10000 FA vs 18000 SW value or not

[Ben Rutkin]

I've been using a mates gear and am just about to sink some funds into a GT rig.
Im pretty sold on the T-Curve GT Special for a good reliable rod for the price, but can't decide whether it's worth an extra $350-$400 to go the 18000SW over the 10000FA which will give me a larger spool and a comparable ratio?  Im definitely going Shimano, but which way to go?  A few lads on these forums are mortgaging their first borns to get an 08 Stella so if anyone can tell me why its $350 better, Im off to the races.

Cheers.

[Mick Cunningham]

   good question .
   can you tell me what are you fishing for and where about will give some
   idea on your fishing need so we all can share with you .

   but this is what i know .

   if you go for the FA10000 but it will be 100g heavy than the SW18000.

   but there is another problem if your fishing with pe10 you will need a
   bigger spool like 16000 / 20000  to hold more line . which it will cost
   you another 200 buck to the FA10000 .

   if your fishing with pe8 or lower it should be fine on 10000 spool .
 
   another good thing on the SW18000 which is the line management system which
   it will cast a lot better . this reel can use 300m of pe10 which you not
   need to buy the spare spool like the FA . so i think this is easy to go so
   another 150buck to the sw is worth it .

   cheer,s mick

[Ben Rutkin]

Im in Cairns.

As stated, the core purpose will be for popping bommies in search of GT.  I want the flexibility to whack the reel on another rod and go jigging in the deep stuff.

I'm not certain what I would spool up with just yet, but I'd be hoping to cover both bases.
Id be stoked if people also discussed what they would consider the best middle ground in terms of line. At the end of the day, Ive never done any jigging and I dont want to learn the hard/expensive way.

The wind here is all but guaranteeing that I will never get to use it, regardless of what I buy.

[Mick Cunningham]

    ahhh i see okay ben .

    okay for cairns cos most of them are up to 25kg but you can use
    stella 8000 with pe5-6 line. also  jigging  with it too . but if you     
    want the stella FA10000 that is fine as you will not need the big spool
    as you might need pe5-8 up there .

    stephen who is a menber in this forum
    he is based in cairns and he go fishing for the GT up there over
    the bommies as he fish,s with pe6 gear / stella 8000 .

    mayeb you should sent him a pm and ask him to go fishing  but he has   
    sold his boat a while ago so i not know if he has a new boat or not .

    hey go and have a good look around in this forum here for carins trip
    as you will see more story on it from stephen .

    cheer,s mick

   

[Stephen Polzin]

Gday Ben,

The new stella's are pretty sweet that's for sure, but the old ones are proven and will still handle the same fish. 

Put it into perspective, nearly all the enormous GT's caught on Nomad and by Okubo (Legend 5 dvd) were caught on a dirty old 10000 Stella.  Yes some of them use bigger spools, but I don't reckon it's necessary in Cairns.  The 10000 was certainly good enough for them before the new version came out. 

There are heaps of GT's around Cairns, but I can't say I've seen one yet over 30kg.  Even if I did I'm pretty confident in my 10000.  Any GT that can spool a 10000 in Cairns will reach a bommie before you reach the spool knot.  I was using an 8000 for ages and it caught plenty.   

You should be able to get a 10000 pretty cheap at the moment too, though may have to look further than the local shops.

Those new ones are nice though, depends how much you want the latest gear. 

cheers,

steve

[Jon Li]

In my opinion , better spend the money on good GT rod rather than new Shimano SW series .

Jon .

[Ben Rutkin]

Ok so Ive decided to pick up a 10000FA on their way out - but what I have noticed is that everyone seems to be buying the 20000 spools and putting on them on the 10000 reel?  Are they identical reels with a different spool sizes?

What is the difference and is it just a question of line capacity?

Cheers lads.

[Jon Li]

Hi Ben ,

10000FA n 20000FA differ in gear ratio , the former is high geared while the latter is low geared , for popping 10000FA is better but if one needs more line capacity , 20000 spool can be used and vise versa .

Jon .

[Ben Rutkin]

Yeah ok, for some reason I considered gear ratio in terms of line retreived and not revolutions of the spool to revoultions of the handle.  Obviously with a larger spool diameter (10000 has a greater diameter with line excluded) you would retrieve more line per spool revolution.  I mistakenly attributed the difference in gear ratio to be a reflection of spool circumference and therefore line retrieved.

In actual fact, the gear ratio and the larger spool diameter will result in significantly more line retrieved in the 10000 than the 20000 on a per handle wind basis. That is assuming the average distance over the number of winds, because once the 20000 was fully spooled it would be the same.

Long story, get one of each so if you need the capacity for jigging then you can just switch spools and rods and you're away?

[Brandon Khoo]

Ben, I wouldn't want to be jigging with a high gear ratio reel. It really comes down to what the primary use of the reel is. If you do about equal part of popping and jigging, I'd get the 20000 rather than a 10000.

If you're prepared to shop around and buy second hand, you'd get a 10000FA and 20000FA for around what you'd pay for a new 18000XG.

[Sachin Chaudhry]

Ben, I reckon Brandon's dispensed about all the relevant help you need here. I have used both a Stella 10k and 20k and his comments on their most suited duties are spot on as is the point about bargain hunting.

[Brandon Khoo]

Ben, on the now superseded FA series, my opinion is that Shimano didn't quite get the spool size right for the 10000. In Japan, you could get a 16000 spool that was a good size for heavy popping but the 10000 spool was just a bit too small. Shimano subsequently released the Yumeya 10000D spool which was a great size for PE8 and useable for PE10. Unfortunately, they were a very expensive aftermarket peice of equipment and are now no longer being made. There is still quite a bit of demand for them though. I know - I regularly get requests to see if I will sell one!

They got it right with the new 18000XG - the spool size on this is perfect.

Ok so Ive decided to pick up a 10000FA on their way out - but what I have noticed is that everyone seems to be buying the 20000 spools and putting on them on the 10000 reel?  Are they identical reels with a different spool sizes?

What is the difference and is it just a question of line capacity?

Cheers lads.

[Jon Li]

Hi guys ,

Fyi , the line capacities of the old SW16000 secondary spool which comes with the previous Stella models SW10000HG n SW20000PG ( JDM ) is identical to that of the new 18000XG albeit without those holes , however these 2 spools aren't readily interchangable even though both have Twin Disk drag system .

My older still STL16000F reel with 16000GT spool ( JDM ) can accomodate 290 m of PE5 , just a tad lower than the capacity of the new SW10000XG and this particular 16000GT spool has smaller diameter lip than the ordinary 16000F spool .

In my opinion , the new Stella SW series is a homologation of the F series and the FA series with JDM contents being made available internationally .

I had a couple of days using Ky Doucet's SW10000XG recently and with me I had my old STL16000F reel with 16000GT spool mounted , I felt there is not much different feel between the 2 reels except probably the SW10000XG feel smoother being new while my STL16000F has been with me since the year 1999 .

Jon .

[Andy Rowe]

Hi Jon,

Interesting comments about the SW10K XG. Did Ky have PE6 loaded on that XG spool? I met him in Singapore briefly we were both buying rods at the same shop.

Do you think the new 10k will be capable of handling the serious repeated abuse of good gt sessions?

Regards
Andy 

[Brandon Khoo]

I don't have any doubt the 10000XG will be every bit as robust as the biggest reels. I'll be using one on my TBL and Coral Viper.