Best Distance Casting reel

[Guest]

Hi

I figure I need to add some yardage to my casting this autumn (I'd like to average 100 m +) and was wondering what reel all you guys and the new girls would recommend to twin with a Penn Vendetta 12.6 rod rigged for a multiplier reel. I expect to use 15 lb main line and use it in relatively clean marks. The rod has a rather soft tip but it also has enough backbone to get the lead moving quite well...

Thanks
_________________
Kieran Hanrahan

Moderator (aka Dogsbody)



reply by anonymous

Penn 525 mag or the abu 6500 mag elite (green).

[Luke Scully]

Hi there kieran.
I use the Penn Villain rod which is very similar to the Vendetta. I couple this with a mag Elite and am currently casting 150 genuine yards using the off the ground method. The mag elite if you are not that up on them is a brilliant casting reel as is the 525. MB3 uses the 525 and is very good with the ariel ground cast and reaches similar distance. Both reels i would imagine are equally good casters and probably the best on the market. :wink: The 525 is slightly harder to control from what i see requireing less line and more magnets. The ABU with using one centrifugal break block and about 3 on the magnets allows you to almost fill the spool with complete casting control. This may be different for others but this set up works perfect for me with hardly ever a birds nest. I use 18 lb line and these distances are easily attainable. The current marketing stratagy for the 525 promotes the fact that it has bigger gearing cogs than the mag elite. What they don't tell you however is that the pinion gear is made of stainless steel and main cog is made of Bronze. Basicly this means that it is the cog which will be the first part to fail rather than the pinion gear as it is a softer metal and thus there really is very little between the two. The mag elite will land any fish you will land from the shore. The true difference between the two reels is the reteive speed. The ABU is 5.3:1 while the penn is 6.1:1. what this means is the penn will lift your lead higher in the water quicker than the ABU and thus is marketed as a 'rough ground reel' A snag is a snag in my book and no real overturns rocks. indeed only a fool would try use his reel to pull out of a snag anyway. On the boat the desireable retreive rate while redgilling is between 3:1 and 4.2:1 as it provides the right speed to catch pollack etc. obviously this depends on how fast you reel in of course but faster reels have had less catch rate in my experience. From this point of view i would imagine the ABU would be better for spinning over rocks for Pollack. Different horses for different courses. Make your own choice. You will not go wrong with either of these reels anyway both are high quality reels. One other last point about ABU reels and the reason they are my favorite. I have 5 multipliers - Masterline, Penn and three different ABU's. The ABU's are a piece of piss to take apart and clean. You can do this in a couple of minutes and really get in there to keep them 100% forever. Other reels in my limited experience are a little trickier altough far from impossible! :shock:

[Steve O'Hanlon]

You should think about the Daiwa 7HT as well Kieran. It may have been around for a while, but why fix what ain't broke? It doesn't have mag braking, but it's the easiest to cast and control by far, and casts straight from the box, no tuning required. As far as I recall Mr Cooke caught a rather large shore tope on one, so reliability will not be an issue, even if it is only really suitable for clean beaches.

The Abu's were originally built for salmon spinning, so bear in mind that they will not be able to take too much rough treatment.

The 525mag is built like a brick ****house by all accounts, but seems to take a while to get used to. I understand it can be very difficult to control until it's set up to deal with your style of casting. MB.3 will tell you more about it I'm sure.

[Donagh]

Once the two internal bearings on the mag 525 are tuned with red label its just a matter of adjusting mag settings. The slidey does have a habit of being flicked to zero when your not looking causing a birds nest and one of my mags popped out which was resolved with super glue. As for taking the reel apart Neil Mackellow advises against exept for the above tuning which is an easy enough task. One of the main complaints heard from 6500 users about the 525 is the chunkiness making it uncomfortable to tumb the reel but the 525 has a better ruputation for dealing with bigger fish and weed.

Donagh

[bigcol]

2 of the mags popped out in my 525 aswell.They must be suseptable to this.Brilliant reel though.It is as good on the rocks as it is on the beach.One question though.Why is it recommended taht you do not take it apart?I strip my reel once every 6 weeks to give it a good clean and oiling.Should I not be doing this?

[Guest]

I'm using the Daiwa SL20SH and I love it. I find it real smooth to cast now I've set it up with Red Rocket Fuel. I'll only get a birds nest if I'm not paying attention to the lead entering the water. m.b3 has cast with it on my Suveran Beach Sport and easily cleared the 100+ meters of line I had on it - he had to stop it mid flight with about 10 turns left on the reel! It's my first multiplier, but I'm looking at buying another for my Shakespear Tornado. As far as rocks are concerned, it has a 6:1 retrieve to lift the weight quickly.

[IDPearl]

Note to self....login before posting. That was me with the SL20SH :oops:

Ian

[dtmcc]

Penn 525 mag,



size counts

dave

[SOD]

I have both a 525 mag and abu 6500 mag and find the abu to be the better caster . But both are excellent reels .

