Screwed & Stripped Ryoga

A friend recently handed me a bunch of bait casters for inspection and regular maintenance. They all offer a wide variety of challenges and issues to be looked at. I'll start with the handle-less Daiwa Ryoga. Apparently the handle's at another workshop being looked at for fitment modifications.

This Ryoga's been through quite a bit battle with some external accidental damages to the housing. Apart from that, everything seems to be in excellent working condition.

Handle-less Daiwa Ryoga. Brake side plate removal shows clean spool support bearing on one side.

The owner admitted that he may have been a tad over ambitious when tightening the screws as he loathes any free play in any of his gear. I can relate to how irritating this can be when you cannot fully count on your gear to focus on the task at hand to lure your target species.

It is quite common among Ryoga owners for over tightening the screws just like a previous customer's reel which had to be sent back to Daiwa factory for rethreading. It's not a design flaw, just that most people don't know how much can the aluminum body take as we generally gravitate towards 'tighter is better'. It's a balance in getting the right amount of torque to secure the screws onto the body without stripping the thread. The difference between just tight enough to stripping the thread could be just a quarter turn away.

Tough screws, not so for the aluminum body. Thread's been stripped clean out of the Ryoga body (red pointer). Re-threading is definitely in the cards here, more on that later.

Not been serviced much but it's definitely been cleaned and rinsed off after use. Grease and grime splatter all over the crank case. Drag system is soaked in water and grease (bottom left). Drag water proofing design doesn't quite work as with previous Ryogas I've serviced to date.

Bearings are all in good working condition with no rust damages (top left). Just grimy and rough. Some effort's been put in to lube up the internals with grease (top right). Mixture of water and grease in the drag system (red pointers).

The first real damage found. Emergency anti-reverse cam guide's been munched up (red pointer). Possibly from serious fish fight or something caused it to slip and clip the guide onto other mechanical parts within the crank case. Not a deal breaker, a trim off would do to prevent further damages.

Shields removed on most bearings and ready for ultrasonic cleaning bath together with some dirty parts.

Ultrasonic bath in action (above) and spanking clean after (bottom)

The sum of all parts after ultrasonic cleaning and some elbow grease scrubbing on bigger mechanical parts.

Scrubbed down and contact cleaned to prepare all internal surfaces for a new coat of protective grease.

One way bearing's cleaned out and lubed with one-way bearing oil. No signs of rust on the bearing and a new coat of one-way oil brings back firm stopping power with no back plays.

All bearings are in excellent condition. Contact cleaned right after ultrasonic bath to prepare all metal surfaces for new packing of marine grease. This reel will see some salt water action.

Putting them back together layered with protective grease. Emergency anti-reverse cam guide given a straight forward trim (red pointer). Worm gear shaft ready for grease coating too.

Drag grease coat on, layer after layer. One-way bearing shaft cleaned and coated with one-way bearing oil for maximum stopping power.

Now back to the stripped screw threads on the crank case. Now that the existing screw thread's out of the body, it needs to be rethreaded. This means the original screws will no longer fit and calls for slightly bigger screws to match the new threads.

Stock screws replaced with pimped up purple bling aluminum cap screws. Light and strong, just don't over tighten them

Replacing 2 screws would mean looking quite odd. May as well replace them all for a more consistent pimped up look.

Almost ready to flash its full-on bling. Everything's rocking creamy smooth!

Another revived Ryoga being ready for more battle with some unintended bling to go with it.