I was wondering how many of you agree with Bob D'Amico's write-up on the Nautil reels. He goes into great depths about how he thinks.....they're...JUNK!!!

He knocks their water-proof-ability

He knocks their construction, claiming that they're not made to be dis-assembled/serviced

...and much much more.

Those of you who have had them from the beginning, what is your opinion???

B. D'Amico's write-up.>>Nautil 7500 (http://stripersurf.com/nautil_3.html)...after you choose one of the links, scroll to the bottom...and click..."Go back to the article"

I haven't fished with a 7500 yet.

Bloo - my experience is limited to the 6500 Nautil (yellow). I didn't fight many "large" fish on it (say, over 10-15 lbs) - so keep that in mind.

It worked okay! No problems with gear slippage and the such, but the bail had a tendency to stick b/c of salt and grit getting embedded in the protective bail spring grease.

I think they should offer the Nautil in a bail-less model - and poof problem solved. You can do the mod yourself.

For the $$$, you ain't risking much. If the reel does have a fit, just send it in and the folks at Pure Fishing will take care of you (fantastic customer service).

Having said that, I fish mostly Van Staal's now that I acquired a bunch of the newer models.

-WW

I also have the 6500 Pro and I love it. My first time using it caught over 100 fish without a hiccup. To this date I have not had one problem. It has been underwater and pounded by the surf with no lock-ups due to sand and water. I bought another one this year because I liked it so much. That review is so biased and unscientific that I had to laugh after reading it. He only looked at one reel! Who knows where the water marks came from. It would be like asking one person on the street how he/she felt about the war and then assuming that everyone felt the same way.

I have 3 nautils and 2 have worked out very well for the uses I use them for . One is brandy new but it will work too . for the price you cant go wrong and they have great service when its needed . I havent needed it yet !

I made some comments in the thread. All in all, I think the plusses outweight the minuses by far. Haven't had a lick of a problem with either 7500. But there were design flaws in the original 6500. Tim S's best friend Dubs had a brand new, right out of the box 6500 that had every nut tightened before he fished it, and the gears stripped the first night he used it on mid 30" range fish at Pogue Gut. I was there so this is first-hand stuff. My 6500 hasn't had a problem yet. Both Dubs' and mine were (are?) the black GV version.

His main knock on the internals is that the gears are brass---but so are the gears on the old Penn Z's and they're almost bulletproof.

I had problems with the 6500pro with the gears racheting. It was replaced with the yellow nautil by Pure fishing (again great service). I had like the reel so much I bought another yellow for this season, so I have two of them now. I will tell you how it goes at the end of the season. For the money I don't think you can get a better value.

Only buy the yellows, and tighten the 2 screws that hold the reel foot and stem to the body. I had the gears strip on my first one. I emailed Pure Fishing. The sent me a new one overnite. I got it in time for the second trip to Cutty, and they even told me to keep all of the spools.

I have a 6500 (black) Nautil. Last season I took a 43" 26# with no problems at all. I did however have to reprogram myself to manually flip the bail closed after casting so as not to have the braid cross over the top of the spool instead of going around the spool which would cause a break off on the next cast.

I purchased a 7500 (black), this winter to use on my new 10' rod that I built this winter. I did some test casting at the Race this past tuesday. I casted various lures from 1.5 oz to 3 oz with no problems. So hopefully I will have a good season with this reel also.

Tight lines, hopefully soon:) :) :)

I have many fish over 30 lbs on mine including 2 35 lbders. And this is in 5 knot current of the canal with 10-11 lbs of drag pressure, if anyone has trouble with gears stripping then you are winching the reel too much and not pumping the rod enough and winding down. I have had my troubles with the bail snapping shut on occasion but have solved that trouble a bit by rotating the bail up against the stop before I cast so it doesn't gain any momentum as I cast so not to trip the bail. I don't have any trouble with the drag or water entering the reel. The warranty is fine with me for 2 years for the amount of punishment I give the reel and for what I pay for it. The reel hasn't cost me one fish because of any lack of performance, NOT ONE. At $120 a reel divided by 2 years = $60 per year. So if I get 2-3 seasons out of one purchase, that equates to about 40-60 bucks per season and isn't that almost as much as the maintenence on a VS.

