Shimano Aero Technium XTC & XSC Reels

Shimano’s new Aero Technium XTC and XSC reels are as gorgeous as they are groundbreaking. They weigh nothing; they retrieve line like Usain Bolt off the line; and the line lay is spectacularly good, but do they add to your angling (aside from looking beautiful)?

Crack open many of Shimano’s legendary reels and you’ll find plenty of the same, unique-to-Shimano, features embedded in their guts. However, the Japanese giant hoards its best work for its Aero Technium line of big pit reels. The latest, the 14000 XSC and XTC, has a featherweight 485g body and Super Slow Oscillation 10 - that’s the stuff of a long-range casting junkie’s dreams. This incredible new OS10 sees 105 wraps of perfectly laid down line in the time it takes the spool to travel up and down once. The result? Unrivalled line lay which results in less friction as it leaves the spool and reduced drag on the lead, improving casting distance and accuracy - a stat we’ll be able to back up later.

While the new Shimano Aero Technium XTC (Black) and XSC (Pearl White) might cost almost five times as much as the gorgeous looking Ultegra XTD reel, there’s good reason - and it’s not just because of that dreamful line lay.

The list of features on these two new reels is huge: every bit of technology Shimano can put into a big pit reel has been applied. That lighter than meringue body is thanks to a rich blend of materials: Ci4+ for the rotor (which is 2.5 times stiffer than its predecessor, Ci4), magnesium for the body, and aluminum for the rest. However, don’t get light confused for weak.

The Hagane Body eliminates flex, warp and distortion of the reel, allowing smooth reeling with little power loss, while Hagane Gear is produced by Shimano’s cold-forging technology and delivers a long lasting smoothness, strength, lightness and power at the very heart of the reel; traditional diecast, machined gears are less durable under heavy loads.

Coming back to that Super Slow Oscillation 10, to give you a comparison of how mind-blowingly impressive that is, Shimano’s ‘Standard Oscillation’ is 20 wraps per cycle; ‘Slow Oscillation’ is 40 wraps; and ‘Super Slow Oscillation 5’ is 55 wraps.

To prove how much of an impact this has on your overall casting distance, we hit the open fields with Shimano’s big hitter, Mike Dagnall, armed with a Aero Technium 14000 XSC, a Ultegra XTD Reel, one rod, matching line and a drone. The accompanying video to this review is now live on our YouTube channel (CARPologyTV), so you can get the long verdict there. The short version is that the Super Slow Oscillation 10 on the Technium consistency added 15yds onto Mike’s cast, proving, without doubt, that superior line lay results in greater casting distances. Shimano, we salute you.
£699.99