Ark Gravity BFS

[MontclairDave]

First day using Ark Gravity bfs reel. Followed instructions and set internal brakes to II and spool tension to no side-to-side play and outside knob to a quarter turn looser than half way. Threw a 1/8 jig head and 2.75 paddle tale to start, on 8 lb J Braid Grand to 7 lb Fluoro leader. Wow. Not a single backlash and chucking really far casts. Some casts were not exactly finesse either: a few kinda jerky heaves on the backhand to hit some water under a tree before river current took me too far away and still didn’t backlash. And the drag seems very good, but only caught smallies to around a pound, not sure where the big ones went today. 

 

Now for the next test tomorrow: much lighter baits. Gonna start with some 1/16 ounce finesse jigs and 1/10 neds, maybe a Rhythm Wag split tail on a 1/0 weightless hook. Interested to see whether I will have to change reel settings at all.

 

I had read this reel could be a bit hard to dial in. Not for me so far!

[casts_by_fly]

nice!  Can't wait to hear about the lighter side of things too.  What rod are you using?

 

Also, are you local or on a trip?  I'm curious which river you're on if local.

[FryDog62]

I recently started using this reel because it is marketed as excellent for casting extremely light lures. Acid test for me is a 1/16th hair jig which due to surface area and weight is one of the more challenging lures to throw. 
 

I am using the 7’1” Phenix Classic BFS Light for this. The key is dialing in the reel. I did set the internal brake at II but initially made the mistake of setting the tension based on a slow fall of the hair jig. I got backlashes. Then, I re-set the tension just barely tighter than a little side-to-side play in the spool. Dialed in, casts great. 
 

The only other adjustment I might make is line. I’m currently using 7 lb Sniper, but have heard by going lighter (maybe 5 lb Sniper or 6lb 131 braid) I might get even more distance. 
 

This reel seems to be one of the better values in the BFS market. 

[GetFishorDieTryin]

3 hours ago, FryDog62 said:

I am using the 7’1” Phenix Classic BFS Light for this.

How do you like that rod?

[FryDog62]

23 minutes ago, GetFishorDieTryin said:

How do you like that rod?

I do, it’s my lightest action rod, close to a Dobyns 700 but just slightly more tip. Not something I would use around weeds/cover very much - but

in open water trying to cast a 1/16th oz hair jig it’s fantastic.  

[GetFishorDieTryin]

39 minutes ago, FryDog62 said:

I do, it’s my lightest action rod, close to a Dobyns 700 but just slightly more tip. Not something I would use around weeds/cover very much - but

in open water trying to cast a 1/16th oz hair jig it’s fantastic.  

I was looking at them at noticed they were rated slightly heavier than other BFS rods in terms of weight range.  

I haven't taken the dive into BFS yet, but if I did the phenix or dobyns would likely be my first.   

[FryDog62]

5 minutes ago, GetFishorDieTryin said:

I was looking at them at noticed they were rated slightly heavier than other BFS rods in terms of weight range.  

I haven't taken the dive into BFS yet, but if I did the phenix or dobyns would likely be my first.   

I prefer the Phenix Classic BFS or Feather Light, or ML over the Dobyns.  The Dobyns tip is just too soft to fish around any cover IMO.  

[GetFishorDieTryin]

1 minute ago, FryDog62 said:

I prefer the Phenix Classic BFS or Feather Light, or ML over the Dobyns.  The Dobyns tip is just too soft to fish around any cover IMO.  

Yeah, I dont know if I intend to fish it around cover, but I prefer a tip that had just enough glass to cast a bait without being too soft.  I throw lots of 1/20 and 1/16 heads with 2.5 or 3" swimbaits.  So as long as the rod can cast one of them about 50 feet, I would be more than happy with it.   

[MontclairDave]

6 hours ago, casts_by_fly said:

nice!  Can't wait to hear about the lighter side of things too.  What rod are you using?

 

Also, are you local or on a trip?  I'm curious which river you're on if local.

Vacay on the upper Delaware in PA. Friday going with a guide but until then using my kayak at a put-in just down the road from the house rental. Using a JDM Handing Magic ml rated from 5-17 grams. Liking the rod so far. My first foray into bfs so I am by no means an expert but I think I’m on the power bfs side of things with this set-up. 
 

ironically I walked down to the river from the rental house today at high noon, waded out to a rock and caught more—and bigger—smallies in one hour than I did in 6 hours in the yak yesterday. Biggest one was a 2.5 lber. Landing that fish from shore in pretty honking current was fun! Just casted upstream, let wacky rigged Senko float down river on semi-slack line, bam, kept hooking up between 12 and 3 o’clock on the casting “clock.” Made up for being outfished by my son yesterday about 3-1! He threw Senkos all day long; I wasted too much time cyling through paddletails, topwaters, underspins, chatterbaits, jerkbaits, blah blah blah. I get bored fishing Senkos and prefer moving baits but the Senko is apparently what they want. As long as it has copper color in it, that is…. (Crayfish imitator maybe?)

