The Axiom II rod is here. Naturally it makes sense to have a reel to complement the arrival of a new fly rod. Say hello to the TFO’s Power reel.
The official debut of the Power is set for later this fall. To give us a sneak peek, Jim Shulin and Nicholas Conklin have volunteered their time to give anglers an idea of what to expect from the new product, which has been in the works for about eight, nine months.
Nick is TFO’s Director of sales and development for two-handed fly fishing; Jim is the Director of Sales/Conventional.
TFO: What do each of you like most about the Power?
JS: “Its light and powerful drag. It’s the best reel we’ve ever done. There’s no doubt about that.
“The big thing is the drag system, which incorporates Belleville washers, which look like cymbals and two carbon-fiber disc drags. It’s a pretty common type of drag system when you look at everything. Most people use coil springs, including us in the past. You get this huge wrap-up towards the end. As the spring coils and gets more and more compressed, each click gives you a ramp up in drag, where these Belleville washers give you a very even long, one smooth turn, from zero drag to max drag in one full turn. And both of those are adjustable, by the way, the max low and the max high. They’re not independently adjustable. You start with the higher low-end drag, and when you make that one full turn, of course it’s higher on the other end, so that you can prevent overrun, things of that nature.”
NC: “Really the biggest thing with fly reels to consumers is the look — the sexiness of it. Yes, there’s a lot of machining and lightweight aluminum and componentry that goes into the Power reel. It looks good. It’s why they make so many different colors of lures and styles — to catch fishermen, not catch fish, right? If you’re looking at this reel, that might be a way to look at it, the sleeker design, the way it’s ported. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the Loop Opti reels. It’s a very similar reel. We ported it a little bit differently. The weight- savings thing is always something that catches people. Although it may be a miniscule amount, ounces, half ounces, that’s something that comes up and is brought up often on the customer-service level. The weight savings is always good. And then you have your drag; it’s sealed, which is something that’s going to catch someone’s eye and be attractive to people.”
TFO: How does it fish? I know it comes in the Power I, II and III.
NC: It has enough drag and fish-stopping power to really handle anything. We really haven’t tested it in bluewater. For the sizes and configurations, it will handle anything in freshwater and most in saltwater. It has enough fish-stopping power to handle anything.”
TFO: Any other TFO reel that you can compare the Power to?
NC: “In terms of the design look, the sexiness factor, the Atoll reel we’ve done is probably going to be the closest.”
JS: “We’ve done a lot of reels, a lot of good reels in the past. What separates this one from the others is it has a more sophisticated drag system.”
TFO: It seems like it’s a pretty good value?
NC: “We’ve been dipping our toes into that higher-level price point fly reel. It’s getting to be a tight market. That’s a tough price point. You’re getting into some Nautilus’ and some Hatches. For us, it’s pretty high end. In the grand scheme of nicer, heavily manufactured fly reels, when you’re looking at $700, $800 bucks for a fly reel, $499 is not too bad.”
JS: “It’s not a cheap reel, but it’s incredibly capable and in keeping with our value proposition.”
Interested in the Power Reel?
Click here to read more about the Power Reel and here to find a dealer nearest you.
