Reel Repair by Alan Tani

QuoteAlan, I recently joined up on your very useful website, thanks for that, thanks also for all the posts you put on our South African site Sealine (which now seems to have stopped temporarily). I use Torium 30 and 20 reels for surfcasting and have replaced the dartanium washers with Cal's greased Carbontex on all of them. I have, however, found that if you slacken of the drag to say for example place the rod in a sand spike (to prevent rod and reel being dragged into the sea by a fish), it sticks until you give the handle a quick turn (with spool slipping). After that it is smooth as anything. All of them do that. What is the reason for this? The reels are in excellent condition and I cannot see anything wrong with the drag stack, star drag etc. Could wading be the cause for this? We often wade in fairly deep to cast and your reel gets a thorough dunking then (Shimano seems to stand up best to this punishment). Although I must say that the sticking happens even when I haven't taken a reel for a swim. It is generally not such a big problem as I generally fish with 40lb line, but if I use lighter that initial jam could lead to a break off. I had no problems with the last couple of big sharks that I caught and the drag was smooth even with fish peeling off 500m of line, after it got through the first jerk. On one of our forums a guy complained of losing two sharks in a row because of his Carbontex having that initial jam. He was fishing throw baits so had rod in hand and tightened up immediately where as in my case the fish initially ran on a fairly loose drag before tightening up.  Your comments will be greatly appreciated.

this is an odd one.  my first thought was that the spool itself was stuck somewhere.  the problem is that a can't think of a single way that the spool could get stuck like that.  there is no place on the left side of the spool that could cause such a problem.  the gap between the spool and frame could have line caught up or corrosion.  removing the left side plate for a quick inspection would answer that question quickly.  at that time, you could inspect both the left and right spool bearings.  for the type of fishing you do, i'll bet that the right spool bearing is corroded already.  it's possible that the bearing could be the cause, but i doubt it, even if it IS corroded. 

if the pinion gear had seized up on the spool shaft, you could not get the reel in and out of gear.  the spool and pinion gear would still spin together as a unit against the main gear.  which leaves the main gear to get stuck against something.  the main gear is in full contact with the carbontex washer UNDERNEATH and the full drag stack inside.  nothing to get stuck here.  there is a possibility that the main gear could be in contact with the side plate, but that would require that the carbontex washers had been installed incorrectly.  the main gear could also be jammed up against something else underneath.  that something would most likely be the dog, so check it again for proper installation. 

try this.  remove the side plate, then re-install the star and handle in the normal manner.  if you can re-create this problem, you might get a visual clue as to where the spool or main gear is getting stuck.  clearly, something is getting stuck against something else.  it's like the children's song, "the foot bone's connected to the ankle bone, the ankle bone's connected to the knee bone, the knee bone's connected ...".  alan

QuoteHi Alan, I can certainly eliminate all of the following: Rusted bearings, Line caught, Pinion gear corrosion, Spool corrosion.  Reason being I easily cast over 100m with 0.55mm line with all 4 of them, they run smooth as anything. A reel with rusted bearings won't cast like that and will whine like a hound dog missing his bone! 

There is no corrosion in any of my reels, I am meticulous with maintaining them. Last time I had that big bruiser strip 500m of line off I thought I better take the reel apart completely, but it was pointless, I could have just rinsed it and put a drop of reel x on the bearings, everything was still perfect.

I have never seen any signs on the main gear of wear and tear that would indicate that it is jamming on the dog, they all look shiny and smooth at the bottom. The drive shafts are also not worn, in fact I have replaced the bush the driveshaft fits in with the Trinidad bearing as that bush corrodes, gets stuck in the frame and the shaft wears down. Where does that leave me? Water in the drag? I have seen this complaint pop up once or twice on our forums (also for a Saltist) with no explanation/solutions coming forth , the last one the guy turfed the carbontex and went back to his leather washers.

It's all rather weird – the drags are all installed correctly, I will monitor the situation and keep you posted. It is more of an annoyance than serious at this stage. Hypothetically worst case scenario if you don't turn handle to "re-adjust" drag is – you cast out, place rod in sand spike, slacken drag to a point where it just holds tension on the line without the current pulling it out, fish takes and now the drag is much looser  which results in an overwind and if you are not fast enough rod disappears into the ocean. On light line it would simply pop. I will try and ask some old salt dogs here also what they think.

a similar thing happened to me last week.  the reason was that i had forgotten to remove one of the original drag washers when in installed the carbontex washers.  it might be worth looking to see if you have an extra stock washer in the stack that was forgotten.  thanks!  alan

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Alan, nope that one can be ruled out, I have all the old washers and they are complete sets, reckon it's the water, maybe I need to put more Cal's on? I will strip all my reels now in the off season and put more grease on.

yeah, i just slather the stuff in.  you might look for burrs on the drive shaft.  the force of the keyed metal washers against the drive shaft might lock the washers in place.  alan