Bigbox99

That would be the Zillion TWS and old/USDM Zillion HD.

That's the Steez CT LTD. It's a Steez LTD and has the usual treatments of a unique paint finish and shallower/light weight spool. You buy these for the rarity and paint finish. You can put whatever spool in you want that fits based on your application. If you're just going go use it bone stock then based on the spool appearance, I would spool it with 10# sniper and use it the way I do my 2015 Alphas SV skipping light plastics on a ML rod because that looks a lot like my 15 Alphas SV spools. To complete the silver look then maybe pair it to a Steez rod from recent years with a similar appearance to the Real Control rods. I'm not tuned into the current era Steez rods but something must tick the boxes. Pic sorced from TT forum is a full size Steez TW LTD on a Real Control rod. Certainly looks the part.

Your line doesn't seem to be the issue. If it was heavy fluorocarbon I could write it off but even 15# Big Game is pretty manageable with buzzbaitsz spinerbaits ect. Are you tracking the bait with yout eyes and slowing then stopping the spool with your thumb as the bait nears and then reaches the water? If you don't do that then you will get some line fluff at the end of the cast. I don't have an Elite but I have an Elite spool in a Fuego CT. It bombs and is very well controlled in the Fuego CT. Maybe that reel has stronger magnets than the Elite but I can fire off a spool emptying long cast and then go low effort cast for 80% as far instead of 30% with the stock Fuego CT spool. That's the beauty of the Elite spool. It's more of an effortless caster than it is a max distance caster. It impressive how far it casts for so little effort.

What line are you using?

That style of rod originated in Japan. Also Shimano is Japanese company so would call that style of rod a Japanese BFS rod or what I call a traditional BFS rod with a Majorcraft or Shimano 68L from a bass rod line being the quintessential BFS rod in my opinion. An American style BFS rod is an interesting concept. I we could define one as a rod that would be 7' or over with a softer backbone and slower tip likely owing to the fact that they are just ML spinning rods with casting components. There are a few brands that get it but the rule of thumb when buying a BFS rod is to stick to Japanese brands. If money was no option and you are sold on Shimano then I would look at the BFS versions of the higher end Shimano bass rod lines like the Glorious. Between the two you listed for the reel you listed I would use PA but don't overlook the Expride BFS rods either. I like the Zodias and have a 610ML BFS 1st gen rod but that dark blue Aldebaran on a red and black rod would give me a migraine. Speaking of a ML I would look at those too. I'm not sure what you intend to throw but that Alde DC looks like it has a deeper and heavier spool than what I would want to pair to a BFS L powered rod. Maybe it's a super small diameter spool but my gut reaction would be to spool it with 10# sniper and put it on a Shimano ML PA for weightless 4" Senkos, 1/16 oz head flick shakes, the small size Fluke and smaller 3/16 and 1/4 oz jerkbaits, crankbaits, spybaits ect. Basically what I use with my ML 1610 Zodias BFS and 68ML 1st gen Steez Skyray Shallow Cover Finesse.

Assuming you aren't experiencing braid slipping on the spool then you may have lost max drag pressure from leaving the drag too tight for long periods of time. If you don't back your drag off when the reel is not in use you will lose pressure on the drag washers from the spring washers deformation over time. You will have to add increasing tightness over time to get the same high drag pressures as before as the spring washers continue to deform. It take as little as a few years for this to happen but it happens. It's good practice to back off the drags after each trip with every reel. Reels that are meant to be used with locked down drags all the time will come without spring washers, have a spacer in their place and no drag star. You can easily duplicate this yourself if you want to run max lockdown drag all the time by removing the two curved washers that act as a spring and replacing them with shims. The drag will lose the range of adjustment and be off or max lockdown but it will never deteriorate from max lockdown drag pressures if left there. Basically the spring washers allow for a range of adjustment in drag pressure as the star is tightened and the spring formed by the two curved washers compress. If left compressed the washer spring will lose some of its spring force pressing against the drag washers and lose drag pressure. Continued tightening of the drag star to compensate for the lost pressure and continued loss of pressure from leaving the reel at those high drag pressures for months and years at a time will result in flattened spring washers and unsatisfactory drag pressure for high drag pressure use. An extreme form of this is leaving the reel at high drag for years and forgetting about the reel only to discover it later and find that it has lost all drag pressure because the curved spring washers have completely flattened and taken that flat shape. The drag star will reach its mechanical limit and bottom out before you can press the flattened washers into the drag stack to apply any pressure meaning the reel will have zero drag. This is how most of us have expericed this but it can be a slow loss of max drag pressure over time too from leaving the drag tight over the season and off season for a few years.

