a friend of mine recently gave me a nice lami blank. when i took it over to my rod maker and told him i wanted to set it for braid, he said no problem.
i use the older penns. 550s and 6500 ss. when i told him i was going to use these reels on the new rod i was informed that their were some problems using braid on these reels. i tried braid about 4 years age, too many problems and went back to ande back country, which i never had a problem with.
my question is, has anyone ever had a problem using the older penns with a braid setup???

1. Must close bail by hand... not by cranking
2. Must not overfill spool
3. I'd stick with original fused Fireline (20 or 30lb) and stay away from Power Pro, etc. It's stiffer, thicker and behaves a little better / more like mono
4. If you fish pencils a lot, it takes some extra care to have the line go on the spool with some tension so there are no really loose winds that might cause a wind knot.

YES!

5. Glance at the top of the spool frequently to make sure there is no loop over the top of the spool.

There's a guy who fishes at the end of the B-way, uses Rangers only and uses a 650SS. He wears a glove on his right hand and retrieves his plug while keeping the line running through his thumb and 1st finger. I think the reel is loaded with Power Pro. Not sure his technique is necessary, but that all he does, watched him for a few years and he does not get knots.

I use 7500 and 8500 with PP slick and Suffix 832 and never had a problem in over 100 nights last year

I was introduced to and began regularly using braided line about 7 or 8 years ago. Back then i was using a Penn 6500SS, and the advantages of the Power-Pro braided line were immediately apparent--- until the dreaded birdnest struck, and it seemed like one after another occurred! I noticed that the line wold wind on unevenly, forming a conical profile with the widest portion at the top of the spool. One look would tell you this wasn't a good thing. I then learned that stacking nylon washers under the spool would change the line's profile and even it out. As if that wasn't enough, the bail would periodically trip during a cast, causing me to lose my pricey wooden plug. Not to be defeated, I removed the bail-wire arm (the one without the line roller) and placed a small nylon washer between it and the rotor. This simple mod prevented the bail from ever flipping again. Problem solved! As i discovered soon after, an over-full spool was more apt to tangle, but the problem would usually solve itself. Now i use different reels which seem to handle braid much better, but i also switched to Daiwa Samurai Braid about 4 years ago. This line is incredible. Thinner, rounder, smoother and much more supple than Power-Pro (even the Slick-8).

Closing the bail by hand is a good idea. Some of the old penn's line rollers don't like braid from what I hear. I use fireline on my old 704z. That works fine and I've strayed away from trying other types of braid on old penns from just what people say. I have, although, seen many people fish power pro on older penns with no issues. I personally don't like power pro and switched to cortland master braid a couple years ago. Love the stuff, will never look back. But if you have trouble with regular braid, try the fused 20 or 30# firleine.

Have a 10 year old 6500ss that was a real pain with PP super slick. I'm not the smoothest operator and its certainly doable but requires too much focus to be worth it for me.
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Use fireline 20lb and your transition will be fine.
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It pains me to say this, but from my own personal experience(s)...the fault most often falls upon the fisherman.

When first experimenting with Braid many many moons ago...I quickly learned that I was going to have to reteach myself in the way I retrieved my line. That applies to all types of fishing and retrieving methods REGARDLESS of lure and regardless of how I wanted to present that lure to the fish.

In regards to the "too much focus" comment made earlier, YES..it will require focus, but that goes away once you've permanently adjusted your retrieve techniques when fishing braid. It becomes second nature. If someone has honestly given it their best shot and continues to have issues, braid just may NOT be for them.
(*Rule #1 - which has been posted many times before in this and other threads, you CANNOT over-fill your spool. Everyone has their own idea of what "over-fill" is though..so this too will vary).

