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Wellstone
From Japan comes this high quality reel for both saltwater and fresh. I kept reading excellent reports of this reel on various internet bulletin boards so I decided to order one for my own use. What I received was a reel that was beautifully crafted and very strong for its weight. Unlike many other reels I've seen from Japan, this is not an exact replica of someone else's reel. Though almost all saltwater reels share many features, this is an original design. The freshwater models are simply smaller and simpler versions of the large arbor variation of the saltwater reel. Anodizing comes in black, gold, blue, silver and a very unique camoflage. Perhaps the single biggest advantage of the Wellstone is the quality to cost factor. This is a way to acquire an extremely well designed and manufactured reel at a terrific price without having to resort to something made in the third world. I have found Noboru Ishii, the reel's designer, to be very knowledgeable and extremely excited about having his reels available in the United States. The freshwater models are available in large arbor only, whereas the saltwater models have both full arbor and large arbor models. The spools are interchangeable between frames of the same size. The drag is a massive piece of cork and the clutch is a one-way needle bearing. It features rim control and is easily converted from RH to LH retrieve. They all have an outgoing click, but are silent when retrieving line. I will initially be stocking these in the blue anodizing. Noboru mentioned that this is, by far, the most popular color at this point. Other colors would be available with a brief waiting period. The new for 2010, the DH reels (for double-handed rods) are actually quite capable of handling many types of fresh and saltwater fishing. I've caught several false albacore on mine already using a single-handed rod. Its drag consists of several small discs of teflon and requires a fraction of the amount of maintenance that cork requires. One doesn't get quite the same amount of top-end drag, but other than that there are no disadvantages of this material. The only color available is black, at least for now, and the backplates are ported as it is intended primarily for freshwater use, and there is no cork to contaminate. The photos will be up soon!
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