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Baitcaster

28 (45.2%)

Centerpin

34 (54.8%)

Total Members Voted: 60

[THE_ROE_SLINGER]

Recently on the river I noticed way more people fishing CPs! I remember when i started fishing a pin 5 years ago their were hardly any!

[dennisK]

Recently on the river I noticed way more people fishing CPs! I remember when i started fishing a pin 5 years ago their were hardly any!

I blame paris hilton, her dog (tinkerbell) and the internet.

Damn poseurs.

Real men fish with baitcasters.

Flame away.

[mastercaster]

If you grew up as a kid fishing with fisherman who fished in the forties, fifties, or the sixties you really had no choice to fish anything but pins, usually silexes in my dad's circle of friends.  Your only other choice was spinning reels (my dad called them coffee grinders)....he wouldn't allow one in the house. When I fished the Thompson as a kid I'd see the odd guy, who were always Americans fishing with a phleuger(Sp.?), a bait casting type of reel. 

So long story short... I started off with a seldex when I was a wee todler and got my first silex, a suberba, for Christmas when I was nine and it's still my go to reel....never once has it needed a repair.  I do own baitcasters for the women in my life (daughter, wife) because they are so easy to learn to cast on and they don't fish the rivers enough to want to learn to use a CP.  I think the use of CP's has increased a lot because of websites like these.

[coryandtrevor]

What are the main advantages/disadvantages of both types ?

From what Ive read, baitcasters are good for river and stillwater as bass fishermen and other Yanks use them for all kinds of fishing.


Center pin seems like a river thing mainly and is not mentioned very often when others describe what reels they use. They are far simpler in design and have been around longer I assume.

Centerpins arent cheap either ! You can grab ultra cheap baitcasters starting at 25 bones but I am hard pressed to find a CP's in that range. Most CP's are like works of art and seem to be a precision tools almost surgical in some cases.

Most pros on this site use CP's and you know what people do  - Emulate the pros ! -

just like all those beer leauge hockey leauge suckers who spend more on 1 peice graphite sticks in one season than the team fees they pay. ( then I slash them to peices and they start crying  )

 

[Fish Assassin]

More moving parts=more maintenance

[Sterling C]

In my eyes fishing a centerpin is like a right of passage.

Maybe one day I will get one, but for now I do not feel as though I have earned the right to fish one.

[mastercaster]

In my eyes fishing a centerpin is like a right of passage.

Maybe one day I will get one, but for now I do not feel as though I have earned the right to fish one.

I know what you are saying but anyone who fishes as much as you do, ties their own flies and jigs, catches lots of fish, knows about the life cycle and science of fish, etc. (all things I've learned about you from reading posts on this site) has earned that right!

It's not like you're going to flounder out there on the river like the guy who has a gazillion dollars whose goes snow plowing down the bunny hill in his $5 grand worth of ski gear...now that guy hasn't earned the right!

[~IvAn~]

Recently on the river I noticed way more people fishing CPs! I remember when i started fishing a pin 5 years ago their were hardly any!

I blame paris hilton, her dog (tinkerbell) and the internet.

Damn poseurs.

Real men fish with baitcasters.

Flame away.

That's Hot!

[firstlight]

I like using both.
Sometimes you feel like a nut and sometimes you are one.

[CohoMan]

I changed over to the pin last year eventhough I had one for many years. I can say that I will never go back to the baitcaster again. The fight is just plain amazing. You control the drag totally with your palm.

I will still fish with a baitcaster when I am on the Fraser.

[Geff_t]

I have always used a bait caster but have just picked up my first pin. Just waiting for it to come in. I can not wait to try it out.

[kingpin]

Centerpins are a fad. people are getting them now before even becoming close to mastering a baitcaster... its all to look stylish and grab attention. That being said ive been using one for over 8 years... and there was definetly less people using them and more pride in fishing one. Everyone and there dog has a pin...
Spey fishing is becoming crazy too.. the next fad?

[bentrod]

coryandtrevor,
you know stick slashing is now a penalty.  If it results in my broken Easton Stealth, I'll be going to the box also for a 5 minute major. 
As far as the cp/bc thing goes, I find the bc more versatile.  I can float fish, fish cranks, spoons, spinners, jigs.  I know you can do that on a cp, but try burning a buzz bait or fishing spinners or spoons w/o a float and current.  If I'm going to resort to a cp, I'll just get my spey rod and fly fish.  Just my 2 C. 

[Steelhawk]

I used both too. I have 2 center pins - a Silex and a J.W.Young Purist. The Silex being heavier duty, I use it for springs and also close shore casting. The Purist I used it with a customed Loomis 1261, a light action rod. This is a very light set up and I use it mainly lower river fishing where I have a lot more room to play a fish w/o over stressing the lighter set up. I also have a bait caster Shimano Calcutta that I use now a lot of time for very accurate long casting - very important in fishing mid-river pocket water behind boulders. With the bc, I can accurately and effortlessly cast across the river with the more accurate overhead cast, and land at just a small pocket water behind a boulder, a riffle, or log jam on the other side of a wide river. This way as I move along testing pockets, I am covering both sides of the river.  I can do that with the cp too, but you have to do side casting  for longer distance casts and so not as accurate and trees or bushes can limit your side casts too. As the years go by, I also find the cp quite a tiring task to retrieve from those long cross-river casts, as cp only works on a 1:1 ratio whereas the Shimano bc is 6:1 and therefore you can make a lot more long casts in a day w/o tiring as much. The more casts you can do in a day, the more chance of a hook up. However, the cp is definitely much more superior in fight quailty than a bc, no comparison there. Nothing beats the experience of using your own control on the drag than depending on a mechanical system. So there are merits in both types of reels. Tough choices there. So make your pick .     My humble 2 cents.

[kingpin]

coryandtrevor,
you know stick slashing is now a penalty.  If it results in my broken Easton Stealth, I'll be going to the box also for a 5 minute major. 

haha Id be pissed if someone did that to me.. my brohter broke 6 one year.. never got in a fight though..but then again hes crazy so most people tend to avoid it.
my last year midget the dman was slashing the back of my legs in front of the net so i stomped his stick with my skate and broke it..lol

back to the topic though... baitcaster IS more versatile in the sense you can float fish then switch to spoons and such but the natural drift with centerpin cant be beat and if im going to toss spoons ill be doing it all day anyways so a spinning reel is fine..