bulldog1935

Incorrect. $800 deminimus. from there to $2400, you will be invoiced import duty by your courier. Above $2400 is considered commercial and must be itemized through customs broker. NOTHING HAS CHANGED HERE.

They'll buy your Langleys and Golden West

@FloridaFishinFool My retired BB-1NG fished inshore (and surf) from 1985 to 2015 Following my lead, my guide buddy Tim bought his. These reels became so popular on the TX coast, Roy's Bait & Tackle in Corpus bought up the parts inventory when Lew's was sold and discontinued support. But my buddy Tim never even rinsed-off his reel - just stacked it in the corner of the garage with his Penns - and the foot corroded-off within one year. The problem isn't the environment or the reel, but the negligence. Salt water never quite dries, but concentrates to brine that will remain a concentrated liquid for over a year. Simple rinsing solves everything. Also, removing any part that shows any sign of corrosion instantly. Salt corrosion products of metals are 100-times more corrosive than salt, and will spread throughout the reel. Timely Topic - for a dead Steez in TT Shop Talk today, I called up my TT Salt tutorial: http://www.tackletour.net/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=90503&p=728651 My BB-25 caught its last redfish in Nov 2018.

I think we're drifting away from OP's question, which is a re-branded Ambassadeur S. They're not go-to for quality, but you spend any time inside a Svangsta reel (even a 50-y-o one) or a full-bench Isuzu, you're bound to be impressed with the quality, simplicity and durability. It's no accident these reels will continue in form for a long time, and aftermarket upgrades will continue to be made in Japan, UK, EU and, more recently, China. more show-and-tell, my friend Rob's 2501C built scratch from parts, including AMO barstock frame - every part for this reel is available aftermarket. Last fall, I added Ryoga for a salt niche, when I noticed my Isuzu BC620SSS wasn't happy with a couple of salt trips.

One more rod to show you that perfectly fits a reservoir kayak niche. This is the one place where I'd be bottom-bouncing neds on deeper shelves. There's always a pre-dawn topwater window, and the spooky bass quickly move deep. 400-acre no-motors reservoir, and the kayak I like to take here is too unstable to turn around, so it's a one-rod boat. (happened to take a spinning rod this day) Unfortunately, Valleyhill offered this rod spec in only two rod series, and haven't duplicated it since both sold out. The wide-range works extremely well for 1/15-oz neds to 1/2-oz cranks and topwaters, and makes a very versatile one rod. I have just three shorter rods that will cast light distance with my shore rods, and this is one of them. (Also Daiwa Black Label ML). The other is Smith 66SPX, offset grip for mid-frame round reels. Japanese rods tend to cast and fish well below their rated low end. Japanese call a para-taper rod "sticky" (stick-like) - they call a progressive tip "berry" (cherries on the end of a branch), which they like for working topwaters, and it also makes the rod double up for all-around BFS. ______________ Fly rods? They're not just for panfish. When we took inventory on FFR, I came up with 120 species on fly rod (included suspended snapper at an offshore platform). At least part of the reason I took to BFS, they make using a fly rod obstinate for all except moving water.

Steez with AMO or Roro 34-mm spool will cast this 2 g past 130' Contributions to the inertia include spool diameter (28-mm is lower inertia than 34 mm), loaded spool mass, rotating mass of bearing, bearing ball diameter. But the 34-mm spool doesn't have to spin as fast to get the same line speed and distance, and when you get loaded spool mass down to 5 g, 28-mm spool has no inertia advantage any more. Borderline -- --- I have synchro reels that will do this, and they have the added drag of LW slaved off the spool.

I don't have any plans to add any more - right now. also for @Lake Otter, the Japanese liked BPS MegaCast enough to pick up the product https://www.headhunters.jp/SHOP/bassproreel.html Headhunters even calls it Abu 5000 Classic - it may accept all the C3 (Ultracast) reel tuning mods that I've been discussing.