Adding the Tomahawk GT3 Shiryu "Purple Dragon" crankbait rods to the list. I always wanted to try a Tomahawk for a moving bait rod and just discovered that these existed. They meet my requirements of old Megabass and of Megabass rods with dragon artwork. I looked at later glass/graphite Tomahawks but these are earlier rods are more highly coveted. https://www.tackletour.com/reviewmbshiryu610.html Oh God, it's spiral wrapped too. I have to have it now. I already own 3 MB spiral wrapped rods. It ticks all my MB boxes. Old legendary weird MB rod before they went mainstream with consoomerslop. Glass (i'm on a glass rod bender since my 71MH Valkyrie and want another). MB dragon detailing like on the X7s I'll never probably own. Spiral wrapped guides. It also strongly resembles my Super Destruction in design even though it is not a Destroyer.

That shallow spool has got go be at least 15 grams based on the thickness of the aluminum. I'm more inclined to think that spool is meant for braid and vertical jigging. My Engetsu has a spool like that and while I like how heavy it is in that it keeps spinning with momentum on the cast providing for long casts of long casting baits it really can't do below 1/4 oz and 3/8 oz is its sweat spot.

Tatula 80s are closer to $100 on AE.

The old advice was to turn them on in pairs but I've ran odd numbers on other reels with similar brakes without issue.

The internal ones are the centrifugal brakes. The brakes use centrifugal force of the rotating spool to compress their retaining spring extending outwards and contact the brass race on the side plate when in the unlocked stage. The magnets are tied to the external dial and move a set of button magnets closer or away from the aluminum face of the centrifugal brake assembly. It's a good system that has worked well for a long time. I set the spool tension to just eliminate side to side play like it came right out of the box (zero adjust), 4 out of 6 pins on and set the mag dial for the need for control. Higher mag dial when casting into the wind, trying to skip, with baits that slow rapidly or when using a stiff line like fluoro is unruly and needs the low speed control of the magnets at the end of the cast. For bombing with an easy flowing line and bailt like braid with a frog I run little to no mag brake and let the centrifugals do their job. It's two braking systems in one reel and I always set them up as a zero adjust centrifugal and use more or less magnets based on bait behavior.

I've heard good things about the glide bait rod. For the money the combos don't seem too bad. The rods look like they will be pretty good and the reels are a bit of an unknown but they do appear to be an aluminum frame Doyo platform and use their time and tested Doyo dual brake. It's a Lubina too. The Pro Qualifiers of the 2010s that everyone liked were also a Doyo Lubina. That doesn't mean this new will be as legendary as the old model but it's a good lineage from a well known reel manufacturer.

I have both and prefer the Tatula 80 for all around use. It has a more versatile braking profile and I like the dial location better that allows for adjustments while palming the reel instead of having to flip it over and dig at the little nub dial on the Alphas. The Alphas is way better at control so it gets the nod for jigs and plastics. I've shelved mine and will be pairing it with a jig rod in the future.

I use a Zodias 72M and an old Tatula with an aftermarket Ray's Studio SV spool for most of my weightless plastics. I use 12# Sniper skipping to docks with frequent cuts and reties of the bait so braid to leader on a spinning reel isn't an option for me. It's a stiffer medium and more of a M+ but I like it. Nothing wrong with using a spinning reel for weightless plastics. Back when baitcast reels all had 20 gram spools and everyone used spool tension spinning reels were the norm for a Senko reel because it's wasn't viable on your average baitcast reel that wasn't a TDZ, Alphas/Pixy or Scorpion 1000D.

