I was on a road trip this past weekend to shoot some sporting clays and stopped in a huge Wally World unlike any I’ve seen. Fishing department was pretty good size and bigger than what’s near home but really not all that impressive. 

 

You are generally only going to be able to buy a moderately made quality rod there. This is not to knock a Lightning Rod, Shock Rod, CherryWood or an Ugly Stik. All I’ve own or have owned. I had seen first hand a major dissapointment with Berkley Rods. They had these rods there that were Amp, C-Series Crappie and one other that drawing a blank. Every one of those rods had a radical bend one direction or another at the tip. Not a straight one amongst them. That’s not right. Bottom line affect, I don’t know but it’s not right.  Granted not expensive rods but I expected more from that company. 

 

I know guys mention how even high end rods all have a hook to them. I disagree on that. But, If you were to see these you would think that slight hook to yours was a perfectly straight blank. 

 

Expected better from them. Will continue to be a Berkley consumer. No one or no process is perfect. But they consistently all had a radical bend. 

 

I have ave grand boys I buy for that why I was even looking. 

Maybe these are defective? Berkley are lower to mid range but I've used a couple over the years that I liked quite a bit. Lightning rod, and Series One worked well for me. Also, I don't know about the curve in rods l ike some talk about.Good rods should be straight as an arrow, or maybe I just never noticed before

13 hours ago, Mobasser said:

Maybe these are defective? Berkley are lower to mid range but I've used a couple over the years that I liked quite a bit. Lightning rod, and Series One worked well for me. Also, I don't know about the curve in rods l ike some talk about.Good rods should be straight as an arrow, or maybe I just never noticed before

I still have a couple of my old Lightning Rods also. I'm probably older than you but there was a time you were all that and a bag of chips if you fished with a Lightning Rod. We are in a time that manufacturers are putting a lot of stuff out to handle the masses. Eye catching graphics, colored tips, guide wraps. Some people won't look past the eye catching features. 

I have read about batches of Berkley blanks that were very much not straight, but from what I gather that is not all of them.

7 hours ago, Boomstick said:

I have read about batches of Berkley blanks that were very much not straight, but from what I gather that is not all of them.

I believe that. I’m not implying all Berkley Rods are junk either. I’m a pretty big overall fan of Berkley. But those three series of rods surprised me. Not a straight one amongst the batch. My latest rod purchase the other month was a Abu Garcia Winch. That rod is straight as a gut. And in the full scheme of things is not that expensive compared to a few other rods I fish with. Only a couple of week from breaking it out. I’m just trying to say beware. Something that looks “cool” ain’t so great. 

Just a precautionary note, any rod can develop a bend if it's not stored right.  I've seen plenty of high end rods that were curved after storing laid against a wall with a bow in the rod.  It is important to store them with no stress on the rod.  

3 hours ago, Spankey said:

I believe that. I’m not implying all Berkley Rods are junk either. I’m a pretty big overall fan of Berkley. But those three series of rods surprised me. Not a straight one amongst the batch. My latest rod purchase the other month was a Abu Garcia Winch. That rod is straight as a gut. And in the full scheme of things is not that expensive compared to a few other rods I fish with. Only a couple of week from breaking it out. I’m just trying to say beware. Something that looks “cool” ain’t so great. 

I have heard from others that every Berkley rod in their Walmart was very curved as well. It seems the bad batches might go out together. The rods in my my local Walmarts may not be perfectly straight, but they're not too terribly far off.

I think some of the rods at Walmart bend because of how they are stored and because they get handled too much. I actually noticed the same thing when  I went a few years ago to buy another lighting rod. They were all bent, I wouldn't be surprised if maybe they get some defective batches as well.

 

The Berkley Lighting rod is one of my favorite rods for price and quality. Tough to beat for $40.