Josh Smith

Well, the Shimano thing was sort of tongue-in-cheek with a couple other unwritten rules. As far as I'm concerned, everyone has put out some really great reels as well as some stinkers. My only concern is looking deeper than skin deep or even functionality to find what I'm looking for. I have Abu Garcia, Quantum, and look forward to finding a Lew's or two and a Shimano. It would be really boring if ice cream only came in vanilla, you know? Regards, Josh

Hello, Man, I don't hate Quantum and didn't know that folks here did. I knew not to dis Shimano, but only because I was told by a friendly member via PM that it was a bad idea... that, and I have no experience either positive or negative. My first reel was a Zebco. I don't recall what it was; it was a little black thing. The next one was a Zebco 33 (made in USA). I still have Grandpa's made in USA Zebco 33 on a vintage Cherrywood reel in the other room. My first ultralight was a Feathertouch combo, under-rod spinning reel. That thing took bass, walleye, saugeye, and even a couple catfish! As far as I'm concerned, Zebco is good. In fact, when I first saw a Quantum, I was turned off because I didn't know the name. I found out later it was a Zebco and thought, "whey the hell didn't they just say that???" New Zebco 33 reels are not as good as the old ones. I've serviced both and the new ones seem a step away from disposable. It's an insult to the name. Likewise, I've been scared to try the Abu Garcia Ambassadeur "S". I'm sure I won't like what I see inside it. I might be compelled by curiosity, but am sure not looking forward to it. By the way, I did a bit of research and it turns out the Quantum I referenced in this thread -- the one I just bought on eBay -- is actually an EX200, not an LEX200. I have no idea what an LEX200 might be. The EX200 seems like a decent reel with the only thing going against it is the magnetic braking system. This latter is, of course, personal preference. Regards, Josh

http://malwaretips.com/blogs/suspicious-cloud-7-ep-removal/ Looks like enthusiastic heuristics on Norton's part. Josh

I almost used Dex III, G3, but I wanted to give the heavy stuff a go, first. You're right. They do spin slowly compared to the modern reels. I like it. I've not calculated the RPM yet, but the lure travels around 30fps to 40fps or so. I got on my shooting range, cast the line and counted to come up with those numbers. Granted, it's a parabolic curve instead of straight cast, but the weight is usually airborne for a two or three count and travels 35 to 40 yards. It might need lighter oil. I like the bushing reel to ride on a film of oil, though, and not let the axle touch the bushings during the cast. The bearings should probably get lighter Dex III or similar, though. Regard, Josh

Dude, no! I like what works for me. I'm curious about what works for other people. Abu Garcia round reels are what work for me. I bought a Black Max II to see what these were like, and I found that I didn't like it. I have never used a Shimano. No experience. This thread and another thread (where I had asked for a list of reels NOT made in China) prompted me to buy a Korean-made reel. I figured that since I had an early Quantum (a 1310) and liked it, I might as well get a slightly newer Quantum that was made in Korea. I went to eBay and found one that seemed to have been used but not abused. It said "made in Korea" on the foot and I could make out a 5. something on the side. It was advertised as an LEX 200. The expired listing is here: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Quantum-LEX-200-Anti-Reverse-Bait-Casting-Reel-Good-Condition-/191224374105?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2047675.l2557&nma=true&si=U4rTSeBmNRf9tB01kBqE2CD3jjE%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc For $8.50, it's nice. There were a couple hangups inside, but that was due to sand and nothing more. It's fixed. Remember, I've not kept up with new stuff since 1998 or so, and even then I didn't read much but went with what worked on the water. Dad was the one doing the reading and studying at the time. I also bought a Mitchel 301 spinning for next-to-nothing. The idea is that, if I buy a reel and like it, I'll fix and keep it. If I fix it up and find out it doesn't work for me as well as I'd like, I trade it, or in what is more often the case, give it away locally to someone trying to break into the sport. The last one I gave away was a spinning combo made of a Shakespeare LXIII I repaired/rebuilt/tuned/whatever. An acquaintance of mine loaned me his flatbed trailer to move some stuff, saved me a bunch of money, and wouldn't take payment. I spooled it with fluorocarbon and told him to enjoy it. Was the Shakespeare LXIII considered a good reel? Heck, I dunno. It looked OK inside and felt good when I tested it. Would it hold up long-term? I simply do not know. It looked like it would but it also had plastic in a couple places I wouldn't want plastic. If I want to know about something, I buy it if I can afford it, and I take it apart. Usually the thing, whatever it is, needs cleaned out anyway, so taking it apart and looking at the guts is incidental to maintenance. If Chinese reels work for you, hey, I have nothing against that. I'm glad they work for you. I grew up on Zebco spincasting reels and later learned baitcasting on a centrifugal-braked Ambassadeur reel. I'm therefore partial to them. I have no idea the long-term quality of the LEX 200. It looks decent and if the components are not cheap, it should hold up. May I ask, why did you think that I am a ? I sincerely don't know. I joined this board when I got back into fishing and found I was behind the curve with regard to equipment. I'm finding the combination of new and old that I like (I love braid and fluorocarbon and hate magnetic brakes, for example). From my limited experience with Quantum, they do seem good. I'm not going to commit myself to a blanket statement like "all Quantums are good." I won't even say that most are. I will say I don't have the experience to say this, and that most low-pro reels look the same and from what I've heard, pretty much all use the same design from the same factories. True? I've not see it first-hand, so I don't know. I'm only relating what works for me and my limited experiences. If someone has a new Quantum they'd like to send me to clean out or tune or whatever, it would give me the opportunity to see the guts and maybe form an opinion. It would be interesting. Regards, Josh

