Titahi wrote: I am aware that people recommend angular contact bearings mike, and I initially thought they would solve the issue as well..... after reading this I dont know any more????? http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=3373.0 Swordfishsteve being a mechanic/engineer par excellence might be able to offer a fix, I think adding a spacer between the spool  bearings will increase free spool and reduce the drag binding ???

 Agreed. after reading that its very inconclusive. I guess its very subjective but I know Okuma have gone this way in some of their reels and had great results with it. It doesn't fully eliminate the issue but does minimize it. We need someone that is clever and interested to have a play :D
 I sort of look at it like this, A thrust bearing is used in a car for doing exactly what the spool bearings do. they operate under normal free spool conditions until the clutch is pushed and then immense side load and RPM are applied much like applying the drag . seems to work on a car so why not on a reel with much lesser forces involved.
 

the thing is some of these guys are experienced anglers, god knows where they get there info from, but yeah Mike you cant tell some anything, still people like that are a god sent to the industry they keep it rolling over nicely

Just on those 225's Eric, I serviced mine for only the second time ever, I even put some new mono on it! The internals on these reels are pretty bullet proof - it was like new inside and the drag disk is pretty hefty. Tried it out on a few tuna the next day, smooth as a new one!

I set my drags to a third of the line weight and the adjuster just gets left alone but it must only be altered in free spool. I think where some go wrong is there is a similar knob on most star drag reels which alters the preload on the spool bearings so it does a completely different job.

Yeah Eric I did indeed notice that they can be turned over. As i was looking at it I couldn't help but think that drag couild manage way more than the 5.5kg drag pressure claimed by Penn. I recently bought a little baitcaster - a great little reel that boasts almost as much drag pressure and to be fair for the price I wouldn't be too concerned if it melted on a big ray but the Penn will handle that sort of drag pressure all day long. Last week I had two small (thankfully ) rays on the baitcaster that had me worrying about it's ability to last, never going to be a problem with the 225. Great reels even if a little heavy compared to modern gear.