product review/question

[Joe]

Van Staal has a following among the best surfcasters that is hard to argue with.

The guys who fish Penn and can break them down and fix what needs fixing with their eyes closed (like Paul I, and several other regulars here) for them its a good reel.

But the guys who fish them because they are all they can afford without those maintainance skills, they are usually fishing a reel that is in a bad state. Penns are known as tanks; but they are also known for grinding, siezing, uneven drag, terrible anti-reverse, bail slamming on the cast, bailsprings breaking, etc.

Sooner or later, those problems come back to haunt people who can't circumvent them on the tool bench.

[piemma]

I spent 30+ years fishing Penn 704/706s. As Joe said, if you take care of Penns they will last you forever. Clean the washers. Convert the 704s to manual pickup so you don't have bail spring problems and asways have spare dog spring on hand.
My wife and kids bought me a VS 250 2 years ago and I wouldn't trade it for anything. The Penns are now backups.

[wheresmy50]

My first surf fishing reel was an Okuma Epixor. It lasted about 2 months of fishing (wading) 2-4 days a week. After that I switched to Shimano and never had another failure.

Before if failed completely, I had problems with the bail closing and the baitrunner feature not working properly.

I had fished all my life but never in saltwater, and the B&T owner really pushed the Okuma. I don't know if they have a high margin, or if he really thought it was a good reel. Most of his other recommendations turned out to be sound.