So what do you think my opinion of Bob's article is?:laughs: :laughs: The article in very one sided and it is not an accurate reflection of the reel, especially since it wasn't made for us to buy it and just place it in a bucket of water and then taken apart and examined :smash: It was meant to be fished with and used to catch fish.

I don't see anyone doing that to a Shimano Baitrunner, and they supposedly have a waterproof drag also.:smash: :smash:

Are there better reels out there? Sure there are, but to blatently knock everything about the Nautil as an engineer is rediculous. He's just stirring up crap with those words on a page, and who gives a crap about the pictures with some beads of water on reel parts?:bshake: :bshake: :bshake: :yak:

I'll read another couple chapters tomorrow but I do detect an ever so slight tint on it.... :rollem: . From what I have read so far it sounds like it would fall apart right out of the box and therefore should not be considered the fashion statement on the ditch that is... And the ditch ain't like some sandy place with a 3 foot tide, right :D ?

I had the Nautil 6500GV brand new. I got it for kayak fishing because it was waterproof or at least sealed up pretty good. I used the reel 2x and liked how it felt and its weight. The second time out though I had a problem with the gears inside stripping and slipping. I could feel it and hear it.
When I got home and contacted the folks at Pure Fishing they told me that they would send me a Nautil Yellow 6500 in exchange for my 6500gv. Maybe that particular model had some problems in some units and they feel that the Yellow Nautil was a better model. Great customer service and I feel a great reel. Looking forward to receiving my yellow this week.

I had the Nautil 6500GV brand new. I got it for kayak fishing because it was waterproof or at least sealed up pretty good. I used the reel 2x and liked how it felt and its weight. The second time out though I had a problem with the gears inside stripping and slipping. I could feel it and hear it.
When I got home and contacted the folks at Pure Fishing they told me that they would send me a Nautil Yellow 6500 in exchange for my 6500gv. Maybe that particular model had some problems in some units and they feel that the Yellow Nautil was a better model. Great customer service and I feel a great reel. Looking forward to receiving my yellow this week.

Welcome to S-B

Interesting dredge from a few years ago. The black 6500 wore out on me in a year and another shortly after. The Yellow 6500 I've gotten a lot of miles out of - good for what it is, a cheap (compared to other) waterprooof reels.

I have a brand new Natuil 7500 yellow that i will be using at the canal this season. We will see how it holds up hopefully to some big fish.

i have 3) 7500gv pro's ,silver/black,, never a problem with any of them .. Have done 0 maintenance in 5 -6 yrs. other than spray down with wd-40 . I've considered them throw away reels ,but they surprised me ..

I have the 6500 yellow, and the black 7500. Both have held up fine. I do not use them all the time. I have found that Shimano Stadics to be much smoother. I use the 7500 at the canal for jigging, it still works fine. I have been looking at the Diawa Emblem's Pro's for jigging:

I bought a 6500GV when they came out and liked it. I got ~4yrs out of it before it failed. Since then, I've picked up three more 6500's plus a 7500GV for reasonable money. If I can get 3-4yrs/zero maintenance out of the 6500's them I'm happy. The 7500 has caught big enough that if it was going to fail, it would have happened by now.

btw...went for the GV for the fast retrieve vs. the yellow version...

mm

IIRC the yellow reels were far more reliable than the black...

JohnR,
I believe you to be correct. I don't recall ever hearing about a failure on the yellow/non-GV version of these reels.

I saw a black 6500 fail on the second fish ever hooked, when it was brand new out of the box.

Even the yellow reels weren't all that durable if you put them to heavy use. I killed mine pretty quickly once I moved to the Cape and started jigging the Canal 5 nights a week.

Mac and Slip were around the night it crapped the bed for good, on a 43" fish. Somehow I landed the fish after 20 minutes of basically palming the spool because the drag went south.

My two still work fine. Just need to tighten the allen bolts under the yellow cover from time to time.

To recap:

I did end up buying one,...it took over 4.5 years before mine failed.

I can't say I respected it enough with rinsing though, ....I'm happy I made the purchase.


thanks for the replys ~