6 hours ago, FryDog62 said:

The only other adjustment I might make is line. I’m currently using 7 lb Sniper, but have heard by going lighter (maybe 5 lb Sniper or 6lb 131 braid) I might get even more distance. 
 

Yeah, I’m a bit worried the 8 lb J Braid I am using might be a tad on the heavy side for throwing 1/16 ounce baits but jeez it feels hair-thin to me, based on the 50-lb braid I’m used to fishing on my other baitcasters! 

Edited July 15, 2024 by MontclairDave
Old eyes

[MontclairDave]

Day 2: started off with a Whopper Plopper in the 65 size. Thing is itty bitty! Reel handled it great but I wasn’t 100% happy with distance so I backed off the tension knob just a smidge and got an extra 10-15 feet or so. Not huge but an improvement. Left it there and caught 7 fish in about 2.5 hours and… wait for it… my son got skunked on Senkos! Water was super dirty due to torrential rain last night, so maybe not idea bait choice. Until water clears not sure I’m gonna be throwing anything smaller for a while so will update later. 

[KP Duty]

Tackle Tour liked it...

 

https://www.tackletour.com/reviewarkfishing24gravitybfs.html

[Bigbox99]

These are based on the Haibo Arise and the Ark markup is very modest.  You also don't have to wait a bazillion years for it to show up in the mail from Aliexpress and you have a US company to work with if you have any issues.  This is OEM reels done right.  Nothing wrong with a rebrand as long as the markup is fair and the reel pricing isn't being treated like a dogcoin with 3x plus multiples of price increase. 

[MontclairDave]

Epic day today with the Ark Gravity bfs reel. Did a guided trip on Delaware and caught 75 fish between myself and my son. Used the Handing Magic ML 6’ 3” rod with the reel. 90% of fish caught on a 3” white Keitech Easy Shiner on a 1/8 ounce Eagle Claw Pro V jighead with the weed guard cut off. Rest on a 2.75” Big Joshie swimbait (my addition to the party) after the guide ran out of Easy Shiners, and also a 65 Whopper Plopper. Most of the smallies were around 1 to 1.5 lbs, a few to 2 lbs, so this setup made the catches a load of fun. For the bigger fish, the drag could not quite muscle them through the fastest current and so I had to put a bit of pressure on the reel with my thumb to gain more control and get them into the net. Worked great! Also was able to pinpoint casts to current seams a bit more accurately than with the guide’s spinning setup (Vanford/Fenwick). Sure, the spinner casted a bit farther but I didn’t find that to be an advantage.

 

Also: being able to press down on thumb bar and free spool for a second or two to drop the bait and make it look like a dying baitfish and then re-engaging the reel caught  me about 20 of those fish. So much easier than opening and closing the bail of a spinning reel!

 

Not a single bird’s nest all day—until I hooked my son’s line on a cast and bam, instant blowup. 100% user error. Tried picking it out for about 5 minutes and then gave up. Only an hour left to the trip so no biggie.

 

Love love love this reel! 

[casts_by_fly]

Nice. That’s a lot of fun. Throwing moving baits all day for eaters is a whole lot of fun. 
 

How far up were you? 

[MontclairDave]

4 hours ago, casts_by_fly said:

Nice. That’s a lot of fun. Throwing moving baits all day for eaters is a whole lot of fun. 
 

How far up were you? 

Damascus launch.

[Shinmothy]

On 7/18/2024 at 11:42 PM, Bigbox99 said:

These are based on the Haibo Arise and the Ark markup is very modest.  You also don't have to wait a bazillion years for it to show up in the mail from Aliexpress and you have a US company to work with if you have any issues.  This is OEM reels done right.  Nothing wrong with a rebrand as long as the markup is fair and the reel pricing isn't being treated like a dogcoin with 3x plus multiples of price increase. 

I can’t remember exactly but the scuttlebutt is that Ark either paid for Haribo to do the R&D or did it themselves, and somewhere along the line Haribo was contracted to manufacture the Gravity BFS, Allegedly Haribo then “stole” the design which they sell as the Arise. They are probably allowed sell it in places that aren’t the US, and without knowing the exact terms of their contract it’s a little hard to point fingers are any party but that’s what I’ve heard at least.

[Bigbox99]

9 hours ago, Shinmothy said:

I can’t remember exactly but the scuttlebutt is that Ark either paid for Haribo to do the R&D or did it themselves, and somewhere along the line Haribo was contracted to manufacture the Gravity BFS, Allegedly Haribo then “stole” the design which they sell as the Arise. They are probably allowed sell it in places that aren’t the US, and without knowing the exact terms of their contract it’s a little hard to point fingers are any party but that’s what I’ve heard at least.

Haibo is an OEM.  They design and manufacture reels and sell them to companies to rebrand such as Ardent and others.   I high doubt some fishing rod company designed a fishing reel. They almost certainly ordered the Arise considering it has been out longer than any of the Ark reels have been on the market.  Also the 4 position inductor seen on the Arise and Gravity reels predates both and was 1st sold on a Ray's Studio (Haibo) spool 1st seen in 2018.