bulldog1935

Here's where I buy most of my JDM lines and JDM lures https://fishingshop.kiwi/category/Fishing-Lines/Pe-Line/Pe-Line-Ygk/

Every glass casting rod I've ever fished will fish below its rated low end - what it does best is skip-cast (reverse spiral) lite lures below its rated low-end. Can't exactly call it noodle, but this 6'4" bad boy S-glass, I set up to skip-cast 1/8-oz bunny shrimp to redfish backs under mangrove overhang. This is my river kayak version for cypress overhang, and only 5' - the 1-pc composite blade has S-glass tip and an IM6 layer on the butt for turning bass.

200 g of '23 SLPW Millionaire is 10 g (5 %) more than a '23 Steez A Yes, they're aimed at different niches, but the $720 Millionaire sold out in weeks, and most sold in advance, prior to their release. Somebody likes them, though a peeing contest wouldn't fit their culture.

I wouldn't call it bad luck, but the thumb bar design was added as an afterthought. In classic marketing form (sell your weak points) they call it FC for "fast cast" It works, but you have to finagle it about half the time - rock the spool with your thumb to get the clutch to disengage. As I said before, my hands-down favorite Ambassadeur tuning result is '77 4500C - - I liked this enough to build a 2nd one. Avail AMB-4550R-EF spool will fish PE#1 (200 m) to PE#3 (55-lb), or mono to 14-lb Thumb caps on both sides, adding/subtracting bronze shims, also let you center the spool, which makes a difference w/ fine braid. Since I'm still here, there's a couple of schools on the forum. One is get rid of them, or keep them fishing as an option while recognizing there are better newer reels to use instead. The second is fish them because they'll keep fishing as long as you want, and then can hand down to the next generation. @MAN, @redmeansdistortion, and I fit a subset of this group. Recognize as the Japanese did 40 years ago that you can improve these reels, fish them peerlessly, and they'll always be worth what you put into them.

Another way to look at the top-weight rating is the butt power for turning and handling fish. I fish rods that will cast below 1/16 oz, yet are rated to 5/8 oz top end. Bass Seabass There have been dufus call-outs from a banned member "how is 20 g finesse" Here's how - while this rod will cast and fish a trout lure, a trout rod won't land this fish.

@SC53 look into Florida Fishing Products for cost-effective braid - I believe it's supplied by Varivas, and it meets the specs of Japan X-braid. I fished a charge of their 20-lb for four years inshore. My go-to inshore spinner is Twin Power C3000MHG - the stock spool capacity is 150 m equiv to Florida Fishing Products 20-lb. I also have spare spools that include a back-up PE#1.2, and a shallower-yet spool for PE#0.6 for long shore casting niche.

@Smirak hi friend, that is Duel X-wire in PE#0.8 (0.15-mm-dia, 16-lb breaking strength) - the Japanese are big on 5-color braids, changing every 10 m (+ 1-m marks) - this is good for counting as you load your spool, and they like it for measuring depth when vertical jigging. For me, it was my first delve into salt BFS on a long shore-fishing rod.

The weight here tells you the frame size under 200g is small frame, 210 to 230 is mid-frame (C3000MHG is beefed-up mid-frame), 260+ is large frame. ('20 Twin Power chart) I bought C3000MHG for bad-boy inshore small package with near-enough large-frame drag. (Actually, I bought it because my friend Lou accidentally ordered 2 from Asian Portal). I have a distance shore niche that will benefit casting PE#0.6, and the target is snook. My bud Nick uses C2000S Twin Power in spinning finesse and loves it. My reel is both so smooth and so overbuilt, it seems like cheating. What you gain in Twin Power strength is not lost in finesse performance, because Japan-bench parts matching makes these reels astounding. Side-by-side, Vanquish is the best finesse reel ever because it was designed to be the best finesse reel ever. But unless you have the two side by side, you won't notice the drive inertia difference.

wow, you guys really do live with backlash to have that many different names for it. @Fishingintheweeds The reason mono was ever described as easier with baitcaster is exactly because backlash is easier to see, and easier to pull and work out of your spool. Without backlash, fine diameter and total limpness makes braid easy to love - the smaller it is, the farther it casts. Braid backlash makes tight 180-degree loops that can be very hard to find - if you don't want these, fish mono. Most of what gets called braid line dig on the forrum is actually backlash that has been ignored and fished over.

