New Rod Carabus Nano

I've been on a bit of a rod buying spree. While researching the Carabus/Diplomat Extreme I came across the Nano series rods. Since they were $120 to $130 less than the extreme I decided to order one to try out. I was hoping that it would be similar to the Extreme. I ordered the CARABUS NANO CNA-602XULS MGS. It is a solid tip XUL, they also have a tubular tip XUL. I went with the solid tip like the Extreme has.


I was going to take some pics comparing the two rods side by side, but it turned out to be a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. The pics I took weren't anywhere as good as the stock pics on the Abu Garcia website.
Carabus Nano CNA Rod – Abu Garcia® EU (abugarcia-fishing.eu) 57Grams
Carabus Extreme CEX Rod – Abu Garcia® EU (abugarcia-fishing.eu) 52Grams

The weights of the rods are very similar, the handles are different, the Nano has alconite guides except for the top guide that is torzite vs all torzite on the Extreme.

I took the Nano and Extreme over to the pond to try them out. I caught about 20 fish on the nano and 5 or so on the Extreme. Fishing them side by side you'd be hard pressed to tell a difference in sensitivity between the two. I had no problem feeling a .5g jig with a trout magnet body while twitching it. Had the same line and jig setups on the two rods, casting distance was withing a foot of each other.

I compared the bending curve of them, the curves are pretty similar, the Nano being a XUL takes less weight to get a full curve.

Caught sunfish from 4 to 7 inches, even the dinks were fun, a couple of the bigger ones were a blast putting a nice bend in the rod.

Overall if you are looking for a sensitive XUL rod I don't think you can go wrong with the Nano, it's still not cheap but a good bit less than the Extreme.

Attachment 463698

Look like fun rods .
Curious, What kind of casting distance are you getting with the .5g jighead and TM body ?

I haven't done any measuring. when comparing I just stand at the same spot on the bank and cast to a weed that sticks up in the pond so I'm able to see where the jig lands in relation to the weed.

One of these days I need to do some casting in the driveway to measure.

Sounds like a great rod

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gillchaser999

Look like fun rods .
Curious, What kind of casting distance are you getting with the .5g jighead and TM body ?

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This morning I did some casting with the Carabus rods both the Extreme and Nano. While fishing at the pond the good cast were withing about a foot of each other with the same set up. So I consider them equal for casting distance.
All the lines are from Varivas, casting .5g jighead with TM body together they weigh 1g on my kitchen scale. (I didn't get out the reloading scale). Reels were 21 Diawa Presso 2000 spool for the Lemoni, all others were 1000 spool.

Line - Distance .5 jig w/TM
Lemoni 2.3lb Polyester - 48'
Twitch Master 4lb - 42'
Avani SalwaterX8 0.2 PE - 49'
Area trout Master Limited 0.3PE - 46'

Did more casting with a 1g jighead and TM body
Line - Distance 1 jig w/TM
Lemoni 2.3lb Polyester - 59'
Twitch Master 4lb - 57'
Avani SalwaterX8 0.2 PE - 60'
Area trout Master Limited 0.3PE - Didn't test again

Thanks ! Good info !

Hi, Z. Thanks for sharing the info! I just might think about pulling the trigger, especially how I love the look of the Nano. Walked into my local Bass Pro and saw the Zenon series of Abu rod, sadly all are bass rods, and they were all priced out of my reach. So the Abu Nano seems the more justifiable now...lol.Attachment 464443

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Sweet looking little rod.

Good looking rod. I’m patiently waiting for fish pics.

I fished the Extreme and Nano for most Tuesday. Caught sunfish, small mouth bass, rock bass and a catfish. Nothing big on the Nano even the catfish was only about 10 inches. I started with .3 braid on the Extreme caught a 13.5 small mouth and several sunfish. There was enough wind blowing that I wanted to switch line so I rigged up the Nano with a different reel spooled with the lemoni. Fished with the Nano for most of the rest of the day. The best praise I can give the Nano is I never felt I needed to switchback to the extreme because I was missing something. I would have like to catch a bigger fish on the Nano to see how it handled them. I did hook a small mouth about 10 inches, it was fun playing it. Lost it at the side of the boat when I grabbed the line to lift it into the boat. Line broken right at the leader knot. I should have used the net.

Duplicate

Sounds like fun with the new rods. If gotten a few LMB this weekend that gave me a time of it. Yesterday was better than today but either one would be considered a good day for the few hours invested. Glad you got to get out and play, always makes me smile.