Yes. You will need to put one plastic bushing and one bearing at the bottom of the Daiwa handle when fitting Shimano knobs. Shimanos handles have a taller base for the knobs and you will need to duplicate this on the Daiwa handle to accept the Shimano knob. Instead of a plastic bushing at the bottom and one bearing at the the top of the Daiwa knob on a Daiwa handle use one plastic bushing and one bearing at the bottom of the Shimano knob and one bearing on top. With a complete Bantam handle assembly you should have all the extra bearings and parts plus extra to make it work.

Great job capturing pics of the damage.

Gloobis isn't even all that high end. If you're going to poverty post about how great your low end rig is then at least shoot higher. I make direct comparisons between my most expensive moving bait rig and my cheapest. There's 10x price difference here and both do the same job. The top one is just cooler and no longer in production further increasing scarcity.

I've heard of the plastic side plates on Shimano reels cracking around the AR housing when used with locked down drags and swinging for the fences type hooksets. It's rare but if you set the hook like a maniac with locked down drags day in and day out this failure could occur on the SLX and Curado (200K pictured). An aluminum handle side plate would prevent this like on a Bantam or "armed housing concept" Daiwa. I like aluminum handle side plates for quality of life reasons but a failure was never a concern until I saw this from two Curado 200ks on another site. I don't know if this is a 200k unique failure or if this is indicative of this kind of use and material.

Wanees is the brand. I've seen them for sale on the Japanese Amazon but I'm sure other sited have them too. They have a US site I just found. I haven't compared them to Japan prices but everything US seems to be considerably more expensive https://wanees-usa.com/

The Zillion silver paint is particularly fragile especially on the top over. It's a removable top cover but isn't sold individually yet. I will be getting a sticker decal set to cover a gouge on mine from the drag star of another reel.

The Steez is the flagship and their special limited edition versions are basically chrome.

I have both and don't notice and difference in distance. Both cast far and offer plenty of control on the other end. The difference is that the SV is better with baits under 1/2 oz than the HD and the HD can handle baits up to 3 oz and large diameter stiff lines very well. They are so close you can use both for normal bass duties and not notice a difference between the two. If I were to buy another Zillion I would get an HD because it looks nicer.

Yes, but I don't have any confidence with glide baits. I can't seem to get bit on these unless there is a crazy bite where they will bite anything but then its just a bunch of small fish. I do get bites on Gantarel Jrs, Savage Gear 8 inch trout line throughs and Savage Gear 5 inch slow sink bluegills. All big fish bites too. Maybe I am getting followers I can't see sitting down in a kayak but glides have been a waste of time for me. I still throw them but my Savage Gear baits are my confidence baits. Hudd 68s specials rof13 also get bit slow crawling but 60% of the bites for me are on the tail and they never find the hook.

If you ever watched the Project T video when the reel 1st came out you would see a lot of lob casting and pitching hinting at the precision, effortless casting and control of the reel. Only Jun Maeda shows off what I consider a normal distance cast. Everyone else is doing close in work or lobbing baits.

I tried some 15# green Big Game last year as a trial on my budget power moving bait combo and I really like it. My high end moving bait combo has 14# Sniper because fluoro is the best monofilament line or so I thought. I still like it for plastics and jigs but for moving baits my mind is being changed. My high end moving bait rig can't be used with topwaters like buzzbaits or ploppers because the fluoro line sinks and ruins the action. After taking out the low end rig and using it for the same things the high end was being used for without missing a beat and having the advantage of being able to work buzzbaits and ploppers I will be switching the high end to a high end green mono. But what about visibility? I like this video. It is supposed to show how fluoro is harder to see than a green low vis mono but they look basically the same from every angle. Now imagine if instead of stationary on a rig the line and bait was moving like a crankbait or bladed jig? They are both functionally "nearly invisible to fish" or whatever fluoro claims, at least for moving baits.