Wishlist - first conventional setup

[trowpa]

Ok - when the "hobby kitty" starts to build up some more and/or my wife asks me what I want for my birthday (comming end of august ) or Christmas, I'd like get a conventional setup.

Never casted a conventional before - only used them off shore for trolling or bottom fishing. But I'd like to learn and have that be my "heavy" or 8nBait Plus more setup (up to and including casting for sharks, but still useable for stripers and bluefish)

So...I was thinking of the Diawa 40shv (I like the idea of a loud clicker and it seems to have a good reputation). This a good size?

Matching that up to either an OM heavy 12foot(heard good things about this and it is rated up to 10oz), a regular old taco 12' or a taco dolphin 12' (If the regular tica prices move up, it might be worth the 10 extra bucks or so to upgrade to the dolphin?) Do all these rods through up to 10oz ok?

Do the above suggestions sound ok for a learning setup?

[igormothra]

I learned with the Garcia 7000 and a 12' Tica(actually started practicing with a 6'6" Garcia rod down at Stinky beach) Just takes time and patience..... and alot of self control(to keep yourself from chucking the whole mess in the drink after your 1000 blow up) the clickers on my penn 545(which is a b$%^& to cast) and my Garcia are rather soft. The 525 Mag is loud but limited line capacity unless you use braid(which will scorch your thumb if you are not careful) All of them have thrown 8 and a head fairly well, while mounted on the 12' Ticas. Looking to step up to a better reel when I find the resources to have a rod built.

[Coop]

Steve, I think you are making the right move when considering throwing 8+ and bait with conventional.

I would recomend getting the diawa 30,,,the 40 is just as good, but its a big boy, to big for my hands but may fit you ok,,,but being new to conventional, you may be better off with the smaller one,,,with the brakes installed, the 30 is very tame (only takes a couple minutes to install the brakes),,,I have yet had a blow up but have yet pushed the limit of the reel, which I plan on doing here shortly.

For a rod, I would recomend the om12,,,this is a true heaver in that it can handle 8+ bait very well,,,I own the ticas and they are rated to 10 and have thrown 10, but I wouldnt consider this rod a heaver, 10 and bait is really going over the limits for that rod,,,I have never thrown the om12, but have heard its a beast of a rod and for the money, it sounds like a great price for a true heaver,,,heard it can throw 10+ bait without any problems,,,I would recomend not undergunning yourself and go with the om12.

My experience with other reels are limited, except for the 525mag and 535gs,,,the 525mag is a very good reel but may be to fast for ya but with extra mags and the setting set to slow, I think a beginner can master this reel in quick order,,,I own three and love them, the only problem is the clicker is weak and line capacity is limited if spooling up with 20lb line,,,I use 17lb suffix and can get about 250 on the reel, which I think is enough but still wish I had more,,,535gs, forget it,,,this was my first conventional and almost threw it in the trash,,,an animal for a first timer.

I am sure there are many other reels that are good choices that I just am not familiar with but I would give a thumbs up for the 30 and OM12, or even the 525mag,,,30 being my first choice.

A diawa 30 and om12 is a great heaver combo and can be had for maybe around 250.

[trowpa]

Thanks for the info Oliver and Scott. I'll put the 30 and 40 in my hands and see which feels right. Only reason I was leaning toward the 40 was to give line capacity - 30shv would get 300yds of 20lb test..less then my 8500ss spinning reel...

tough to really know if its too big when you're starting i guess and you say the 30 is more "Tame" plus i'm guessing my hands are smaller than yours, scott (i'm 5'6" at best).

[igormothra]

If you want to borrow my 6'6" Garcia rod for some light practice I would be more than willing to loan it to you for a little while.

[trowpa]

Thanks for the offer Oliver - first i'll need a reel though Once I get it I'll let you know... If I'm lucky - it'll be the end of the month...but it may not be until Christmas :(

If it get it Christmas - I'll be casting in the snow - you can bet that!

