THE BADGER DYNACAST 1060 REEL
Price: £ 29.99, OR £ 84.99 PLUS POSTAGE FOR THREE

Specification

  • 10 ball bearings
  • Computer designed balanced rotor to reduce vibration
  • Front drag
  • Free spool system
  • Aluminium long cast spool
  • Brass pinion gear
  • Line roller
  • Spare spool
  • Left or right hand retrieve
  • Quick fold-away handle
  • Line capacity is 290 metres of 0.35mm diameter

This is quite a big, heavy reel, which is not a criticism, but the weight does make it best suited to fishing applications where it will be sat in rod rests or on the rod pod for most of the time. I certainly wouldn’t use it for barbel and chub fishing along the river, or for any application where I hold the rod.

I don’t know what the internal mechanism is like as far as quality is concerned, and only time will tell about its reliability and longevity, but the reel certainly feels good and solid, with the bale-arm mechanism quite positive and the front drag and free-spool facility very positively and finely adjustable.

Line lay is as good as I’ve seen on a spool that is adequately long enough for long casts and the ‘rosewood’ handle has a good feel to it. The anti-reverse lever is conveniently placed underneath the reel where it doesn’t pose a problem to snagging the line.

The little ‘touches’ are excellent too, both the free-spool lever and the free-spool adjusting wheel having a rubberised grip.

FISHINGmagic VERDICT

Okay, pushing the incredibly inexpensive price tag to the back of my mind I have to say the reel is heavy, but as I said earlier, if the rod is going to be sat in rod rests or on a rod pod for most of the time then that doesn’t matter too much, especially when used on heavy carp rods.

The lip of the spool is on the thin and sharp side, but again, that won’t make a massive difference to how the reel performs. And the spare spool is made from graphite and feels a little flimsy, which means it probably won’t stand up to having strong braid wound tightly around it.

Focussing on the good points, and there are many of them, it’s a damn good reel that performs well where it matters most.

And try as I might, I can’t ignore the price. At a penny under 30 quid, if the build quality is less than what you’ve come to expect from other reel manufacturers, you can almost afford to chuck the 1060 away after two or three years and buy another one.

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