It's an LEX200, or was advertised as such. Most markings are worn off and I can only make out a "5." on the side. Five point what? Dunno. I have no experience -- none, zero -- with Shimano and had no idea they aren't made in China. Oh well. Josh

It's an LEX200, or was advertised as such. Most markings are worn off and I can only make out a "5." on the side. Five point what? Dunno. I have no experience -- none, zero -- with Shimano and had no idea they aren't made in China. Oh well. Josh

Well Guys, I got my hands on a Quantum that was made in Korea. It's much better quality than any of this made in China stuff. It's not up to the made in Sweden round Abu Garcias, but it's pretty good. It has plastic in only a couple places it shouldn't compared to most of the low-profiles I see today. I would own another Quantum like this one. Josh

I love my older Ambassadeur models. I find that when I use newer, reels with faster speeds, my crankbaits start misbehavin', my spinnerbaits start layin' on their sides, and my slow worm retrieves ain't so slow. I have a small handful of things that I'll go faster than a 21 or 23ipt retrieve for, but those are very limited. From here on out, I'm also going to stop talking about gearing and start talking in IPT. As far as I can tell, my old Ambassadeur reels with 4.7:1 gears and the wider spools pull in about as much line as a 5.4:1 low profile, and stay more consistent due to the wide spool. Line depth doesn't vary nearly as much as on these newer reels. The 4.7:1 Ambassadeurs pull 22" to 24" per turn with full spools. The next reel purchase, after I get done with this very nice 5000c I traded for here on this forum, will be a 5500c3, I think. That will give me a faster retrieve with the consistency I want for the times I need it. I have a 5600Mag and it's just a bit larger than I prefer for most things. Regards, Josh

Hello, I was going to put this in the "I'm Trying Mechanical Broad Heads This Year " thread, but figured it would be too far off topic. Some pictures in chronological order: I thought I had more pics. A couple are watemarked an I don't want to get dinged for "advertising." The bow has a whole new configuration, though, with a Trophy Ridge drop-away rest and crosshair front sights. I might have to get a picture of it. Pics of your stuff, anyone? Regards, Josh

There's a world of difference between slugs and arrows. There's a lot of difference between slugs and other bullets. Most gut shot critters will run and may take days to die. Remember, "gut shot" can be intestines as well. Regards, Josh

Raul, I sent you a friend request on the strength of that post alone!

