I've been looking at getting a couple of new reels for deep water puka and blue nose, I've come across a really good deal on a couple of tekota 800's and was wondering if anyone has/is using this reel and your thoughts.

The fact that it doesn't have lugs doesn't bother me too much, the main thing I'm looking at is line capacity and a smooth drag. From it's specs I can see it holds 715 yards of 65lb powerpro braid, is this the same diameter as most braids as I was looking at getting at least 500m of 50lb (maybe 80lb) braid spooled on it.

Thoughts?

Yep they are ok I think I got 600- 700+ 80lb on mine and they do the job & the drag is good (11kg max ??) but think from memory 4.2 -1 retrieve was a bit slow for my liking. I have gone to the tyrnos 20 & 30 and love them a mate landed a 125 kg marlin on the 30 on Thursday. Another good option which would be a very versatile reel deep water, jigging stray lining or any thing else you may want to do is the torium 30 the drags on these shimano's are very smooth as is my tekota 800

can't say I've had that problem but noo it dose not sound like fun