Being an american manufacturer I am big on buying American made products.. Does anyone know if there are any reels suitable for salmon and steelhead made in America?? not fly reels!

dont know if they still are but Penn used to be made in USA...

not the best for steelhead though

went to their website to check them out... Looks like they are still made in the US.

Check out this bad a$$ looking Salmon reel. Anyone use this reel? how about some feedback.

The mag series are usually found in the hands of surf casters. I've heard that they cast a mile.

For steelhead and salmon, however, the Penn's International series baitcasters are also made in the US. Bit pricey however!

Pflueger.

Penn

Some of those Penn's are real long distance surf casters. Hattaras Outfitters http://www.hatterasoutfitters.com/index1.html
sells them "tuned" for distance casting. They also sell "tuned" Abu's for distance casting.

"Made in the USA" really only has to be assembled in the USA. The parts can be made anywhere.

Jigman,
Is Plueger now American made? last I had heard they went to Japan and quality went down the tube.

Hope its true. I have quite a few old Medalist that are the US models... there are no better knuckle busters out there!

Yes, they are made in America. And the Trion is very good.

Sorry, BW, but Pflueger reels are outsourced. They are made in Korea, Taiwan or China (depends upon the reel) while the company itself is American..it's part of the K2 company. Shakespeare/Pflueger just bought their own company in China, in fact.

The reel foot on one of my Trions says Korea.

But you're right, they are pretty good reels.

http://www.pfluegerfishing.com/about.html

Check out what they say. If that is not true, Oh well.

Piper,

If the manufacturing went to Japan, the quality would go up, not down. Name one Japanese made reel that's not of the highest quality. Most of Shimano, Daiwa, Garcia, etc. used to be made in Japan ten years ago, but unfortunately it's no longer the case. Those now made in Japan are the top-quallity reels usually costing upwards of $100.

I just ordered a couple of $115 Daiwa reels, thinking that they were made in Japan. Alas, they're made in Thailand. I just hope that it was designed in Japan. The reason that I like things that are made in Japan is that they have an abundance of engineers. The last I've heard that they have the same number of engineers as we do here in the US, although their population is only half of ours.

A friend of mine who's in semiconductors industry told me that he was shocked that his counterpart engineers in Japan work in teams of several dozens on a chip project while his team consists of less than a dozen to design basically the same stuff.

I was only talking about Pflueger and I guess I generalized a little when I said japan. I should have said asia.

It is a known fact that the American made Pfluegers were superior to the Shakespere Pfluegers. I have one of each in the 1494 1/2 series and you can easily see the difference.

It could be that the Asians are not accustomed to producing uncomplicated, over simplified reels like the phluegers were... I don't know, Maybe the parts were to big or something.