The reel.

 

Nice genuine Ruby bearing and a spiral engraving. The inscription says: "Record 2000 A.B. Urfabriken -Svängsta-" All engraved in capital letters

 

Some yellowish/greenish marblized plastic material

 

Original Kuggfett.

 

Some spare parts. The wrench is  a Pflueger "Little giant" made in the USA. Oil bottle is "ABU Reel oil"

 

The box is original, looks like it's really  built to suit the reel . It has two compartments.

Granddad left me all his fishing gear. There is some more stuff I'm sure of it. You know up here in the Nordic countries ABU is THE brand for fishing equipment. I have four casting rods(all ABU), one cardinal and two Ambassadeurs which I purchased for myself and my son.  Anyway he left me about two cubic meters of fly tying equipment and other fishing gear. I'm gonna lay it out for you and take a pictures  of it to share here . It'll be a days work  you bet.

I might add, Granddad or by his name Karl Östman never fished in the ocean. He was strictly for inland fishing. I think he was very specific about things.

About my grandad I can say this: He lived and breathed for fishing. When we were out driving, and drove past a lake you could always see his eyes light up as if he saw some good spot or opportunity. In his later days he were mostly into fly fishing.

I really can't imagine him going into a shop to pick up the top of the line Ambassadeur. He was a very modest man, even in the jungle of fly fishing jewellery. He never bought the expensive "milled from a single billet" reels - rods or anything like that, even though he could easily afford it in his later days. He spent a lot on top quality feathers though. I think he  won the Record  2000 at a competition.  Maybe he was for once dazzled by the great looks and feel of it. 

Grandad was born in Härjedalen county in north of Sweden. They were very poor. At the age of ten he was out in the woods with his father, poaching moose just to get food on the table. Fishing and hunting was probably more of a necessity for these people. He began working in the forest at the age of twelve. They raised the lake so his family and others lost their farmland. Others lost their belongings to alcohol and poker. Granddad were always very moderate with alcohol and would always warn me about card games.

One thing I remember about my granddad was that he never bragged, but he always caught fish even then others didn't. He never talked while fishing, he could sit for hours and never say a word, just looking over the lake. Then he came back from moose hunt I would always ask him if he shot some, he would always answer "Nah - someone else did" Granddad probably shot more moose than the entire hunting team together, before he was twenty! He was really a true woodsman.

He was mostly a trout and grayling fisherman, all his rods were in the range of 8 1/2 to 10 foot. He never fished for salmon. We did do a lot of ice fishing for trout, bass, and röding ( a variety of trout which is greenish/redish with silver streaked fins, deep red meat) we also caught some "lake" or burbot in english. The burbot looks like a cross between cod and eel. He always ate the liver of it which looked like an alien, pinkish with tentacles Haha! The rest he fed the dogs. Pike made him really angry cause it had to many bones and ate the precious fish.

Sorry I can't tell you so much about the reel. You got some background on my granddad though.

Thanks again Mikael for allowing this gem to come to my collection and be shared here! It is so easy to document the features of a reel, but it is this personal infomation about the owner/user which is important in my mind! I look forward to sharing more in future...

Daniel Skupien's  opinion of this reel  in Vintage Fishing Reels of Sweden is here

If you have very unique or rare models that you wish to display here please contact me wayne@realsreels.com 

 If you have any others listed below, that are unneeded  or doubles in your collection and are available for a reasonable fee, I would be very pleased to hear from you. I cannot afford to collect Mint, in-box or unused reels at present, until my children have completed their education.