cabelas salt striker drag upgrade

[yota924x4]

so i had a little envelope from smooth drag come in today (3 days from cali to Pa isnt too shabby) and one of the reels that i ordered washers for was a cabelas salt striker.  i handled one of these reels at the closest store and it feels smooth for a $70 reel so i figured i'll pick one up. 

the specs are as follows
SS-50B    drag:17 lbs.
cap   390/12lb  280/15lb    gear ratio 4.5:1    bearings 9+1    weight 16.2oz
graphite frame and sideplate, aluminum spool
it has been mentioned that the reel could perhaps be made by okuma but i'm not certain (another cabelas brand reel that i own has daiwa right on the spool and directions and looks exactly like an exceler)

the stock oiled felt drag was plenty smooth out of the box but 3 #23 washers from dawn certainly can not harm the situation so i lubed them up with teflon grease as the master taught us and in they go




so after this i'm changing a daiwa 2500 over to CF and an inexpensive daiwa d-wave combo that i picked up for the GF since that reel feels like the drag material was made of recycled pencil erasers.  now every reel i own that fishes over 10lb test runs teflon greased carbon fiber and the worlds problems are one step closer to being solved...

[BMITCH]

Thanks for the pics and post. I had one of these a couple years back. Did the same and upgraded the washers to cf greased. Only problem I had was that the main body cracked right at the base of the stem where it comes into the gear case. Ever since then I only buy spinners that have alum. Bodies. You should be ok if you don't push it to hard. Thanks for the post.
Bob

[philaroman]

the baitrunner SS's are definitely Okuma, maybe an old Epixor platform...  the standard ones look kinda' Pflueger[ish]