Waterworks/Lamson Reels

Good Day to you all.

I'm a recent registrant to the FAOL bulletin and it's taken me a good few days to read through the many recent forum submissions on the BB. It's a great forum and I'm happy to say that I have already gained valuable information from all your comments, and wondered if I could possibly tap your brains on a specific problem I am having.

Firstly, I am from Capetown, South Africa and our best trout fishing in the region is small freestone streams for wild spawn trout. Trout are not indigenous to South Africa and they were introduced roughly about 100 years ago and have taken relatively well to many of our streams. The trout in our local streams do not grow very large and a fish of 14-16 inches is regarded as a good sized fish (but over 20inchers have been caught), with most fish caught being closer to 10-12 inches. As you might well gather, the small sizes of these fish combined with the small size of our freestone streams makes lightweight setups the perfect rig to fish with. Anything 3wt and lower is the norm.

I am currently looking for a repleacement reel for my 1wt and 2wt setups and have been eyeing the Lamson/Waterworks range of reels, particularly the Litespeed and Velocity ranges because I personally prefer the look of them to the ULA-P series. I just wanted to know if anyone has had experience using these reels on lightweight setups and if they would be well suited? Unfortunately I cannot find a local tackle dealer that stocks them so I cannot have a look at them myself so your input would be greatly valued.

Drag system is not all that important with such small fish except that I'd like to know if the drag makes a clicking sound when line is pulled off. It may seem petty, but in the middle of summer our water levels are low and the fish can spook at the snap of a twig at times. What I am more interested in is lightness and finish (Non reflective finishes are better). I do a bit of underwater photography too so i'd like to get your opinions of which of them looks the best to you as it's always nice to have a good looking reel in the background behind the fish.

If anyone has any other reels they feel would be appropriate for my needs I'd like to hear about them too.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Bastion.

I have the Litespeed 1 on my 4 weight TXL and am really happy with it.If I were setting up another outfit I would not hesitate at getting anther Litespeed.

Hi Bastion,

The sound of the reel's click cannot be heard by the fish under water. The surface of the water acts as a barrier to sound created in the air. Which basically means, you can talk out loud all you want and trout cannot hear you.

My "theory" on the main benefit of "keeping quiet" is that it means you are concentrating on what you are doing. That, in turn, means one is a bit more careful in how they walk, because the bank and the river bed are all one thing, there is no barrier there. Kick a stone into a rock, etc, and that spooks the fish because the vibrations travels through the ground.

Next time you are at a swimming pool, put your head under water. Notice how much less sound there is then when you emerge? Now, add on top the normal "sound" that a river would have as the water tumbles along and you can be pretty sure that a reel click isn't going to be heard. Have a friend tap on the edge of the pool, however, and you will hear that because the sound travels through tiles and gets directly transmitted into the water. The "airborne sound", however, bounces off the water surface and almost all of the energy is reflected back and echos off the water.

In other words, choose the reel that suits your needs best and do not worry about the clicks.

- Jeff

True, If a 16" fish is a big un there I'd get as small and light as I could go.... for the reel.

Thanks everyone,

Jeff, your comments about the clicks makes perfect sense.

hehe - When the only wild trout available to you average between 10 and 12 inches, you'd be amazed at how excited you can get by a 16 incher. They are really feisty and fight dirty! The way we down south like it!

Hi Bastion,
I have a Litespeed 1 that I run a 4wt. line off of and I love it. Very smooth and light. I'm thinking about picking up a 3.5 for steelhead too. The Velocity is a nice reel as well. 10-12 inchers are pretty much the average up this way too, unless you count the steelies.