msgf91

It sounds like they were finesse fishing. Drop shot is finesse fishing but for me I use it as a tool to avoid nasty vegetation on the bottom. I'll fish a pond and see someone constantly bringing up crap on their T rigs. I'll throw a drop shot and usually the small weight might get a little bit of stuff on it but the bait avoids it. Bringing in a big bass with a drop shot, depending on the hook you use, is like a balancing act. Constant tension so the hook doesn't come out, but not too much so you don't pull the hook. Old school drop shot rods had a mod-fast action to help with this. But I just lean on the drag for this. Tight enough drag when I turn the handle there's plenty of tension, and some slip but loose enough when the fish runs it pulls drag easily. Similar with the light crappie spinning rods and bfs rods but a little different.

I saw a tackle advisors video where someone sent him a bushing made from some industrial grade 3M material. It sounds like a cool concept to experiment with. But the material is pricey and having it cut into bushings could be expensive. In the video he replaced the main shaft bearing in one of his saltwater reels. (currently trying to find the video)

They are the same reels based on the Sahara. Depending on what you use it for, the Sahara could be another option. The Sahara is the base reel, the Nasci has an extra bearing and water resistant seals, then Miravel is lighter and made from CI4. I fish freshwater 90% of the time so I went with the Sahara. If you want to see how tough they are you can check out MDLR's videos. He uses 500 sized reels to catch speckled trout and slot reds. Before he had a Sahara and in his more recent videos he switched to a Nasci.

I did tons of research into the rods. The 0 power rod has a thin solid tip while the 1 has a regular tubular tip. Here is a post on Reddit by the owner of BFS empire on the rod: "The 0 power rods with the solid tip are considerably lighter at the tip section and are better suited for casting lighter weight lures as well as techniques where you want to impart a subtle action by shaking the rod tip - like a dropshot rig. The soft tip is also great for lures with tiny treble hooks, like 1/8oz and under cranks, topwater, etc. I prefer the 0 power rods for JDM skirted finesse jigs as well, which tend to be 1/16oz and under and are generally paired with 1-2" soft plastics. Tiny swimbaits like the 2" Eurotackle B-Vibes paired to tiny jig heads with #4 and under hooks are gonna suit the 0 power rods as well. I'd personally recommend the 700c or 650c if you're wanting a 0 power. The 1 power rods are gonna be more of your traditional bass finesse techniques like standard size Z-Man Ned rigs, wacky worms, 1/8oz-1/4oz crankbaits, topwater, etc. The tubular tip offers a more uniform fast action, and has a little more hook setting power. I would go up to 1/0, maybe 2/0 w/ thin wire, hooks on this one."

I saw on TW there will be a Light model so now it's on my list for BFS rods lol

What do you plan to do with the new rod? That dobyns from everything I've heard has a really soft tip compared to other rods

BFS is kind of complicated I think. I think it's just using finesse specific techniques with a casting reel. The BFS rod of BFS rods, the megabass Hien, is rated up to 5/8ths.

Hello, how are the classic BFS and curado Light rods actions? I'm currently trying to decide on sort of an all purpose action rod for casting underspins. I want something with enough backbone to set the hook on a single hook, but load fine casting 1/16th ounce underspins + swimbait. Kind of like a MH fast rod but scaled down. Thanks for any info

This fall my main BFS setups have been ALX Aura Old 18 Authentic UL Then a SS Air doing double duty but if I want to bring both rods I pair the Aura with the SLX BFS. 4lb XL on the SLX and 2lb XL for when I use the UL Zman shad fryZ blue glimmer sparkle on a 1/16th ounce roadrunner Mule fishing donkey tail jr Karma on a 1/32nd ounce roadrunner I have a bunch of other baits but these 2 have been producing for me since fall started. Money right there

I contacted him after reading the post. It's still in development, he wants to try and make it lighter with the same strength. He uses BFS reels differently, for European catfish. I told him how I use 1/32nd ounce roadrunners with a micro swim bait and he said that's like the weight of just one of the snap rings he uses. I heard some people have tried out using the SS Air spool if they switch the Airs side plate to the Steez Ct. So maybe the spools are interchangeable if you move the side plate with it.

Abu black Max Or one of the CDM reels from AliExpress. I just picked up a SoloKing Acura (Mine was the dovello hicc50 variant) on sale for 30. It came with a BFS spool and a shallow spool so it can do bfs and regular fishing duties.

That reminds me of how the 70's reel looked before we retired it. Not the color but on a heavy rod for big fish. We broke the original bass rod during the striper event in the 90's. Then my dad took it over and put it on an old Daiwa trolling rod. We caught a lot of bruiser cats and bull reds on it.

I have an old ambassador from the 70's in a box somewhere that I need to rebuild. That thing took a lot of abuse. It was the only reel that survived the mid 90's Lake Texoma Striper event where both sides of the dam was open all summer. Lost a lot good reels and rods that summer lol

Got my SS Air back together finally after cleaning and swapping out the bushings. It feels way better and is much quieter. I don't hear the plastic sound I would hear sometimes. I know I've heard bearings don't make that big of a difference so I figure the difference is it's not dry anymore.

