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Swimbait Rod Wars Installment #15:
G.Loomis, Has the Baseline Been Surpassed?
(continued)
 Real
World Test: We fished the SWBR955C with a variety of reels and a wide
variety of baits. As the last in our line of rods to test, this stick both
benefitted and suffered from our combined experience over the last several
months in throwing the big baits.
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Complete
Field
Test
Set-Up
for
G.Loomis
SWBR955C
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Reel(s) |
Shimano Calcutta 201 DC
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Daiwa Luna 253L
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Shimano Calais 201-5L
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Line |
90yds 20lb Sunline Shooter FC
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100 yards 25lb Toray Bawo Polyamide Plus
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125yds 22lb Sunline Defier Nylon Mono
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Casting:
By suffer I
was
referring
primarily to
this
category of
our tests.
We started
out taking
it easy on
the
SWBR955C
throwing
mainly the
six inch
Huddleston
Deluxe
Rainbow.
This bait is
entirely
within the
stick's
comfort zone
and we were
able to toss
the six inch
Hudd around
like a
crankbait on
this rod.
Overhand
casts, roll
casts, even
pitches were
made with
ease.
Rigged and ready
to go with a
Daiwa Luna 253L
and six-inch
Hudd.
Then we decided
to up the ante a
little and tied
on the full
sized, eight
inch Huddleston
Deluxe Rainbow,
a bait still
within the rod's
rating but one
we felt
overloaded the
two rods book
ending the
SWBR955C in our
RoD tests. Even
the full sized
Hudd was no
problem with
this stick. So
much so, we
brought our
KBSBS80 and
795ML back out
on the water for
some side by
side tests and
found, really,
with sidearm lob
casts, all these
sticks handled
the eight-inch
Hudd just fine.
It's when you
try to go with
the overhead
cast that the
rods feel more
taxed. In this
respect, the
SWBR955C felt
the best.
Zander readies
for a cast...
To take it even more extreme, we tried this rod out with 3:16 Lure Company's Original Wake and Armageddon baits. These are both, ten inch baits weighing in excess of six ounces. While not ideal, to our surprise, the SWBR955C even handled these baits quite well. This seems to be one stick that really does fit well into our "All Purpose" designation of big bait sticks.
Note how the SWBR955C loads through the entirety of the blank...
Sensitivity: Back to the dragging of bottom bouncing big baits to test the sensitivity range of the SWBR955C. Matched with a six inch Hudd, we found sensitivity to be just okay. This stick doesn't seem to transmit bottom contact information with this bait as well as our 795ML.
... and away the bait flies!
I found this rather surprising since with G.Loomis, the one area I usually do not question is sensitivity, so to get to the bottom of this issue a bit more quickly, I borrowed from a solution we employed with the previously reviewed Dobyns 807MAGH. I cut off the six inch Hudd and swapped reels mounting my Daiwa Zillion HLC spooled with Sunline Shooter Defier nylon monofilament and tied on a Lucky Craft LV500MAX.
In this case, a full sized Hudd makes a splash just off a point in the distance.
At first, I wasn't able to feel this bait coming through the water, but then I noticed, on faster retrieves, I could barely feel the bait vibrating in the water. Strangely enough, I was able to feel more with the 807MAGH, a heavier powered stick.
G.Loomis finally enters the big bait arena with their lineup of swimbait specific sticks, a collection of four rods.
Next up was an eight ounce sized Luhr Jensen SpeedTrap (actual weight one quarter of an ounce) and after a hybrid flip-flycast casting technique to get the bait out far enough to retrieve in the water, I found I was able to feel this bait coming through the water though still not as well as I did with the 807MAGH. In the end, I was left a little disappointed with the SWBR955C's sensitivity.
The foregrip on the SWBR955C measures a full five inches
Next
Section: More Performance Results and Conclusion
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