here is a link to the schematics: http://www.mikesreelrepair.com/schematics/albums/mitchell/Mitchell_Riptide_2%2C4%2C6-0___GL.pdf

The problem that I think I have is with #45 - spacer seems to be actually a double spacer, and then there are two wafer-thin washers between that and the bearing that aren't on the schematics. Also, #30 - Tension Washers are essentially those ()) style spacers.....maybe I have them in a wrong configuration such as ))) or something.

[Keta]

Well, there goes the easy fix.  Mono does not slip like Spectra.

The two "wafer thin washers" are most likely shim washers.

Did you put the metal washers in keyed, eared, keyed, eared?

Is the star bottoming out when you tighten it?

Do you have #43 and #45 "spacer" reversed?

[mitchman]

Well, there goes the easy fix.  Mono does not slip like Spectra.

The two "wafer thin washers" are most likely shim washers.

Did you put the metal washers in keyed, eared, keyed, eared?

Is the star bottoming out when you tighten it?

Do you have #43 and #45 "spacer" reversed?

I think you are correct that those are shim washers.

The drag stack is in the correct order.

The start seems to essentially be bottomed when I tighten it.....but its bottomed out I also get binding in the handle (like a maxed out Avet).

I don't believe #43 and #45 are reversed since the diagram is deceiving as #43 is much wider than #45.


This weekend I will take the drag stack apart and check for excess grease. Then I will look closely at the tension washer spacing. Hopefully one of those works. I will report back.

[Keta]

Could one of the eared washers have come out when assembling the reel and is catching on the gear?  Thanks for letting us know what you find.

[mitchman]

So I took the reel apart last week and cleaned off the excess grease out of the drag washers (there was too much) and then attempted to align the tension washers in a ()( configuration. My results didn't seem to change a bit So I am kind of stuck as I can only get 2.5 lbs of drag which seems like waaaay too little. One thing I noticed is that it seems that the bearing is getting pushed into into its sleeve in the housing about an 1/8in. Something must be misaligned...

[Bryan Young]

can you add pics?  I conceptually have a picture in my mind, but I don't seem to have a vision of how the reel is being put back together.

[mitchman]

I will try to add pics by the weekend....

[paal]

Could one of the eared washers have come out when assembling the reel and is catching on the gear?  Thanks for letting us know what you find.

Yes, my guess also. Happens very easily, and hard to detect from the outside.