I have a '20 Twin Power, and it's my favorite Shimano, and my only mid-frame. I just added a ('19) Vanquish spool (while I still could) to get shallower PE #0.6 capacity on my C3000MHG reel. Standard spool on this size is 1215 - PE#1.2, 150 m. Killer line management, even swapping 3 spools around.

letting the lure hit the water and then thinking about it The OP's description to me is start-up backlash from wrist-jerk. The difference between getting it or not can be really subtle, and it's a bad habit brought over from spinning tackle, because spinning tackle rewards wrist jerk with distance. This is a fact of physics - gravity also causes wind backlash when the lure is approaching mid-cast hump.

@redmeansdistortion The bronze pinion always takes the wear, and it's nice OS is out there so we can replace them. The 6.3 ManFish gears include stainless pinion - been on my watchlist through the stock of this run, and I got the last set. The maker says this will be the last pinion we'll ever need...

Sorry, this is non-sequtir. Depending on brakes for end-of-cast overrun carries a long list of character derisions that boil down to inexperience. When your cast gets past mid-hump, gravity prevents backlash. Your thumb should always be there for end of cast, both final brake, and to adjust your final cast elevation and accuracy on the fall. Difference here is tournament distance casters, who load their spool only with the day's distance target plus extra kismet - they never brake on the fall, and let their spool backlash at the end to get every competitive inch from their cast. If you're not a tournament distance caster, your thumb should do its best work on the fall and finish. There are times casting the light-end limit of your reel, where the spool runs out of energy and stops itself before the lure hits the water. End-of-cast thumb is not needed, but it still should be a habit. This is not the normal cast finish with a baitcaster. Your thumb should be placing the heavier lure exactly where you want it. With enough experience, your thumb also feels incipient backlash, and reacts as a reflex to add light brake and get you through it. In my case, it helped a lot coming from old Ambassadeur, where every cast was 100% thumb. Moving that to reels with modern brakes, thumb is still ready to engage through the 3 types of backlash - start-up overshoot, mid-cast wind backlash, and end of cast spool stop.

@PourMyOwn - my custom Zzeta 4500CT has 6.3 gears and just got the brass gears upgraded to 6.3 stainless from UK - everything about this reel is a joy, but it's crazy difficult to photograph because it blows so much light back at you. Didn't start with a reel, but built entirely from parts. I know @redmeansdistortion has built 2500CI this way. When I first tried matching my rebuilt Royal Express with a Japanese Smith SS offset-grip + separate rod blade, the graphite/plastic foot would bend and spit out from the reel seat. So I replaced it with a NOS alloy frame with chromed brass foot - all I could get was a red frame, so I call it my Black Cherry. Another thing about these reels, they're built to last, easy to work on, parts will always be available from aftermarket makers, OEM parts from e-replacement parts and repair shops like Dad's Ole Tackle and Mike's in BC, Ebisu in Japan, Abu bench-built limited runs, and UK vendors build their own Ambassadeurs. RocketReelCo complete C3 drive plate, sold with stainless main gear and BB main shaft - it's cheaper to buy the complete C3 plate than buy their mainshaft and gears separately.

I race mine out for stream BFS, river kayak niche, one 4500C casts far enough for shore fishing niche, and I've built custom surf reels in 4500CT to 6500CS. River extremes, stream UL 1500CI, and frogger, built on 4600C3 Express. There's a whole world of Ambassadeur upgrades out there, and you can prioritize your upgrades following this essay from Jun Sonada. https://japantackle.com/Tackle_topics/abu_tuneup.htm My reels typically get Avail spool, improved spool bearings, mag brake, full-ball-bearing LW (Avail, Valleyhill and Mike's Reel Repair) alloy rider for braid and zirconia pawl. England, France, and Italy offer the hot surf reel upgrades, stainless gears, ball-bearing drive, external variable mag. Here's my raciest '77 4500C, which will out-cast a new-from-box Steez or Zillion. Shore fishing at March new moon, it was casting 3-g microjigs to surface slashes 150' out, on 6-1/2' 2-hand rod. This one I upgraded to full-ceramic bearings, zirconia microbearings in the LW, full silicon-nitride spool bearings. Barstock-frame surf reels, 4500CT and 6500CS Rocket

What you're describing sounds like start-up backlash - the spool is out-running the lure at initial start. If you can cast with smooth wrist-follow-through instead of wrist snap, it should go away. Otherwise, you need a brake adjustment - more centrifugal, or maybe even end tension - all this depends on the reel. If the spool gets fuzzy mid-cast, you're on incipient wind backlash. This needs more mag brake to solve, or stick to heavier lures.

Daiwa picked both plastic and alloy handle nuts to protect the mainshaft threads - too easy to cross-thread on the square-end shaft, On Zillion, it's complicated by the springy star drag detente-clicker, which acts like an accordion and pushes the hollow star drag and handle outward. It's possible you could cross thread the handle nut and everything feel tight and ok, then everything flops off the main shaft when you're under crank load. Tightening the handle nut should give you 5 full turns - if it binds up in fewer, it's cross-threaded.