This past season I was fishing side-by-side with another angler. We were both fishing braid, coincidentally the same mfg, denier and color. However, the other angler was continuously getting bird-nested. He was complaining out loud in what appeared to be a call of help. As I slowly moved in his direction he began asking questions. He too had noted that I was using braid and was not having any issues. We discussed the possibility that it could be our gear as they appeared to be on different sides of the tackle spectrum. While I did not rule that out, I tried explaining how I felt that the method of "retrieve" was THEE most important aspect of fishing with braid (2nd to overspooling). He was faulting the reel as being the problem. In my attempt at helping this gentleman, he asked if he could attach my reel to his rod. I obliged and let him have at it...within a few casts, my reel was a ball of junk...I quickly grabbed his set-up and was able to save it (I have a love for undoing knots, for some reason God gave me patience for it...not so much in other avenues of life, but for knots, yes...go figure!)
Ok, so now he's starting to think it's his rod...we then attach his reel to my rod and he has at it.....:wall:.
Eventually all gear is back where it belongs and I simply suggest that we switch entire set-ups and give that a shot for awhile. Needless to say, I never got a wind-knot nor a birds-nest while using his rod. On the other hand, I was going to have to respool my rod when I got back home because I wasn't able to correct all the issues created while he was using it.

This proved to ME, that aside from over-filling your reel, your method of retrieve falls into 2nd place when experiencing birds-nests along with most wind-knots. Constant pressure needs to be applied when retrieving braided line. I'm not suggesting squeezing the line between your fingers pressure, but some pressure needs to be applied. It's not rocket-science, but it does require some. Depending on wind speed and direction, sometimes a finger squeeze is necessary when retrieving that large bow created by the strong wind when it took it a mile to the left or right....sometimes you can't just simply "pick up that slack", you have to pinch it. At least that's what I've learned through my own personal experiences.

Here goes a self-ginx for 2013, but I have NOT had a braided-birdsnest in many years, even wind-knots are very FAR AND FEW for me....I better brushen up on my knot-breaking abilities now..:jump1:

I use nothing but sufix and use it on many very old Penns that are not braid ready. The only problem is you have to use a backer with braid or it slips.

Fireline works great on my 704

Iv found that a bail less reel will help as well, convert the penns if you haven't already.
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Eddie:

Why not just stick with the Ande Backcountry if you had no problems with it ?

I use both braid and mono depending on my set up, but in many cases I still prefer mono for a bunch of reasons. It depends on you style and type of fishing and your set up. At the end of the day, you should probably go with what works best for you with the least amount of problems.

I should probably add, that fireline is my personal choice of braid / super lines

1. Must close bail by hand... not by cranking
2. Must not overfill spool
3. I'd stick with original fused Fireline (20 or 30lb) and stay away from Power Pro, etc. It's stiffer, thicker and behaves a little better / more like mono
4. If you fish pencils a lot, it takes some extra care to have the line go on the spool with some tension so there are no really loose winds that might cause a wind knot.



5. Glance at the top of the spool frequently to make sure there is no loop over the top of the spool.

There's a guy who fishes at the end of the B-way, uses Rangers only and uses a 650SS. He wears a glove on his right hand and retrieves his plug while keeping the line running through his thumb and 1st finger. I think the reel is loaded with Power Pro. Not sure his technique is necessary, but that all he does, watched him for a few years and he does not get knots.

I should add that after a very short time of practicing all these little does and don'ts, they become automatic and require no thought or effort. It's simply second nature... no big deal.

Although I do agree that Fireline is a more forgiving product, I still find that PowerPro outperforms it.

Fireline has more of a "break-in" period where-as PowerPro is ready to go after getting it wet a couple of times...Fireline remains stiff for a couple of outings

Fireline also gets that frayed-furry appearance as it ages which may also affect it's ability to get you the most distance (every bit of resistance matters, especially with the lighter lures). That furriness must also affect it's strength, it imagine it must be broken strands???

Call me crazy, but I also found that it lit up the bioluminescence more than PowerPro did :confused: ...that being said, it's more probable that there just happened to be more light-brite in the water on that night.

PowerPro required more of a learning curve for me than did Fireline, again..Fireline is/was more forgiving to windknots/birdnests.

In the beginning, PowerPro had MANY issues with "phantom breaks". I did some investigating and found that some spools had what appeared to be compressed or pinched spots (best way I can describe it). I believe these were the causes of my "phantom breaks". I did not have any cracked or fractured guides and I had it happen with brand new spoolings of line. I haven't seen this issue in quite a few years now, so I believe the problems been corrected.

Just my 2cents of experience...

thanks for all the advice so far.
the only reason i also want a braid reel, there are 2 or 3 spots that i fish that the extra 30+ ft. will give me a nice advantage.........

If you like the Penns, maybe it's time to try one of the new Spinfisher V's?