Reel Repair by Alan Tani

Very nice job.  Now you have me wanting a 3500C.  I actually had one some years back, but I was still green with tuning reels at the time and couldn't get it to work how I wanted.  I ended up selling it, unfortunately.  eReplacement Parts still sells a lot of components for this such as complete gear sets and new old stock side plates.

I have been using mine for kokanee and yellow perch.

Old thread, but thought I'd throw in my .02.

I bought one of these back in the 1980's via mail order from Bass Pro for $29.95.  Loved the 2500c and fished those at the time, and this one seemed like a deal, not to mention a nice upgrade (palming sideplates, etc.).

Well it was a dog right out of the box.  Wouldn't cast, gears were grindy like a well used Penn 60.  And it just languished unused.   Then about 20 years ago I had the bright idea to replace the (brand new!) bearings, and that didn't work either.   Then a year or two after that I replaced the (brand new!) bearings yet again, and the reel came to life!   Nice and light and cast like a dream.

Then I went looking for new gears for the thing, but no luck.  And because of the limited production of this model, figured this reel was only good until it broke down and I was ....well...SOL.

Despite the slow and noisy gears, have been using it lately in the bassy waters of Florida, and duh, thought came to mind: 'wonder if the 2500c gears will fit?", secure in the knowledge that when the next generation of Abus went from knobby to palming sideplates, the internals changed and the new gears wouldn't fit the old.

Well, yesterday did an innernet search and I found this post, and shazzam, looks like all my preconceived notions were wrong.  So I have ordered some high speed gears for the thing.

If they fit, of which I have little doubt, this reel will be 'sliced bread".   It will have taken over 40 years to get there, but.....  LOL 

And knowing what I know now, I should have bought a pallet load of them!




 

My 2500c is one of my favorite reels, the 3500c is just a wider spool. After a bit of aggressive TLC they're truly excellent.

What gear set did you order?

Jason:

Before I answer that, let me get the gears and put them in and make sure everything works.  Otherwise it's just happy talk on the innernet, which lasts forever and I don't want to mess up future generations with a good...but wrong...guess!

I might be interested  too.

Well:  The gears I ordered for the 3500c came in.  They were the "number 2" Avail Gears from Japan labeled for the 2500c.

They did NOT fit the 2500c.

The problem is the pinion gear. It comes with a short, pointed, metal spike imbedded through the pinion gear which -- on the 2500c at least -- the pointed end rides on the face of the right sideplate spool bushing (or bearing, if you have the aftermarket upgrade).

Unlike the 2500c. though, the spool shaft on the 3500c goes through the hollow pinion before it rides at the right side bushing.   

So this pinion doesn't fit. Oh well, worth a try.

I'm open to ideas on where to get a new 3500c main gear and pinion, especially a high speed one. It would sure be nice to get this 3500c into tip top shape.

I wonder if the fact that these Avail gears are labeled "number 2" has anything to do with a solution?

Another clue?  Running the trapline to get to this point I also noticed that eReplacement parts showed that the drive shaft for this model is interchangeable with several reels in the 5500-6500 class, which raises a question as to whether gears for these models will also fit the 3500c.

This is interesting. If they do fit, I see an opportunity/option to make a magnum 2500.

I'm sorry that you had to order something that doesn't fit to open up this idea-door in my brain. That's truly unfair to you. But, consider me even more intrigued than I was before.