Quality/Construction: External moving frame parts and price tag aside, the fit and finish of the T3 Air is impeccable. Our review specimen features a matt black finish with red highlights and is aligned perfectly at every joint. The reel's handle has no backplay nor is there any movement of the into and out from the frame. There is no inward and outward movement of the knobs either. This reel is as tight and refined as they come.

The T3 Air is the epitome of a high end reel in terms of quality control.

Drag: We've copied over the Sweet Drag performance data of the T3 Air from our March 2013 Product Insight article for ease of reference, but out on the water, the T3 Air's drag performed very well. Once again, the line we were using and applications in which we were using both reels (mostly drop shotting) did not call for total lock down and drag the fish out of heavy cover performance, but rather we were looking for smooth and consistent performance. Neither reel disappointed in this regard.

For those who insist it's a point for comparison, the T3 Air did test with a higher max drag than our Aldebaran BFS, but as we've stated before, when it comes to finesse fishing with six pound test line, max drag numbers are hardly noteworthy.

Fig 2. above, is an illustration of the T3 Air's profile. Note the higher overall drag even though both these reels are classified as finesse.

Power: This reel is far more powerful than its spool will allow us to test. Because the T3 Air's spool is so shallow and so extensively ported, you're pretty much forced to use only the lightest of lines. You could spool braid onto this reel to leverage stronger line, but the spool appears so delicate, you might risk its structural integrity. This is especially true given the reel's upper end drag. If you're not careful to keep your drag adjustment at a reasonable force while spooled with braid, you could damage the spool.

The T3 Air's spool is very shallow and unfortunately, standard T3 spools do not fit as a replacement.

If you're lucky enough to have access to a standard T3 spool, the temptation is to leverage that deeper spool to extend the utility of this reel. The trouble is? The standard T3 spool does not fit in this reel! That's because the T3 Air's spool is actually smaller in diameter than that of the standard T3 and the T3 Air's sideplate is engineered to absorb that gap between the outer edge of the spool and the frame. This accommodation interferes with the outer lip of the standard spool.

Testing the T3 Air with a light jighead and Keitech swimbait body.

Casting Range: The T3 Air met head on with the same challenges as did our Aldebaran BFS. In our attempts to see how low both reels would go, we went as light as a Paycheck Baits Punch Skirt by itself (1.7 grams) up to an eighth ounce (1/8 oz - actual weight 4.2 grams) Evergreen International finesse jig. Similar to the Aldebaran BFS, the T3 Air's low end on our tests while mounted on a Phenix PHX-682C and spooled with 6lb Sunline Super Natural monofilament was an unweighted, four inch (4"), straight tail Roboworm (3 grams), but we failed to get any reasonable distance with this bait.

The T3 Air easily handled this offering.

Instead, Evergreen International's finesse jig was the most practical bait we could cast on both combos. However, what's important to note in our head to head comparison, is that while the useful low end for both reels was this threshold, the reel that handled this bait most easily was the Aldebaran BFS.

If the flip open top plate does not upset you, the T3 Air is a fun reel to fish.