Lamson Purist II Fly Reel

This reel forces an angler to cut right to the core of an age-old debate regarding fly reels.  

Is a trout reel’s true purpose to store line on a spool, maybe also serving as a balance on a rod? Or, is there a performance expectation attached, meaning: does it offer a drag/braking system that helps the angler fight and, hopefully, land fish?

I have to tell you that, having purchased this reel for $370 U.S., I thought it was an expensive line-hanger. For that money, you can buy a number of solid, American-made reels with capable disc-drag systems, including others made by Lamson. 

But I’m also an aficionado of click-pawl fly reels. While there are other options that have more “tradition” and “design” panache than the Purist (any number of classic Hardy reproductions, or a cause-driven “Colorado” model from Ross, featuring unique aesthetic accents and directly benefiting certain watersheds and species), this reel provides a number of design and performance reasons to be a fan. 

Foremost, I think Lamson absolutely nailed the level of “click resistance” this reel offers in the average trout-fishing context. So many click-pawls are woefully lacking on any realistic drag benefit–it’s hard to tell the difference between the retrieve and the out-take. Crank, or free-spool? Is it right-handed, or left-handed? Who can tell the difference?

This click-pawl drag is fairly set with honest resistance that will slow a trout after the take, without clamping down like a vise that might compromise your ability to fight the fish. Not too much, not too little–just right for trout anywhere in the 8- to 18-inch range. In other words, the drag basically mimics where I’d set a disc-drag’s resistance level anyway.

It sounds great. If you care about the noise that happens when a trout charges and peels line off the reel, this reel’s music is right in tune.

It’s incredibly light. Granted, too light is often a detractor if you want a see-saw feel as you cast, but this reel puts all of the feel into the action of the rod itself.

The spool is exposed, so you can comfortably palm the reel to make your own brakes. And that’s really where the “purist” aspect comes to the fore. The purist would rather brake the fish by feel than depend on some mechanism housed in the guts of a reel.

It’s a fast-retrieve, good pickup reel that gathers line quickly. Mind you, it’s also true to size. A 3+ is just that–for 3-weight, or maybe 4-weight, fly rods, and the 5+, while the diameter might seem large, is what you need for a 5-weight, or 6-weight, fly rod. If you think you might sneak a 5-weight line on the 3+, you are mistaken. I put a 4-weight DT line on a 3+ and was surprised by how little backing it held.

It’s American made. That might not matter to you, but it matters to me. Frankly, it blows away similar competitors like the imported Sage Click reel, that doesn’t offer nearly the same level of drag, sensitivity and feel.

At the end of the day, there are, no doubt, legions of anglers who will wonder why the heck they’d pay just under $400 for a click-pawl reel, when they could have a reel that costs about the same with a sealed disc-drag. The Lamson Purist is also new, and beautiful, but it is not yet an “artifact.” Those are all very fair concerns in my mind.

But, if you are a fan of click-pawl reels, if you are truly a primitive tool “purist,” if you want a click-pawl that is legitimately engineered (and has a braking system that actually matters), if you like a reel that sounds and looks great, if you value a super-light reel on the end of a bamboo, fiberglass, or feathery graphite rod–this might just be the number.

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