@WRB-2.0 Tom, I've measured the thumb reach on both 4600C and BB1-NG on Falcon straight-seat rod, and the 4600C thumb reach is actually a bit closer. The big change with Lew's was separating freespool from LW, and it changed the game for fishing mono when it arrived. My offset grips put thumb and spool reach in the same position as an LP reel on straight-seat, and LW-mods make the slaved-LW more fun to fish. Best result off my bench, '77 4500C below will cast 3 g past 150', out-performing every new reel out there, and will still do this 45 more years from now.

@Aaron_H - my kingfish trolling rod sports a Seigler SGN For our OP, @Lake Otter, I grew up fishing worms and big cranks on the basic Ambassadeur matched with 6' Fenglas Lunkerstik Same reel doubled up on 7-1/2' Browning Hi-Power (first graphite rod I owned) for inshore and surf. (got spooled by a few bull reds, and landed a few others) Now, I only use braid-modified Ambassadeurs for bass fishing, mostly on river kayak and similar short rods. While Ambassadeur was designed to fish 3/8 oz and greater, my bench-mod reels turn on fishing 1/8 oz. The Japanese are still nuts for these reels, make all the bench-tuning parts, and a boutique market for the offset grips and rod blades that I call the Japan Underground.

@HawkeyeSmallie - stream trout rods are UL, 5-1/2' and shorter, but still progressive taper, casting 1 to 7 g. My river kayak/bass rods are also happiest around this length, but 1-power (weightless senko), 2-power (finesse spinners), and 3-power (cranks). The 5-power frogger/swimbait in the middle, wouldn't call that finesse. Inshore kayak rods begin about 6-1/2' for mud-marsh sight fishing. over 7' for flats drifting and nominal 8' to 9' for shore fishing (tide passes and surf) - long progressive rods 2 to 20 g 3 to 14 g 3 to 30 g

Isuzu Kogyo opened as a family run machine shop in 1955. At the same time, they took apart their first Ambassadeur. In 1972, when Ambassadeur patents expired, they began selling their own bench reel, first as Smith Plugger (this is '21 model - you could buy this on Amazon for a few months in '21). If you look inside both small-frame and medium-frame Isuzu, they all look like '76 Ambassadeur medium-frame - while a functional clone, parts, dimensions, spool and foot positions in the frame, are all their own. No, direct-drive Isuzu reels are a specific sideline - they introduce a limted run every 5 years or so, and like all model batches, they all sell out. Previous direct-drive models were sold as Tabby, and Frog Products Revolver. Last year, Try-Angle, who has made aftermarket parts for Isuzu reels for a dozen years, bought Isuzu business from the family. You won't find many used reels out there - they tend to be cherished - here's two gorgeous examples, a Bright River F-series, and Megabass Pagani. There's a major collector's market for unused boxed reels. My link evaporated - someone bought the reel - but a great example of Frog Products Toy Machine Superlative IAR, which like Pagani, is Isuzu BC520X Chimera. If you had bought this reel new, it was 1/3 of the current asking price. Not all similar reels in Japan are made by Isuzu - Ebisu and Doryu also make their variants, which cover most of the Frog Products models, along with Dowluck reels. When they were still in business, Zeal offered a really pretty monobloc. https://noppin.com/yahoos/detail/o153169030

Of course bass and stream trout are market niches in Japan, stock spools are for mono + centrifugal. Try-Angle spools with mag brake are made for all Isuzu sizes - to me, they're simply braid spools. Small-frame BC420 (Ambassadeur 1500 size) Medium-frame BC620 (Ambassadeur 4500 size) Medium frame BC720 (Ambassadeur 5500 size) You won't get the joy of casting one of these until the first cast. While you can tune an Ambassadeur close with aftermarket parts, it's never quite Isuzu.

and the link to product listing https://isuzu--reel-com.translate.goog/dd310sss?_x_tr_sl=ja&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=sc full-ball-bearing Marhoff on steroids. Here's the same size Isuzu, but with freespool clutch and drag, BC420SSS https://isuzu--reel-com.translate.goog/bc421sss?_x_tr_sl=ja&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=sc

I was casting a reel with full-zirconia-ceramic across a tide pass, and my buddy 130' away complained about the noise - I switched to KTF/IXA hybrid ceramic. full-silicon-nitride ceramic are also quieter.