Captain, I don't know. It seems to work for me. Just a little bit of stretch -- I saw a difference in the holes of the fishes' lips, too. The mono I use on the baitcasters is cheap stuff. It has a lot of stretch and a lot of memory. The memory isn't an issue and the stretch is why I bought it. I sort of counted on it, it being cheap and all. The fluoro I use gets used mostly on the ultralight spinning setup. Being an ultralight, the give is in the pole itself. In this instance the low stretch of the short fluoro leader and the no-stretch of the braid has helped me get hook sets I previously thought were not possible with ultralight tackle. At least, when running UL mono, I never got consistent hook sets with some of this sort of fishing I've been doing. Back when I was learning to fish, from early childhood (2? 3? I can't remember my first fishing trip where I held a rod) to right before I left for college at 20 (took a couple years off to save more money), everyone was using baitcasters and MH or H rods in either fiberglass or, later, graphite... and what a joyous time that was when those graphite rods became affordable to the average bass angler! I was pretty out of the loop for the next 15 years. Oh, that's not to say I didn't go fishing occasionally, but I didn't really invest the time in learning anything new. I opened a business and as the business has grown, I've had to make myself get away, else I would be working constantly. Around the house was no good as the computer was always in range. Fishing seemed natural. When I left the active learning phase in 1998, Spiderwire was something like $50 per spool. It wasn't anything a teenager could easily afford. I did buy a Daiwa spinnerbait rod "by Bill Dance", and it remains my favorite. It's a pistol grip, and why these types fell out of favor sometime in the interim is a mystery to me. I can cast it just as far as my 6'6 and 7' rods, and it's a lot handier, sort of like a long rifle vs a carbine. Short poles work like a catapult while the long ones, from the method I've seen and subsequently used to cast them, work like a trebuchet. Better or not, overall, I can't say. For me, I prefer the under 6' rods more. I can't figure out the fatigue thing. In all fairness, I remember my tendons aching in my casting arm when I was a teenager getting used to the baitcaster after a day on the lake with Dad. It could be that my arm is just used to that type of rod now. I don't know. What's all this got to do with anything? When I ran out of good mono, the rest either used or having weakened, I went to buy more. I noticed the price of braid had come down to 1/5 of what it was when I got distracted from fishing, and so I bought some to try it. That's when I found these boards. I was on about every gun board known to man, and I figured there had to be fishing boards out there. The first one I found was Fish Sniffer. I've not been there for quite a while, but I went there specifically looking for ways to fish this braided stuff. You see, braid had every quality I've ever wanted in fishing line, except for visibility. The stuff is just too easy to see! I learned knots for splicing line. I'd never had use for those before. I tried the blood knot but it didn't run through the guides as well as I wanted, what with the line and leader being slightly offset from each other. I learned the Albright knot and the Seagur knot. The Albright is prettier and works well, but the tag end facing the leads is the mono, and it snags the guides just a little. It's irritating. The Seagur knot is easier to tie, is more compact, and the loud mono tag end faces backwards. It works well for me. Now, for shock absorption, I use one of a couple methods: Dad's old tournament-grade rod (Lew's Speed Stick, Made in Japan) from the '70s, is an excellent fiberglass rod. I'm playing with it as a crankbait rod, and it seems to work well. I can run straight braid or a short mono leader on it and still be pretty certain of not ripping the hook out on a hook set. When I run a leader on the baitcasting setups, and depending on the intended purpose of the leader, I make it either as long as the rod, or twice as long. This gives the shock absorption of which I'm speaking. If I'm just trying not to spook fish, the leader is only two or three feet long. There is little shock absorption there, I agree, and probably little reason to have it. I'm usually cutting grass and weeds and don't want stretch when I'm fishing like this. Josh

I use an ultralight rig with the lightest braid and fluorocarbon leader I can find. With the drag set correctly, it works fine. Josh

Hello, Anymore, these days, I just use braid on everything. I change the leaders as the need arises. I usually use fluorocarbon leaders, but sometimes use regular mono as well. Mono stretches, and it has that added benefit of shock absorption. I finally managed to lose a bass because I didn't have enough stretch. I was using a medium-heavy rod, set the hook fast, pulled the lure out of its mouth. Until this happened, I thought others were a bit nutty for suggesting this, but sure enough... That shock absorption of the mono is as critical as the increased sensitivity and strength of the braid. Regards, Josh

Hi Folks, So got to reading some things which were suggested to me when I posted questions after first coming here. It turns out that "super tuning" is what I've just always done to reels. There are new(er) lubes and ideas out there, but the basic polish points are the same. After experimentation, I've found I prefer 0w-30 Mobile 1 on bearings and high-speed bushings, and lanolin on the teeth of gears that don't move during free-spool. Lanolin is also an excellent protectorant as wells as lubricant, and it's used on the sideplate mating surfaces. Fluid Film is a lanolin spray, and it's used on the internals that are not gears. The whole lanolin thing comes from extensive use of it on firearms. The stuff just works. I recently acquired an older Ambassadeur 5000 from eBay. The price was right and it was lightly used. After ordering new bushings that it really didn't need, I set to do the "super tune" thing to it. However, prior to this, I ran a test to see how far I could cast with a rod and 1/2oz weight. It came in at 30 yards pretty consistently. After "super tuning" I'm getting about 35-40 yards. I can't seem to get much further than that, but that distance requires almost no effort whereas before, it did. The spool rides on a film of oil like car bearings. I installed spool bearings on another 5000 I have. It's mounted on a longer, newer pole that can be cast two-handed. Curiously, I make about the same distance as with the bushing-equipped model. This one is mounted on a medium-weight 6'6 Jupiter rod. Same 1/2oz weight. Both outdistance the Quantum I bought. Likewise, it's "super tuned" but has magnets instead of centrifugal brakes. It makes just about as far as the bearing-equipped 5000. The weight is the same, of course, and the rod is the same but is the heavy version and 7' long. (I bought this Quantum because it was made in Korea. Another thread asked about the quality of Korean-made reels, and though there's a bit more plastic in this one than I'd like, I'm pretty impressed. There are a couple internals that I believe could have been better made, but overall it's an excellent reel.) I do believe the next thing I'll be doing is swapping the worm gear bushings for bearings in the Abu 5000 reels, and a recently-traded-for 5000c. I should be able to also replace the shaft bushing with a bearing. It will require some opening up of the opening, but I think I can just make it fit. The biggest issue with playing with these is figuring out what components swap. For example, the old 'fast' pinion gear is no longer made. An upgrade to 5500c gears now requires a 5500c spool, which in turn requires bearings. This is why I eventually ended up building the 5000 I wanted to upgrade with new gears into a 5500c (for all purposes, anyway). These are just late-night thoughts I'm writing to unwind from a hard day. Maybe what I've found out so far will help someone. Goodnight folks. Regards, Josh

