Abu Targets Enthusiasts With Their New MGXtreme! (continued)

This of course, begs the question, just what kind of advantage do these stock bearings provide? Well, in the lab, there are two tests we like to perform to determine the potential liveliness of a reel's spool. The first is a test most everyone performs in the tackle shop when handling a new reel, timing the free spool. The MGXtreme came in at 5 seconds with the spool stopping somewhat abruptly at the end of each spin. This is an average time at best.

Abu has the enthusiasts in mind with this reel. They even use a bearing under the levelwind worm gear instead of a plastic bushing!

The next test we perform is to fill the spool with line we have handy at the moment. In this case it was Daiwa Samurai Braid in 55 pound test. We then break out our collection of split shots, clamp small samples of them to the end of the line, and test how much weight it takes to get the reel's spool moving. The smallest split shots we have on hand are 735-BB size. These weight in right around half a gram. The next size up is a 735-BB removable split shot. These weigh approximately 0.67 grams.

ABU rates the drag on this reel at 12 pounds.

We tightened the MGXtreme's cast control knob right to the point where side to side play in the spool was eliminated, clamped different combinations of these split shots to the end of the line, clicked the reel over into free spool, and checked how much weight it would take to get that spool moving. The spool of our MBXtreme started moving and letting out line consistently with just 0.67 grams of load pulling on the spool.

Tightening the drag star as tight as we could with our fingers, the max drag we could attain using The Machine to pull was 5.5 pounds.

With the MGXtreme spooled up with a fresh batch of Daiwa Samurai Braid, the next test we performed was check its max drag performance. We strapped it up to The Machine, programmed in our drag test and let it run. The specified maximum drag on this reel from the manufacturer is twelve pounds. With the drag star tightened down as tight as we could get it with our fingers, we were able to get the spool on the MGXtreme moving with 5.5 pounds of pressure. In our view, that's still plenty for the great majority of bass fishing applications