Except the Daiwa nut is aluminum alloy and the main shaft threads are brass. While the brass threads could be bunged up, you could chase the main shaft threads with a stainless M8 (fine thread) then try a new handle nut. Not cheap, but KDW makes titanium handle nuts - these are go to for me in the salt. And yes, the whole point of the retainer is to lock the nut from backing off.

"Braid" is used generically to represent 4 different generations of line, all currently on the market. Basic spectra/dyneema, X8 carrier, coated braid, hard-coated high-density drawn braid (X-braid). Three generations improved braid roundness - the latest generation has twice the breaking strength for the same diameter as the older generations. I use equivalent dia. to 20-lb Sufix 832 on deep-spool Super Duty by backing with 20-25 yds, 20-25-lb mono, with 100 yds working braid on top, for casting lighter lures to greater distance. This works like it was made for it, and line dig is never an issue. For frogging, you want higher strength and improved abraision resistance, which may include bigger diameter, but doesn't have to. With shallow spools, you can fish down to 0.17-mm diameter without line dig, and BFS reels with improved LW pitch like @Tennessee Boy Silver Wolf (I have one, too) will fish down to 0.1-mm dia. without line dig. Backlash in fine braid appears so different from mono backlash, most of the braid line dig called out on the forum is probably backlash.

It's much more likely line manufacturers lie about their line diameter. E.g., I've found from filling spools, 832 is Always larger diameter than Sufix reports it. Reel makers are more likely to interpret spool capacity differently - I've always found Daiwa spools hold more line than their rating. CNC-machining a spool is one thing - drawing line is another. The error math seems simple.

@redmeansdistortion - best thing about that spool, it's made for mono. and of course it will fish braid also. Braid doesn't warp spools, which is how they can make braid-only BFS spools down to 4 g spool weight -- relaxing stretched mono warps and blows-out spools that aren't reinforced for mono/fluoro.

@redmeansdistortion and the spool is listed on ebay for $170 from Japan scalper. If you want to check current stock on Ray's Studio, go first to the Thailand ebay vendor I linked above, where Ray's Studio is made.

In my experience, the most versatile (and forgiving) spool for BFS on Daiwa is Ray's Honeycomb SV. I've fished 2 of these in 34-mm size for 4 years and never backlashed. Current stock limits you to Alphas, and I would snag one of the spools either from Thailand (last one, red) or China (tell him purple, blue or black) Japan vendors are also listing 34-mm (Steez/Zillion) and 31-mm (Pixie) at scalper prices. I always set mag brake baseline using disposable 6-lb YZH - cast the lightest thing you're ever going to throw, dial out mid-cast backlash. When you switch to braid, never go below this base mag number, and add a couple of notches for casting into the wind. Otherwise, the mag is set, and there's no reason to change it. The trick with lighter weights on these spools is improving spool bearings. Can't go wrong with Roro bearings and their bearing pin tool. Better add I've never backlashed fixed-rotor Roro-X or AMO spools, either, but by design, these spools are less forgiving and won't compensate for start-up jerk either from wrist snap or casting heavier weights. If going this route pings you, AMO 34-mm spool outdistances everything else casting the lightest weights. None of this is feely, it's all measured on casting range and proved on the water.

Legit Designs made a bass rod that's darn good, especially qualified for jerkbait. Daiwa made their rod more versatile for JDM travel, wide-range BFS, shore casting (I'm blown away by 3-g distance for the short length) - do-able multifunction bass rod - and note they even rate it for a 4-oz vertical jig.

The rod balances perfectly with a Zillion. The added weight of the joints makes the rod tip feel heavier with a lighter reel, but the spigot joints actually help make the rod more moderate. It fishes a jerkbait very well, in fact, it reminds me of my favorite 7' IM6 Crowder (Crowder calls ML, but it's really MM). I also have the 6'6"ML-5 Daiwa Black Label. Between the two, the Legit Designs is the jerkbait rod and is exactly right for an MM (not BF) bass rod. The Daiwa 5-pc is much more of a BF rod, and will cast 2 g without windage swing, which is below its rated low end - the Daiwa also loads deep at its 3-g rated low end, and is lighter in hand than L/D by 20 g - even lighter here matched with Steez. and yes, the Daiwa has a powerful butt to go with that BF tip. btw, I was happy to get both of these rods at good prices. No more stock now, but I paid $234 for the Legit Designs Wild Side WSC68M-5 from FishingShop.kiwi. The Daiwa was a recent Yahoo score for $190.