Replacing (or at least checking thoroughly) the pawl and worm gear is one of the first things I do after acquiring a new reel. Delaware Tackle's quote seems extremely fair to me. Regards, Josh

I'm old fashioned, I guess. I'm 36, love Abu Garcia Ambassadeur 5000 and 5500 reels, and shoot an Oregon bow. (Oregon Bow Company eventually became BowTech, but how they got there is quite the interesting read. Scandal, airplane crashes, etc.) I don't trust mechanical broadheads. I won't shoot them. I was an auto tech, professional security (owned the thing; carried a gun), a CNA, and am a gunsmith. In my experience, the more complicated something is, the more likely it is to go sour or not work. This is true for engines, tense situations, peoples' bodies, and firearms. I will continue using fixed blades. Regards, Josh

This, but with a caveat. I'm in North Central Indiana. I just got back in from a much-needed fishing trip. There was a massive cold front due to this weird weather pattern, and fishing should be pretty much shut down with bass suspended. I wanted to run an experiment though. Deep and suspending lures weren't doing jack. I went shallow and started catching 'em. OK, two, and I didn't try the traditional beds in this lake. I've not caught much of anything over there since the spawn. But they are shallow when they should be deep, and every bass critter was hitting the Mann's Jelly Worms I was using, and the fry were doing their level best to take down a Money Minnow I threw out there to challenge any territorial bass big enough to eat the thing. They were also hitting spinnerbaits. The bigger bass I caught, a male about 2lbs and a female that was 3lbs or 4lbs, were quite aggressive and seemed to be actively feeding. The ol' girl took my medium-heavy Daiwa 5'6" spinnerbait rod and bent it much more than usual, trying to get down into cover. (I was rather proud of myself on that last one. Mr. Mann claimed to have made bass jump into his boat. I tried this to get it on the bank, and sure 'nuff, dang ol' bass helped me out!) I probably could have caught a few more, but I was doing some experimentation. But anyway, everything I know and all my experience tells me that these bass critters shouldn't have been there, but they were. I caught them the exact same way I do during the spawn. It's the only thing that worked. I looked at their tails and they showed no evidence of bedding, though. Bass critters are weird. I think that's why I like 'em. They're weird and unpredictable. That's why I like wimmins, after all! Josh

Hi Folks, I'm wondering if you all use snaps or snap swivels, and if so, when? Are there lures with which you'll not use them? I used to use them exclusively but started tying directly after switching to braid with fluro leaders. I have been thinking about resuming their use on a limited basis with certain lure types. Thank you, Josh

I prefer casting for medium heavy and heavy. For medium, I am trying to decide if I like casting. I am not used to the reel (Black Max 2). I'll let you all know next thread on this subject. For ultralight, I like a very small spinning setup that will literally cast flies a few feet. For medium light, I suspect I would prefer spinning, but I have no medium light rig. I have an urge to go down to the gun forum and start a 9mm vs .45acp discussion for some odd reason... Josh Sent from the Ancient Blackberry

I use Berkely, Spiderwire, and the like. My vision isn't good enough to take advantage of better lenses. Josh

I too don't use backing. I like about 1/16" of the spool to be exposed. If you backlash at all, take to to 1/8" but no more. On some reels 1/8" is pushing it. Josh

It really depends. I would prefer to stay out all day, and have, but when I take my boy or the fish aren't biting, I tend to come in after two or three hours. I need to take a mini-vacation and use the time the fish aren't biting to throw out some live bait and cook up some food; just stay out all day like that. Josh

I really like 1/2 and even 1oz. That said, I'm having trouble finding heavier lures these days. I've been having to get used from eBay and rebuild 'em. Josh