ANYONE HAVE A TICA REEL,SAW THEM MENTIONED SOME GOOD AND SOME BAD RESPONSES.THEY LOOK LIKE THEY HAVE SEVERAL MODELS,13 BALL BEARINGS,GOOD LINE CAPACITY AND IN THE $70-$80 PRICE RANGE.

Hesh - I'm up in the air. I saw a Tica Pices conventional, looking extremely similar to a Calcutta 400 and was seriously underwhelmed by it's quality. I did not like it. OTH, Don @ Weekapaug showed me a Tica Camry which looked and felt 95% of my Shimano Stradic - very smooth...

Something like Tica builds many Shimano reels or some cross-polination between the two companies... Ask Don, he'll know better...

HESH2:
Last year we sold the Tica series for the first time. Was a bit up in the air until the end of the season...John did see the Camry (made in China) and is the sister to to the Stradic( about 115.00) for $79.00. The top of the line is the Tica Tauras( 230.00 to 245.00), sister of the Shimano Stellaq(645.00). Found out that the Tica company actually makes the Shimano reels or the parts, not sure which.

As a mater of fact I just finished doing a winter cleaning on a tauras for a customer, who BTW fishes extremely hard and is very hard on equipment. I was impressed on how the reel held up to this masher.

Problem was delivery of these reels. When I went to a distributor show in November the rep claimed there would not be this problem this coming year.

The other reel I was impressed with was their 7 ball bearing SPORTERA SR Series Baitrunner model for about 100 bucks.

Here is a link to their site: http://www.ticaglobal.com/ and a picture of the Baitrunner model

..Call me ol' fashioned but.....I like to stick to whats' proven....ie: Penn, Abu..Diawa...etc.

...I'd hate to be a guinea pig for a new line of reels...when that 46 # er is tuggin on the other end of my line!!! ;) :D

...I'm not knockin em' ....I'm just giving my 17 cents :D

when a reel dealer tells me that their " just like " blah blah blah...it scares me away.

let me take you on a trip, I like Nike footwear, I find them extremely comfortable. If I saw a shoe that was made to look like a Nike...but was cheaper in price, I would second guess it, thinking that they copied it to be cheaper. I don't mind paying for quality.

..my point is that they look like the "Baitrunner" series..and I know it was stated above that maybe Shimano makes them/ or their parts......but, I'll stick to whats proven!! :)

...and Don, your not the reel dealer I was quoting...and Don, thanks for the donations to the site...and Don, did I hear you were donating a Tica for the next pluggage contest :D :D :eek: ...and Don, I'll shut up now :D

[QUOTE]Originally posted by bloocrab
[B]my point is that they look like the "Baitrunner" series..and I know it was stated above that maybe Shimano makes them/ or their parts......but, I'll stick to whats proven!! :)

Bloo:
You got it backwards...it's Tica that makes Shimano.

So I guess if someone owns a Shimano, they are already guinea pigs of sorts.

....of course you'd know this better than me....but didn't the " BaitRunner " come out before the " TICA " ????....

...I thought it did ??...I've been out of the reel " loop " for awhile...but I would have sworn the BaitRunner was first..?? so which came first ?.....I'll take your word for it.


.....I guess a better example would be Sony and Sanyo... the same or different ? which would you prefer ?....

Maybe Tica OEM's reels for Shimano?

Kinda like when Audi used to build Porsche's designs - everyone remembers the 924, right :smash:

I will say that the Tica Camry (like the Stradic4000) at Don's shop was pretty nice but the Pices I did try out did not feel as smooth or as well pput together as the Calcutta 400 that it's similar too. I'll need to take another look though...

Perhaps if you flip a reel over and it says "Made in Japan", Shimano puts it together and if it says "Made in China" it's a Tica?

I'll need to check out my Stradic...

I think what you'll find is, Tica indeed was an OEM manufacturer for Shimano. From what I've been told over my internet life, many Shimanos that were sold on the Asian mainland were actually built by OEM manufacturers--including Tica---in China, Maylasia and other East Asian countries. Guys were saying for years that you could pick up "Asian Market" Calcuttas and Sustains in places like Hong Kong and Singapore for a fraction of their US retail. Shimano apparently made only their top-line reels for the domestic japanese and western markets in Japan. Labor costs in China and Maylasia aren't nearly as high as those in Japan.

The gears were mis-aligned in the first Taurus 6000 I got from SOL. Tim swapped the reel body for a new 5000 body he had (the reels are identical except for the larger spool on the 6000) and sent the original back to Tica-USA for a replacement. The new reel body has been fine

I have The Tica taurus, Im a pig. I catch loads of fish. I kill gear. I killed how many rods this year 8 lamie's
Blew up a bunch of penn reels.. Killed my sand sled and ate a babys arm holding an apple....
The first night for the taurrus It took bass to 32 pounds and a bunch up to 30.... If You take care of it.It will be ok...
I didnt water proof the reel like I do to the others(pack grease in the side plates andfront and reer covers rotator cup ect......)
The drag Is pissa and the reel is smooth, The only thing is the weirgt of the reel and the gay gold parts.......
I tore My shimano sustain 6000FB down.....
I beat the hell out of that reel and I aint kiddin. I took a few thousand fish on this reel and thats no exaggeration.......
I almost Puked a lung when I seen the felt drag washers in this reel... It is soo smooth its a nice reel mated to 14 fire line and I give it a :smash: Hamma time 4 star rating.......
I would buy another one.......(it has Gay gold plates to But im trying to rott them Like Slip on a jig......)
The trick to thes reels is packing them with grease I use super lube..Its kinda cool when You tear the reel down and Ya turned the grease black:D
I have a pile of penns I break I meen use to:laughs:
My 2 bits........
Oh Yeah Here is the first night on the taurus