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New Drennan float rods

Richard Isaacs said:
Oh Christ that’s not good
Must admit I’ve got afew Daiwas and always found them to be spot on
The guides on mine are the Fuji sic high stand offs which are so strong and awesome.

My only criticism I’ve had with daiwa is the tightness of the joints. I mean I’ve physically had to rub down male spigot v joints just to get em on. That’s the only thing mind. My 2 speccys are my favorite and I’d happily have a conny z mk11 or a RS F in 14ft. I think Daiwas definitely work best at that length.
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I prefer my 13ft Harrell rs pf to the 14 footer, reasons for that are it's so much slimmer and lighter. I have no idea why the 14 footer is so much thicker in the blank, non of my other rods have such a difference in blank thickness and weight when going from a 13 to 14 foot rod.
I did actually break the tip on the 14 footer when casting out. As far as i'm aware I just crumbled on the cast, I don't think I had a line wrap as I always check before casting out. I haven't shouted about it like people do when a drennan acolyte tip breaks because, at the end of the day it may well have been my fault....somehow 🤔.
To get a replacement tip section it cost me several quid shy of a ton. When the section arrived it was like a dogs back leg !!
I contacted daiwa who told me to send the tip section back and they would reimburse the return postage cost back to me when they had recieved the section. I put a note in the tube asking them to make sure to send me a straight section and not another deformed one. Thankfully the next section was nice and straight.
The guides on the harrell tournaments arn't those excellent fuji SIC stand offs.....unfortunately! They seem like decent guides (I think seaguides) but deffo not in the league of the fujis.
I think drennan let the acolyte rods down by not adding fuji guides.
 
Ian Woods said:
I prefer my 13ft Harrell rs pf to the 14 footer, reasons for that are it's so much slimmer and lighter. I have no idea why the 14 footer is so much thicker in the blank, non of my other rods have such a difference in blank thickness and weight when going from a 13 to 14 foot rod.
I did actually break the tip on the 14 footer when casting out. As far as i'm aware I just crumbled on the cast, I don't think I had a line wrap as I always check before casting out. I haven't shouted about it like people do when a drennan acolyte tip breaks because, at the end of the day it may well have been my fault....somehow 🤔.
To get a replacement tip section it cost me several quid shy of a ton. When the section arrived it was like a dogs back leg !!
I contacted daiwa who told me to send the tip section back and they would reimburse the return postage cost back to me when they had recieved the section. I put a note in the tube asking them to make sure to send me a straight section and not another deformed one. Thankfully the next section was nice and straight.
The guides on the harrell tournaments arn't those excellent fuji SIC stand offs.....unfortunately! They seem like decent guides (I think seaguides) but deffo not in the league of the fujis.
I think drennan let the acolyte rods down by not adding fuji guides.
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Fuji guides are heavy compared to other makers, unless you go for their Torzite range, but the price of the finished rod will be much higher, I guess that’s why?
 
Huanzhou Zhu said:
Fuji guides are heavy compared to other makers, unless you go for their Torzite range, but the price of the finished rod will be much higher, I guess that’s why?
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I don’t think it’s a Fuji thing it’s a trade off between strength and lightness.
The Fuji sic and alc match rings are very strong and stand off the blank beautifully. The weight increase is down to more material there.
Even the Ti A frames are quite chunky and strong and probably not a great deal lighter than a much thinner yet weaker guide made from steel
 
Well, they’re in the shops today. I couldn’t help but be tempted by the 15ft model, we had a play in the shop and compared side to side to the standard 15ft plus, there is so much more power in the bottom 3rd of the specimen blank. Obviously this was just a shop play and the proof will be in real use but but these feel a bit of a beast if a rod in taming big fish whilst still retaining a nice crisp tip. Put on both a shimano 5000 aero and a daiwa 4012 (both fully loaded) and in my opinion, how I like a combo to feel, the daiwa feels better balanced, but both feel nice. I am probably biased as I love acolytes but I have a feeling this is going to be a classic in the making!
 
I’m looking for a 15ft for my perch on rivers and still waters it’s ether the plus or this … so will be great to get some real world feedback.

And or how it compares to the new version hi s 13 as that seems more tame than the original
 
Alan Palmer said:
Doubt I will give it a proper work out barbel wise before March, when I’ll get back on the Severn, but I’ll try it for Chub on the Ouse alongside my 14ft plus over the next few weeks.
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I’m glad that they’ve kept them fast acting and put the additional power into the last 30% of the rod.
That’s exactly where the plus model needed something extra for dealing with bigger fish without spoiling the lovely fast tip action that acolytes are very good at.

