Daiwa's New Workhorse, the TD Zillion: US and Japanese models compared (continued)
 

US vs. Japan - Component breakdown: As described above the performance and even the design characteristics of these two reels appear to be nearly identical, but of course, that's not good enough for us. We took things further by breaking down each reel to compare each component and see if there are any hidden differences between the US and Japanese models of the Zillion.

Side by side, the SHL (left) and SHA (right). Note: the red drag star was an upgrade to the SHL

Both reels broken down to its pieces for analysis

A view of the gear side of the Zillion which weighed exactly the same

In our specifications table above the US Zillion weighed 8.6 ounces while the Japanese model came out to be only 8.2 ounces. So we wanted to determine where this 0.4 ounce difference came from. Taking each reel apart we couldn't uncover any component differences between the two reels until we started weighing them. The differences came down to the handle assembly, which includes the ported handle, knobs, and support components. We weighed each component of this assembly and our scales displayed numbers that were very close to the 0.4 ounces for which we were hunting. Since we couldn't remove the knobs on the Zillion 100SHA, we couldn't measure the weigh of the knobs themselves but it appears that the majority of the weight is in the knob supports where the US version appears to be a brass-like metal while the SHL could be made of a lighter material. The handle knob hole plugs are also different. The 100SHL has a plug that's half the size of the 100SHA. That might be because the 100SHL has a screw head that fills more of the hole than the support of the 100SHA.

Take a look at both of the handles and its differences. Also in the smaller photo the short knob plug is from the JDM Zillion

Front view of the aluminum frame

Spools from the US and JDM models which are identical