Leather Drag Washers & Plastic Restoration

[The Fishing Hobby]

I have what I believe is my first encounter with leather drag washers.
The bottom 3 in the picture were in the drag washer stack on a Shakespeare 2052 spinning reel. The top one in the picture was on the bottom of the spool between the spool and the oscillation shaft (on top of the drag click gear). Can anyone confirm if these are indeed leather drag washers on these reels? If so, what are opinions about leather drag washers? Is leather a good material for drag washers? These are pretty stiff, is that how they should be?
I have the capability to make my own drag washers from HDPE plastic which is somewhat similar to Teflon (slick). Would that be a better route to go or is leather a good reliable material for drag washers?


I was working on cleaning up the spool itself and I was able to clean it pretty well but it is kind of chalky looking in areas. Anyone know of a way to fix that? Also, some areas are yellowed a little...anyone know of a way to whiten the yellowed areas. The spool is still pretty solid and will work fine but I like this old reel and wanted to help it look a little nicer. It will be a user for me but I like to do what I can to make them look nice. Here is a picture of the spool, chalky areas around the top right are visable in the picture.


Thanks!

[Midway Tommy D]

Kevin,
They came with leather if you want to stay original. If you want the best user upgrade available these days I would suggest using, and modifying, carbontex drag washers as replacements. For these older reel spool stacks you usually have to find a size close and modify them a little to fit. That is easily done with sandpaper or a file. They should be greased with Cal's, Shimano or a similar drag grease. I'm sure you can find something to suffice at Smooth Drag or various sizes also sold on EBay. Here's Smooth Drag's washer size list.

The chalky substance may come off with a stiff bristled nylon brush and one of the plastic cleaners like Plastx . The yellowing is near impossible to completely remove.

[john elder]

What Tom said. Re the plastic, I'm wondering if it's similar to the white "chalk" that forms often on old plastic fishing lures. if that's the case, try wiping with WD-40 and see what happens. That works on plastic lures.

[The Fishing Hobby]

I thought about the modern drag washers and may do that in the future. For now I lightly oiled the leather washers and the drag seems to work much better now. May not last, but it will allow me to use the reel some for now to see what I want to do with it.
I used the maroon colored scotchbrite pads and went over the spool a little and it helped, then I used a little WD40 as suggested and the spool looks much better now.
I left the bail wire off intentionally and turned the holes for it around. I wanted to play around with manual pickup some on the reel since the bail wire comes off so easily. Lots of paint issues on this one but it was $17.40 shipped and works really nice after going through it (cleaned and relubricated). If I like the reel as a user I will repaint and see if I can find a replacement emblem for it.
Surprisingly light weight (8.1oz) considering how much of the internals are steel!

[john elder]

nice!

[The Fishing Hobby]

nice!

Thanks! Smooth with the worm gear drive too. I think this one will be a keeper. I probably should replace the chenille at the bottom of the spool but it makes noise rubbing inside the cup so I will use it as is for now.

[Midway Tommy D]

3mm, if you can find them, seem to work fairly well on the Shakespeare made reel spools. It will eventually wear and compress after a little use. I use fly tying chenille on the Italian and ABU Cardinal spools.

[The Fishing Hobby]

Thanks Tom. This one is really close to the Cup so fly tying chenille may be a good option. I will see if I can find some 3mm to compare to the original. The original is a little too thick which makes it noisy.

[The Fishing Hobby]

Well, now I've gone and done it. It started innocently enough and next thing I knew I couldn't stop. I know it isn't a good idea, but I like it
I thought it was interesting that there were only 2 anodized parts, the side plate and the handle (both of which were also painted). Decided to leave the gold colored anodizing on the handle (nice contrast to the polished aluminum to me) and I removed the anodizing from the side plate and polished it out.

[Midway Tommy D]

That's kind of neat looking. Some guys are doing that with some old Penns that have a lot of paint wear. Maybe you can find some sort of protective top coat to prevent dulling.

[The Fishing Hobby]

Probably a good idea and I may do that. It would be better than having to polish it back up. I was thinking if you polished one out and then clear anodized it, it would be duller looking but it wouldn't oxiidze any further. I may have to experiment with a old junker reel I got in a lot auction and see how it looks.

[The Fishing Hobby]

I read that wiping poslished aluminum down regularly with wd40 will help prevent oxidation on polished aluminum. Sounds like an easy enough thing to do. Probably could just put some on a microfiber cloth and wipe it down from time to time.