Roro bearings are excellent (3/8 oz limit) - they have the light-distance edge over the three bearings in my post above, including KTF/IXA double (very close second with higher weight limit). Roro is in Hong Kong. (Ray's Studio is in Thailand) I'm a BKK Fangs nut on my lure-hook swaps. AMO's spools (Ambassadeur upgrades and their barstock small-frame Ambassadeur-copy reel) are excellent, though their spool dual-race BB was not corrosion resistant, and I made my own micro-bearing for it using a KTF/IXA 740 micro and a Momo bearing spacer (purple) - Momo bearings suck, but their spacers are handy. This is my hands-down light-lure distance champ. The palm-cap bearing is China-made Pixa full-SiN ceramic. My Roro X29 spool, which was discontinued, buckled the titanium spindle (likely the reason they were discontinued), and my Silver Wolf got its replacement, Roro X27/34 (photo at top of page), which seems to be a lot stronger. Claiming China has a domestic fishing market is inaccurate - everything they make is for export - their quality has gradually improved over decades of copying OP's products.

I'm fishing Steez SV TW with AMO spool and PE#0.8 - no line dig even catching snook. Jun Sonada says you need increased LW pitch smaller than PE#1, but I haven't had a problem. My Silver Wolf has increased LW pitch, and I take advantage of it fishing PE#0.6 working line. If you get down to measuring the last 5%, the increased LW pitch costs about that in cast distance.

Finding the VN custom-spool maker was a good move by @redmeansdistortion. Probably our biggest loss recently is AMO no longer accepts US IP address or orders. You can still order Roro from Hong Kong - their post is cost-effective and slow-boat. Also, SDS Customs in Ukraine stocks a good range of BFS spools on ebay. I haven't seen Avail prices going up, US$ is still strong against JY, and Hedgehog Studio is still a good option for Avail parts. Thailand vendor Delta Fishing (AOR on ebay) is the best source for Ray's Studio, though waiting on a new batch of parts - they always sell out, with strong markets both in Japan and US.

The simple math is this reel is light years from where it began. Designed to cast 3/8 oz with marginal reliability using centrifugal + end-tension and a lot of thumb. Now it's lighter weight, and will cast 3 g past 150' with total reliability - 100% backlash-proof. It's a bench jewel that began with a good-buy 45-y-o workhorse - it will still be out-performing new reels 45 years from now. I'm not going to do this because the parts cost more than the reel - hmm

@Motoboss begin here The problem is package BFS reels were aimed for stream trout. I've never owned one - the closest I've come is two BFS-mod small-frame Ambassadeur, and one of those is a bench CT surf reel that will cast 1/4-oz plug 200' Skip the package stuff, and take advantage of the aftermarket spools made for 34-mm Daiwa, especially Zillion. Then you'll be fishing PE#1.2 and #1.5. My friend Dave, whom I mentioned in my first post, began with Alphas Air, because it's package, and there's a big YouTube library fishing it for Gulf-cost inshore.

I took my first Ryoga, matched with KTF Kahen spool, into the salt in April. It was a joy, and caught every fish on the trip. I'm not going to reject any of my LP reels (BFS-mod Zillion), because they fit better on straight blank-through-handle rods. though I plan to work this into my mud-marsh niche on a (half-offset) Bright River Rivermaster grip.

On smooth spools, I tie arbor knot, and secure the line with mylar/acrylic film tape.

I use tweezers, and tie a double-base-wrap uni knot.

@GreenPig - what you're describing may be the only bonus result of runaway line that people normally complain about casting spinning tackle. There's likely a tendency for folks to cast their baitcasters low and tight-line. Casting high arcs is pretty typical with shore fishing, wind at your back. Sailing your bait this way ends up with the excess line you want to drop. It's also a test of how well you set your mag brake.

My e-friend on Texas Kayak Fisherman forum moved to TX from the PNW and went fishless for a year (faithfully reporting his shut-outs on TKF). When he followed my lead on BFS for inshore, he began catching fish - this is one fish /nine from his recent TKF report this past weekend: Dave posted this really nice photo of redfish back in the mud marsh. He also recently discovered bass fishing in neighborhood ponds, using his same inshore combo and lures.

I understand why we all have more than one reel, but some of you guys can't count.