I was doing some browsing through the site and stumbled upon Yogi808's post about the Pearl harbor special. I went to my parts and came up with enough to build my own wide jigmaster.
The goal is to have a wide jigmaster stretched with Long Beach 68 base and bars, stretched 3 piece jigmaster spool, offset 112 handle, drilled drag star and eccentric lever, alan head bolts, cerakote metal parts, painted side plates and a mag kit from Chad.
Does anyone know how to disassemble the 3 piece jigmaster spool or how the Pearl harbor spools were stretched? Thanks
Mike, I've pulled a few of the '3 piece' stainless jigmaster and longbeach spools apart, either to replace the chromed brass sides that some had with stainless sides or to narrow the spool by having the arbor machined down to width on a lathe (generously done by Chris (Rothmar2) The procedure I used to break them down is shown at the end of this SS 99 jigmaster post http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=16810.15 (http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=16810.15)
I'm not a machinist, but I reckon to make a 3" wide 'Pearl Harbour Special' the 500 width arbor would need to be extended by cutting and welding in an extension - or machining a new arbor out of a suitable grade stainless. Welding would need to be very well done, the extra wide spool would be under a lot of stress, as Kyle said in his Pearl Harbour Special thread that started you quest - "The stock spool had to be cut and have a extension sleeve welded/braised on depending what kind of spool was used. In this case it was a penn stainless spool that appears to have been drilled and welded. These couldn't be fished with tight drags due to the weaker wide spool being prone to bending under heavy drag and becoming stuck between the sideplates. So there you have it, the grandpa to all jigmaster extension kits like the yellowfin special and super jigmaster!"
Randy Pauly (Vintage Offshore Fishing) and Tiburon made a couple of small runs of 3" wide 'Super Jigmaster' kits but I doubt any of those spools would be available now without the frame kit. Unless you really need the extra line capacity I would probably do the upgrades you have planned, plus carbon drags and maybe a stainless sleeve if the brass one fails, to your standard width 500 - but that's just my opinion, I prefer narrow reels. Have fun with whatever you do with it and show us how it turns out.
Mike
Thank you for the help Mike! That answers a lot of questions for me. I'm mostly building this reel for fun. A standard 500 would be good for my application and I myself prefer narrow reels, but I just have to build something different.
newell made a wider jigmaster kit, i believe the yellowfin special, or something like that. not as wide as you are looking for, but you might be able to find one of those spools and go from there.
Hi Mike. I definitely understand your fascination in the unique ''Pearl Harbor Special'' and wanting to build an homage to it. From the list of mods you're looking at it sounds like you want to fish this reel and use it for distance casting. I would highly suggest NOT using a diy extended spool for fishing as it more than likely going to warp unless you're an incredibly skilled machinist/welder and can find a way to press out the shaft on a 68 spool and make an extended arbor sleeve. It is a challenge to make it perfectly balanced because even if everything is cut and machined perfectly, the heat expansion from welding may also warp it. You can purchase a superjigmaster spool from randy separately, I did. That way maybe you can have a display spool and one to fish? On such a wide reel that is usually fished with heavy mono a lot of force could be put on the frame and twist it out of alignment if it only has the posts and seat of a 68. The longbeach had tiny squidder drags and maxed out at like 8lbs, a stock jigmaster can make 15lbs of drag locked down. Newell P454 crossbars are the correct 3'' width and same screw hole position. This reel is gonna take a lot of effort and it might be a more satisfying end result to start with a very clean jigmaster vs a ratted out one.
Good, solid advice, Yogi...
Best,
Fred
Tiburon does sell the spools separately from the frame. The XW P21 kit is also used for the 505HS Jigmaster which uses a different spool drive shaft for the ball bearing models. I have heated the spools and pressed the shafts out to do swaps on Newell spools for my Jigmaster 506s. Works for me.
Or you could certainly ask Randy Pauly @ Vintage offshore Tackle here on ATs fixit site. He is Mr. Tiburon! TIGgin and turning?? I dunno notin' bout dat, mon.
My favorite reel of all time is my 500 Frankenstein rat rod. Checker-out in the Pictures heading, search "Frankenstein". Pretty funny hack job. Done a couple of them. Fish 'em with 600yds. of Threadlock 50#, & loop to loop leaders. Caught several 60+lb. YFT on long soak, chunkin' rigs off the Loretto Hump. Quite fun on a 5' 6" ft 30-80 Pacific Stick with a day harness & pad by Aftco. It's all I want. Excellent fun and wonderful memories.
Hoyt