I have had a busy couple of weeks...at least for my small shop!
I have had 11 International 30 - 50, and two 80's come through here this week; all of them ended up with limited drag lever range when done. I have had a run of spring washers made from a place Alan turned me on to. Very good material, and reasonable. All of these reels have had new washers installed in hopes of getting a better range of motion from the drag lever.
Of all the configurations from the stock one ()() to (((( to )))) to ((() to just using three of them....I was never satisfied.
THIS....has turned out to be the best configuration. )()(
If you review the chart of deflection vs spring force that Robert Janssen has posted occasionally, you will see that it gives the most travel with the least force. It works!
And yes, with full on drag, the reel will still have maximum drag available. I was able to get it where my scale deflected to 45 lbs and no spool movement...
I can get several turns of the tension knob before I start to pick up drag. Many reels would give me full tension with the tension knob in the minimum setting.
Hopefully this is helpful.
I have been very happy with this choice and will continue to experiment as I feel necessary...
I've tried that configuration and one thing that I noticed is that one of the spring washers comes in contact with the ball bearing holder or outer race of the spool bearing and had to replace the washer next to the ball bearing with a thrust washer instead of a belleville .
Thanks for mentioning that, Bryan....
On the smaller reels the spring washers rest against the bearing and will be an issue. I use a lightly cupped spring washer against the bearing.
On the 80's I have done recently the outer edge of the spring washer rests on the outer race of the bearing. I don't see that one being a problem.