Gt Lever Drag 330Ld

[michaelchen]

Hello guys, i am new to land based fishing. One of my friends is selling their reel the penn 330LD. It is an overheard with line capacity of 325yds/30lb. He is selling for pretty cheap. I was wondering if that reel is good enough to catch legal kingfish and maybe yellowfin tuna at the rocks? will i be spooled cause it only has 325yds and for only 30lb.

I like that reel cause it has a guide on it.

Thank you in advance for everyone's help

[framedtrash]

thats fine for kings

where are you going to be catching yellowfin off the rocks ??

cant even catch the things offshore at the moment

[slinkymalinky]

G'day lbN,

I'm not a land based game fisho but I can give you a bit of a heads up on reels. Any reel can catch any fish... potentially... If you want a reel made for the job I'd suggest a different reel but if it's a real bargain and that's all you want to spend it's not a problem and is a pretty good reel. It just has a couple of shortcomings for the purpose.

The first is the level-wind. Level-winds are a problem on reels designed for high pressure fishing. When your line gets out of sync with the line guide (e.g. the line guide might be on the left of the spool while the line is coming off the right side of the spool), it puts a lot of pressure on the whole mechanism. With a fish on, it's easy for the level-wind to fail or be damaged.

The gears in the GTi series also aren't as robust as in say a Penn 113, which is about the same sort of size.

But they're well made, have a good carbon drag system, are simple and easy to fix or get parts for if you need to. For kings the line capacity won't be a problem (if any king gets more than about 30m of line off you, you're probably going to get busted off anyway). And big yellowfin are a pretty rare capture off the stones these days.

If you're serious about it, get a lever drag like a Shimano TLD 30 or better still, a metal frame reel like a Shimano Tyrnos... then when you upgrade, start looking at Penn Internationals or Shimano Tiagras.

Cheers, Slinky

[michaelchen]

thats fine for kings

where are you going to be catching yellowfin off the rocks ??

cant even catch the things offshore at the moment

I heard jervis bay is a good place. It is for next summer anyhow =]

G'day lbN,

I'm not a land based game fisho but I can give you a bit of a heads up on reels. Any reel can catch any fish... potentially... If you want a reel made for the job I'd suggest a different reel but if it's a real bargain and that's all you want to spend it's not a problem and is a pretty good reel. It just has a couple of shortcomings for the purpose.

The first is the level-wind. Level-winds are a problem on reels designed for high pressure fishing. When your line gets out of sync with the line guide (e.g. the line guide might be on the left of the spool while the line is coming off the right side of the spool), it puts a lot of pressure on the whole mechanism. With a fish on, it's easy for the level-wind to fail or be damaged.

The gears in the GTi series also aren't as robust as in say a Penn 113, which is about the same sort of size.

But they're well made, have a good carbon drag system, are simple and easy to fix or get parts for if you need to. For kings the line capacity won't be a problem (if any king gets more than about 30m of line off you, you're probably going to get busted off anyway). And big yellowfin are a pretty rare capture off the stones these days.

If you're serious about it, get a lever drag like a Shimano TLD 30 or better still, a metal frame reel like a Shimano Tyrnos... then when you upgrade, start looking at Penn Internationals or Shimano Tiagras.

Cheers, Slinky

Thanks for the input. I just want to get something cheap to build experience at the moment. I do like the internationals VSW50 i think dont want to buy it now because i dont know how to handle it properly. i read on forums that you can take the guide off too. i was thinking using the guide first, then when im better at it ill take the guide off.

by the way, what line class should i use to catch fish off the rocks? 30lb, 50lb or 100lb? should i use mono or braid? what brands are good mono and what are good braid brands?

Thank you in advance