I like Sunline Assassin for treble baits. But I'm afraid I just saw posts online about it and wanted to use more Sunline since I like sniper. When I had to I used sniper just fine.

Some of the JDM models come with double handles. I think there's a SDH model on digitaka

With your budget I would recommend St Croix victory or the new Avid. It's a little bit more than the trigon and premier you mentioned. I have a slightly older avid walleye which uses the victory blank. I like mine for drop shot and ned rig. It has a different grip you might not like though since everyone was mentioning how spinning rods have different grips. I've been using spinning rods for a long time so I use 3-4 different grips depending on technique. For drop shot I like more fingers in front of the reel so the victory/avids reversed grip works great. Fast vs x fast like the others mentioned depends on technique and fish you are going after. Recent experience was fishing for crappie. My panfish spinning rods have a slower tip so I wasn't worried about pulling the hook. But decided to try my BFS x fast rod and it was like I had to be more careful with the fish. The tip had much less give so I was worried I would pull the hook a few times edit: crappie have soft mouths so if you pull too fast or hard you can pull the hook

Thanks for the info on the spool, I'm going to have to check it out

Bantam. Mines been going strong. I throw horny toads with mine. Its heavier but super smooth so I forget how heavy it is. I posted pics when I first got it of a huge freshwater drum and gar I caught. Tanked them with no problem

The SLX BFS has a similar FTB system. Too dim outside, can't see it. To bright, can't see it. The best way is when it's overcast. Realized that the previous trip I turned it down to 1 lol

The main rod is a ALX Enox Aura 6'10 Light Ex fast. 4lb Sniper. The guides are tiny so I don't want to deal with Leader knots. It works great with bottom contact. But I tried it with the 1/16th ounce roadrunner and fryZ combo and it was great. I could feel when crappie would hold on and swim with it. The 1/32nd ounce roadrunner rod is an Old 18 Authentic 6'6 UUL. (now I want to try out the other series UL and L rods). I figured that the SS Air was the only reel I have I could cast that light. So I switched out the line for 2 lb mono to practice with. Then when I'm confident I won't blow up the reel as much I'll switch to 2 lb Daiwa samurai FC.

I have one from the first batch earlier in the year. I don't have an Aldebaren to compare it with......yet. (after using the SLX BFS the bait monkey wants an Aldebaren) But so far it's been good. It's got the buttery smooth Daiwa retrieve. But because of the material it's made from (magnesium and zaion) it can get noisy like a revo MGX after cleaning all the grease out. It's essentially a Steez Ct/Air detuned with less bearings and a different braking system. Once you figure out the brakes for the weight you want to throw it does the thumbing for you. Like in some of my recent posts, I'm zipping out a 1/32nd roadrunner like I've been using casting gear for a long time with those kinds of weights. If you do get one I would recommend oiling and greasing first. Mine was dry when I opened mine up. Also a YouTuber that upgraded the bearings had the same issue. The gears were dry. But it's one of my favorite parts, it uses 2.5 mm hex instead of Philips so it's easier to get the side plate screws out. Edit: normally I don't beat on my reels hard and need to do a tear down so soon. But this fall was on fire. I was catching so many crappie and bass. Only after a 40 slab fest did I notice it start feeling like it needed a cleaning. Edit: I should clarify, it's not geary sounding noise, it's more noisy when you cast. It sounds plastic like during cast sometimes. Not all the time. I didn't like that plastic feeling until after I used it during the slab fest, broke off and tried picking up my revros and Sahara spinning reels. It was like I could feel every tooth on the gear, and all the play in the knobs. It just showed how smooth it was.

I use my heavy with a 6.3 Bantam. Big Colorado blade spinnerbaits with keitech trailers, and chatterbaits. Also I fish horny toads either straight retrieve Texas rigged with a weight like a swim bait, or a very versatile way with a belly weighted swim bait hook. You can fish top water, straight retrieve and then jerk it like a jerk bait this way.

I just got a 2000 size revros during the summer on sale for 35. It's an amazing reel at this price and I have it paired with a 13 fishing panfish rod I got on clearance for 35. the new 23 Legalis if you don't mind ordering on digitaka. I watched the I_fish review and it's going to be the next best budget finesse spinning reel. Screw in handle and 10 whole grams off the rotor. I think you will like the revros but just throwing out another suggestion

23 SS Air It's stock at the moment. I tore it apart for cleaning and waiting for some bearings to upgrade the handle and worm gear. I don't think it needs them because it's Daiwa smooth already but I figure while I have it apart might as well. There's no aftermarket spools yet but I don't think it'll need one thanks to the braking system. I was careful at first and would try not to cast hard to avoid overruns with the 1/32nd roadrunner. But all that did was blow up the spool. Then I figured out to whip it out there like a spinning rod and the brakes do everything for you.