The only gripe I have with this reel is the weight, but that goes with the size of the reel ru-vid.comUgkxM68VkfsQhHaabDce1IwOCXuvumcpbZ_k . I brought this salmon fishing up in Oswego, NY. I coupled it with a Cabela's Whuppin Stick. I had no problem pulling in a 14lb salmon. I will probably use this for surf fishing this summer and downgrade to a 3500 series Battle II next salmon season to save my wrists. All of the operations are butter smooth and the bail is nice and thick and has a solid flip to it. Everything about this reel is sturdy and strong. The drag system held up to the salmon and was also super smooth. I did use a scale to set the drag properly before going out to the river and this worked out tremendously. A bunch of other guys on the river would hook up and snap almost immediately. Just because you have a good drag system doesn't do anything if you don't set it correctly.
See sigtasa below. My experience with Kasking is very poor. The handle was crap, the spooling bad and the drag came apart and for the life of me I could not get it working properly. I have Vanford HGs (nice but pricy), Pfluegers (Presidents and Supremes) and a few Okumas. All represent a value point and all work. But the KastKing is just crap. I also bought a Kastking rod (with two different speedtops) that was well reviewed. I donated it!
KastKing? Tell me about it.. once i bought it - got in trash after using few times. I don't know maybe i got defective.. Handle was nightmare all the time unscrewing itself while fishing (they tried copy Daiwa construction here, unsuccessfully), fishing line spooling the worst i ever saw in my life.. So uneven I never had any reel on any budget so bad. After many years i learned one thing - want a reel? Buy Daiwa or Shimano. That's it.
Yeah, me too. The handle was crap, the spooling bad and the drag came apart and for the life of me I could not get it working properly. I have Vanford HGs (nice but pricy), Pfluegers (Presidents and Supremes) and a few Okumas. All represent a value point and work. But the KastKing is just crap. I also bought a Kastking rod (with two different speedtops) that was well reviewed. I donated it!
@@michaelknibbs Seems we have something in common. I'm using Vanford C2000S on SUL/UL. I would say it is perfect for this type of fishing. Some anglers here I talked to are using Kastking Kestrel on UltraLight game this season and say these are o.k. But I will wait and see how long it will last. I still think here is no miracles in this world - you get what you pay for.