As far as hollow tips are concerned I’d only put the 2000/3000 normarks (at full length) above an acolyte for tip speed and recovery

I’m looking forward to waggling the 15fter and if it’s as good as it sounds……..
 
There's a decent teenie here on the new drennan acolyte specimen. At the end of the video they compare the curve in the acolyte rang with a 5 gram weight. You can see a noticeable difference in the power from what I can see. Trust this is helpful
 
For those that give a damn, here are the weights of my rods.

13' Acolyte Ultra - 146g
13' Acolyte Plus - 150g
13' Acolyte Specimen - 168g

15' Acolyte Ultra - 167g
15' Acolyte Plus - 167g
15' Acolyte Specimen - 187g

17' Acolyte Float - 198g

15' Freespirit Hi-S* - 179g
17' Freespirit Hi-S* - 216g

*Newer version

Daniel Earl said:
I’m looking for a 15ft for my perch on rivers and still waters it’s ether the plus or this … so will be great to get some real world feedback.

And or how it compares to the new version hi s 13 as that seems more tame than the original
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I can't really comment on the 13' Hi-S, I've not even seen or handled one. However, if it's safe to assume that it's at least similar to the 15'/17' versions, I'll take a stab at it.

For my money, buy the Acolyte Specimen if your primary use is trotting a river, especially if you are long trotting. If you are going to be fishing a waggler on stillwaters, the Hi-S may be the more appropriate choice. However, much depends on an individual's idea of actions appropriate to different float fishing methods. The Hi-S is more through actioned, the Acolyte Specimen is faster actioned.

Note that I've not considered either aesthetics or cost. The former is entirely subjective, the latter would see the Acolyte winning hands down.
 
It's probably worth adding that I've been using the Acolyte Specimen rods quite a lot over the last couple of months when fishing for grayling. They have proved to be very good, even with modest/small fish, provided that there's a bit of extra water on. The Acolyte Specimen rods are certainly more versatile than I'd anticipated. The next test I'll have for them is decent tench once spring starts to show its hand. Hopefully, a trip to the Trent in the summer might see me try for a barbel on them.
 
Out of curiosity I just weighed the 14ft speci rod.
I played about with the sections removing one at a time and replacing them to see if the reading alterd. Anyhow, one time the scales read 178, but all the other times 177 came up on the screen so I imagine the rod is 177 give or take a gram.
My 13 footer is 168 and daft as it sounds I can feel the difference when using the rods!
 
Ian Woods said:
My 13 footer is 168 and daft as it sounds I can feel the difference when using the rods!
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Makes sense to notice a difference between a 13ft and 14ft rod of the same spec, because of the difference in leverage, especially when there is a line through them.
.
 
Chris Jones said:
It's probably worth adding that I've been using the Acolyte Specimen rods quite a lot over the last couple of months when fishing for grayling. They have proved to be very good, even with modest/small fish, provided that there's a bit of extra water on. The Acolyte Specimen rods are certainly more versatile than I'd anticipated. The next test I'll have for them is decent tench once spring starts to show its hand. Hopefully, a trip to the Trent in the summer might see me try for a barbel on them.
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Sounds like a 1 rod to do all.
 
Kevin Steele said:
Makes sense to notice a difference between a 13ft and 14ft rod of the same spec, because of the difference in leverage, especially when there is a line through them.
.
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Not sure what you mean Kevin, I meant I could feel the weight difference of the 9 or 10g's extra weigh.
I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's true....I am carrying a shoulder injury just now so maybe that has magnified things a little.
 
Ian Woods said:
Not sure what you mean Kevin, I meant I could feel the weight difference of the 9 or 10g's extra weigh.
I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's true....I am carrying a shoulder injury just now so maybe that has magnified things a little.
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It doesn’t sound ridiculous it sounds perfectly logical.
Like Kevin said 10g will be exaggerated a lot over the extra 1ft length distance.
 
I have a normark avenger that I built as a twin tip.
1 spliced and 1 hollow
There’s 3g difference between the tips
They are both exactly the same length.
At full length I can feel that tiny weight difference between them being on the nose.
 
Richard Isaacs said:
I have a normark avenger that I built as a twin tip.
1 spliced and 1 hollow
There’s 3g difference between the tips
They are both exactly the same length.
At full length I can feel that tiny weight difference between them being on the nose.
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Thank FK for that, I thought I was being a wimp 😀.
 
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