[Charkbait]

#1 tip from me

I stopped using conventional because of blowups (initially bass fishing throwing small lures). Once I switched to braid my life changed. Because of the low memory I think it is 100% easier to toss, I rarely have a problem now. I will be putting braid on my heaver this fall without a doubt.

Question for Oliver,

Do you run a shock on your braid? If I'm running 40-50 lb braid do I need it just for the stretch and that it won't cut in to the spool under load?

[flame thrower]

Shock leader is somewhat of a misunderstood term. There is several reason we add heavier line on top of the smaller line.
1. Heavier line is thicker and easier to grab to beach bigger fish.
2. It is some what more abrasion resistant
3. It allows us to throw more weight. But the term shock leader is not correct it should be a load enabler. The Heavier leader allows you to throw more weight. We are by no means relying on the stretch to compensate for the increased weight. Simply put line with a higher breaking strength allows us to increase our payload. Thus, what is better Braid or Mono question arises. To me it’s a personal preference. Braid is thinner and will give you very small knots but will cut your hand trying to land a big fish or when throwing heavy loads or a Spinner that the drag has not been locked down. It also loads the rod quicker because it does not stretch with the initial velocity increase of the rod. If you have bad form this will add to you casting troubles.

I use Mono to Mono on my conventional and Braid to Braid on my spinning gear. I don’t know if I will ever use Braid on by conventional rigs as a main line because when I blow one up it’s usually a get the razor blade out and cut it off. That would hurt with 40 or 50 dollars of braid on the reel.

[Charkbait]

Originally Posted by flame thrower

I use Mono to Mono on my conventional and Braid to Braid on my spinning gear. I don’t know if I will ever use Braid on by conventional rigs as a main line because when I blow one up it’s usually a get the razor blade out and cut it off. That would hurt with 40 or 50 dollars of braid on the reel.

That 40-50 will help you become a better caster pretty quickly

It may be that the heavy weight helps to limit the impact of the mono memory. I only throw 1-2oz and under now on my small bait rods so maybe that's why I experienced the memory problem.

[Dave]

I have had some problems with braid on conventionals, It blows up more then mono, I am guessing because the braid doesn't stretch and just pulls tight on the reel, I like braid just hate the expensive blow ups, I still plan on using braid again, I just dont have any blow ups with mono.

[Charkbait]

ok forget what I said unless you have trouble with mono, sounds like my experience is an anomaly.

[igormothra]

anyone who knows me knows that I use braid almost exclusively. When I am casting in the surf I put a 12-15' length of 50# mono, tied with a double uni, to the end of my braid: my reason is that under the stress of throwing heavy weight I have found that the braid saws right through the fish finder rig, and I was getting real tired of replacing 3-5 dollar weights. I am not sure of any other benifits to adding that mono, I just know that I don't lose wieghts anymore because the fish finder got cut. As far as blow ups go.... they still happen but the more I practice the better I get with it. That is kind of the reason I try to set up all my rods while down at AI I like to practice casting with each reel as much as I can.

[esoxangler]

I have the new 40shv with the om 12 heaver. It feels like you could throw a truck with that thing! No problem throwing 8 ounces and half a bunker!!!! It is a big stick, if your new to conventionals you might want to try the 30 with a smaller rod. I am still getting the hang of it but I finally have a combo that I can throw HEAVY loads with. And I can throw it a fair distance also. Plenty far enough to get into some big stripers.

[trowpa]

Phil cool - sounds like you're happy with the setup. For the rod, yes that's what I'm looking for - I feel like with my current rods, i have to baby them with 8 oz - lobbing them mostly. As for the reel - yeah I have to decide between 30 and 40. I want to be able to learn, but I don't want to limit my capacity....

So once I pick the size (30,40,50) - what about the other variations - Can someone educate me on the different flavors of the Sealine series? (SHV versus HV versus HA, etc) All these different flavors - which is best????

[mdram]

ive been contemplating the same thing. here are some questions i am trying to answer.
the reels all apear to be the same height, but diff widths. is this true?
does weght of a reel matter that much? your not really casting it alot compared to lure fishing.