[Donagh]

Hi Bigcol,

Just on the striping down of the 525mag reel i was just parroting what Neil MacKellow said on his site. The rest of the reel besides the spool bearing should be left as they are unless you have an issue as they aren't designed to be taken apart regularly and the reel may get damaged. Oiling the two spool bearings every six weeks should be fine. Contact Neil on his site through the ask neil section. He's very helpful.

Donagh

[drseafish]

Hi Kieran, I think I would in general like to reiterate what was said above. I have only ever used a 525Mag, but as my first multiplier it took some getting used to. Once I slowed it down by changing the oil in the bearings it has become very well behaved. I use simple 3:1 oil as I found the red rocket fuel was even to fast for me. I still the the odd birdsnest but this is usually due to a poorly timed cast or on a wet night if my thumb slips. The problems I had with the reel were the mags slipping out and yes I glued them back (must be alternate polarity otherwise it makes them ineffective, something to do with eddy currents) which solved the problem. I never had a problem with the mag setting slipping but a friend has had a terrible time with this occuring on his Abu mag (in his opinion the only fault of the reel). It seems the Abu is easeir to cast due to the combination of mags and brake blocks, but the retrieve ratio of the Penn is a big plus because reeling in is a big pain with multipliers in comparison to the control. I have also herd that the screw holding the free spool level can come lose in the 525 but I think that was only in the orginal type which are no longer available. In responce to the Diawa reels above I believe that they are about to introduce a mag version this or next year.

You say you are currently getting an average of 110 yards with your set up, is this with bait, 15lb line and what reel. If mr Scully is getting 150 yards with 18lb line, its a very good cast as the diameter of the line markedly reduces distance. I can hit 140/150 yards with an aerilised ground cast (PZ match + 525 Mag), 15Lb line, 5oz lead (no bait) but if using 18lb line its down to 110.

I need to work on this to get more compression early and a smoother follow through, but it all takes time. Its hitting the first 130/140 thats the easier part

[kieran]

Hi DrSeaFish et al

Firstly thanks all for the opinions and excellent advice.

Yes, heard that the ABU is better "out of the box" but that the 525 Mag Elite was better. People also recommended the 7HT to me, and as it happens I have one islotted into a boat rod (which alas is not seeing any action at the moment, something to do with the lack of a boat I suspect :wink: )...

Just to clarify one point, I said I WOULD LIKE to average 100 m + from the beach, whereas currently with a 535 I am getting only about 70 m on a good day with the wind behind with a 175 gram lead and one bait (clipped down), which still lands me into fish but not the ones I want to be targeting come the autumn (for which you can read turbot & cod).

The 7HT is curently loaded with 30 lb braid (powerpro I think) which as you know has the diameter of 8 lb b/s mono. I am sorely tempted to go and try beachcasting with braid.... after all who needs a thumb anyway?

Cheers all, I will let you know how I progress....

[stevecrow74]

i use the diawa 7ht with the diawa moonraker supreme(the original moonraker) and can get casts upto and beyond 130 yards, but due to back injury thats all i can go (for the moment), even though i fing its not the reel that gives the good cast its the rod,

i have used the 7ht with other rods and it doesn't come near to what i can get with the moonraker, and have used later moonraker series and they have nothing on the original (i like my rod) and with the addition of the 7ht i'm very happy with the casts (but thats just my opinion)

[Luke Scully]

Just like to make a comment about the remark made about the ABU being a Salmon reel. This is quite true, it was origionaly designed as a salmon reel but do you know how big those things are? How hard they fight? Come on now lads, there are very few fishys out there in the sea that could best a Salmon! Rivers also tend to be quite snaggy... Seriously though you should never use a reel to pull out of a snag. I have learned this to much cost with the gears stripped off my Penn Seaboy which has a much tougher gearing system than a 525 i can tell you! The biggest mistake an angler can make is not matching line to a reel. ABU 6500 reels should only be loaded with a maximum of 18 - 20 lb line and 525's with only 25 lb line. This is reflected in the size of the spool and how much you can actually get on there. The reason for this is simple, your line should snap BEFORE any damage is done to the reel. Now I ask you this question? with this in mind explain why you would want to pull out of a snag using your reel as a winch? If that were the case you would want to be loading it with 30 lb line which is complely crazy. if 20 lb line or even 25 lb line i not strong enough to pull out of a snag then you you would rarely retreive your rig anyway. In snaggy situations, release some line, take the line at the top ring and wind it round a stick and take the tension up that way. This will put on far mor pressure and free your line or snap off. Better to lose a rig and a weight than damage your reel or rod rings... :oops:

[jd]

originally from Neilus

I find the 7ht the best all round reel for all round castability as you dont have to modify the reel and it can be used straight out of the box.
But if your into blasting baits into the horison I would go for the Abu 6500ct Mag Elite its easy enough to control .

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tx
John

[nthclare]

I havent oiled any bearings since before Christmas must do some tonight .
The ceramic bearings make a big difference to distance and I dont think you loose as much oil as with the regular bearings.

[nthclare]

ngeaney@yahoo.com