CB Rod Wars Part 10: Crankin' with Carrots, That's E21's 21
Carrot Gold
(continued)
Field Tests:
The E21 21 Carrot Gold Stix 21CRG701M-M-C was one of many sticks that joined Cal
and I on our trip to El Novillo Mexico earlier this year. On this trip, I paired
the rod with a Pflueger Patriarch and Daiwa Zillion spooled with 50 pound Toray
braid. Both of these reels matched up nicely with the
relatively light 21CRG701M-M-C.
The 21 Carrot Gold was field tested Stateside
and at El Novillo Mexico
Casting:
The 21CRG701M-M-C feels
very much like a moderately tapered graphite stick and casts like one too.
Because of this action some anglers will feel the need to make adjustments in
their casting motion to compensate for the way
this rod loads. While adjustments may need to be made to accommodate the action
it is no where near what anglers will find versus changing over to a fiberglass rod. Overall, the
21CRG701M-M-C is a very easy stick to grow familiar with when casting both for
accuracy and distance.
Best with medium diving baits
Sensitivity:
While the 21CRG701M-M-C
casts more like a graphite rod, its sensitivity is very much in between traditional
graphite and glass. It is not the most sensitive rod I’ve fished and some of
that has to do with the moderate taper. Using braid while fishing this rod is almost a
requirement if you want a high level of sensitivity. When compared with the rest
of rods in our crankbait rod wars the 21CRG701M-M-C comes in around average when
it comes to sesnitivity.
No foregrip and the highly
functional hook hanger
Power:
Here’s where I ran
into a little issue with this rod and not so much in fish fighting power but
with the rod’s ability to quickly hookset. I hooked plenty of fish with this rod, but
less than half actually made it into the boat even though I was using braid!
Most of them came off in the middle of the fight during which time everything
felt normal. One second I’d feel the headshaking action of the bass at the end
of the line, the next moment the fish would be gone! When I first started to use this rod I did not have much luck keeping fish buttoned at all.
A crankbait rod needs to be able to protect the line and absorb the shock with
fish just barely hooked on smaller trebles. I adjusted my hookset to even more
aggressive levels and the problems went away. Hook setting adjustments are a must when fishing the 21 Carrot Gold. Set it
harder than you normally would even crankbait fishing, in fact don't be afraid
to channel your inner "Pro" and set hard.
One must adjust to the way they
fish this rod due to it's moderate taper. You must hookset harder and must
adjust your casts due to the way the rod loads
Durability: While the blank was able to handle aggressive sets we did
encounter some issues with the rod when it came to durability. The
21CRG701M-M-C comes with stainless steel guides that are coated with a TiCH coating.
The guide inserts are double swaged so they also do a good job at keeping them in
place. Any coating on the
inside of a guide is going to be susceptible to some level of wearing out and sure enough the
tip top of my 21CRG701M-M-C showed signs of wear after several days fishing
in the waters of El Novillo, Mexico battling those crazy south of the border
bass. In fact the TiCH coating was actually was completely gone in the center
area just after several days of fishing
with braided line.
The E21 tip is
no longer TiCH coated. Braided lines wore the coating off in just a few trips
out
We made E21 aware of this
issue and they claimed that they hadn’t heard of any similar complaints, but shortly
after our exchange, we were informed Pac Bay had gone back and added some extra
layers of TiCH coating to their guides to help guard against possible similar
occurrences. While the rod continues to fish just fine even with the layer worn
away our position is that a coating is still just a coating. True that no
ceramic inserts means there are no guide inserts to crack or fall out but a
harder wearing implementation would have been a plus.
