REVIEW: Daiwa Generation Black Rod – Drunknmonkey

Daiwa’s generation black series of fishing rods offer great quality at such an affordable price, so lets have a look at my dedicated lightweight plastics rod, the Drunknmonkey 6101ULFS, by far my favourite lightweight plastics rod.

FEATURES

• HVF High Volume Fibre graphite blank
• Fuji Alconite guides
• Daiwa tournament graphite reel seat
• Ultra tough EVA minimalist split grips

IMPRESSIONS

For a mid range rod, the Drunknmonkey feels really nice in the hand. The EVA split grips are now a common thing on almost all rods and in my opinion offer better grip and feel to cork. The Generation Blacks matt black colour scheme looks really clean and will compliment any colour reel very nicely.

ROD/BLANK

The Drunknmonkey use Daiwa’s HVF (High Volume Fiber) graphite in its blanks and this helps gives the same action as some of their flagship models of rods like the Steez. HVF “combines precise resin control with unidirectional graphite finer to produce a blank with maximum graphite density”.

APPLICATIONS

The Drunkmonkey is designed for ultra lightweight lures, mainly unweighted soft plastics, small hardbodies and fishing topwater. It is also perfect for finesse fishing with light flurocarbon lines. It’s 6’10” length means it is a good all-rounder for your lightweight applications.

We love our ultralight rods so the Drunknmonkey fits in perfectly with our arsenal of rods used to target bream and trout. Its fast action but softer tip is perfectly suited to our style of lightweight plastics fishing and crosses over well into accurately casting small hardbodies. Using the Drunknmonkey for accurate casting applications is a breeze, and when using braided line and these HVF blanks we can feel every little thing the lures, plastics and biting fish are doing.

CONSTRUCTION/FINISH

As with all Daiwa products that we have and use the quality and finish is second to none. Daiwa definitely know how to make Rods that look great and work well and the Drunknmonkey is no exception to this. You will be hard pressed to find a rod in this price range that is so well finished and constructed.

IN THE FIELD

The Drunknmonkey is my go-to plastics rod, whether we are fishing a comp for bream casting unweighted plastics or fishing ultralight hardbodies socially for trout or bream, this is where this rod excels. The blank still has enough low down power to put the pressure on when required, and it has caught me plenty of 1kg+ black bream caught close from structure.

We have been pairing our Drunknmonkey with a Daiwa caldia 2004, running 4lb braid and it has been a great mid range cost effective combo.

Sometimes a 1 piece rod can be a bit restrictive if hiking into tight places and for travel purposes, so Daiwa do a 2 piece version of this rod called “two drunknmonkeys” and is definitely worth checking out.

CONCLUSION

The Drunknmonkey and the other Generation black series rods are all feature packed, have high quality componentry and have a great feel to them, all at a seriously affordable price. I know I have said it before, but I honestly believe for the price of these rods you get the best bang for buck for a mid range priced fishing rod.

PROS & CONS

WHERE TO BUY

The Generation Black range of rods can be purchased from most good tackle stores. A list of Daiwa stockists can be found here.