Suntech Tenkarakyo 36F TenkaraBum

The new Suntech Tenkarakyo 36F TenkaraBum is similar enough to the Tenkarakyo 40F that you can tell they are related, but the 36F isn't just the 40F's little brother. It is clearly a different rod. Both are full flex rods but the Tenkarakyo 36F is noticeably firmer, at 19.5 pennies compared to 16.5 for the 40F.

The rods just arrived, and I haven't had a chance to fish with one. Suntech sent me a prototype a few months ago and I was able to get out to a local park for some lawn casting. Because the rod feels surprisingly firm (especially if you compare it to the tip flex TenkaraBum 36), I thought I'd better start with a size 4 line.

Boom! At the first cast the rod reminded me of the Daiwa Master 36, which hadn't impressed me on the first cast with a size 3 line but was an absolute cannon with a size 4. By the second time I fished with the Master 36 I had gotten used to the feel and casting dynamics of a firm full flex rod. With the Tenkarakyo 36F I had no trouble at all casting progressively lighter lines. Size 3.5? Sweet! Size 3? Piece of cake. Size 2.5? Come on Spring! I want to get this rod out on the water!

I would recommend starting with a size 4 line. The casting feel may be different than you are used to, but I truly believe the rod will make you a better caster. You don't get better by being lazy and letting the rod do all the work. The Tenkarakyo 36F will reward good form and good timing, and I am pretty sure that with it you can achieve much better accuracy than you have gotten with any other rod.

As with the Tenkarakyo 40F, the 36F was not designed with bead heads in mind although the rod is firm enough to handle them. I did not try casting a weighted fly that day in the park, but I suspect my feeling would be the same as it was years ago when I cast a 3.6m hollow-tipped rod. With a size 4 line and an unweighted fly the cast was a thing of beauty. With a weighted fly the cast worked but the beauty was gone. 

No one knows better than I that American tenkara anglers love to fish bead head flies. I've sold hundreds of rods that were designed to do exactly that. With weighted flies, though, you are missing out on a lot of what tenkara offers, or, as I wrote in an trip report years ago, the essence of tenkara. Aside from the fun factor of fighting a fish with the rod rather than the drag, the biggest advantage of tenkara over fly fishing is the tremendous control you have over the fly.

At one of the Oni Schools put on by the Tenkara Guides LLC in Utah, Masami Sakakibara (Tenkara no Oni) demonstrated how to achieve drifts at different depths - with an unweighted fly. Rob Worthing of the Tenkara Guides LLC has both written and video lessons explaining just how to do it. Even subtly pulsing the fly (basically, Tenkara 101) is a more interesting, more active and more exciting way to fish than dead drifting a bead head nymph.

A few years ago, I got an excellent lesson in fishing a longer line, and subtly pulsing the fly when I visited Adam K in Colorado.

Fishing a 3.6m rod with a longer line, a notably longer tippet and unweighted flies, I cast to the most likely looking spots (generally bank eddies on the far side of the stream) and gave the line no more than three or four gentle pulses before picking up for a new cast. The gentle rhythmic pulses, begun just after the fly entered the water, kept the fly within a very few inches of the surface.

I found it extremely surprising that I was able to see all the takes (except for one when I wasn't paying attention). What I saw was not the end of the line twitch. I saw the disturbance of the water where the fish, having come up from the bottom, took the fly just under the surface and immediately turned to go back down. The splash from that quick turn or the flash of the trout's white belly made each take as obvious as if it had been a dry fly. I didn't miss one hit.

The Suntech Tenkarakyo 36F Tenkarabum is perfectly suited to fishing in just that style - a longer line, an unweighted fly and subtle manipulation. It is an exciting way to fish; I would say on par with fishing a dry and much more exciting than fishing a weighted nymph.

Suntech's description of the Tenkarakyo 36F and 40F on their website specifically mentions the slow taper design (think full flex) with power at the tip as being advantageous for long casts and fighting large fish. The "power at the tip" deserves special mention. The tip section is solid, as I think are all of Suntech's rod tips. However, it is noticeably thicker than the tips on the TenkaraBum 33, 36 and 40. To me, the thicker tip of the Suntech Tenkarakyo 36F and 40F makes them feel more like hollow tipped rods.

I have mentioned a few times (OK, more than a few times) that I really like how hollow-tipped rods cast. The first time I compared casting a hollow-tipped rod with a solid-tipped rod back to back, I felt that the hollow-tipped rod made tight-loop casts almost automatic, while the sold-tipped rod required careful concentration to achieve the same result. The difference actually was surprising.

I am pretty sure the reason it was easier to achieve a tight-loop cast with the hollow-tipped rod was because the firmer tip section does not bend over as much while you are making your forward casting stroke and doesn't overshoot as much when you abruptly halt your forward stroke. The rod tip thus achieves a straighter path, which results in a tighter loop and more accuracy. 

Stop the forward cast abruptly with the rod tip still high and watch the line roll out and turn over completely. Raise the rod tip just a bit as the line is rolling out and enjoy a fly-first cast every time. (Well, maybe not the first time, but with practice your casting can improve dramatically.) And of course, if you can put a fly-first cast right where you want it, you really should catch more fish.

If your fishing is not just for 5" brookies in narrow, overgrown streams, I truly think this could become your favorite rod.

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Suntech rods are made in Japan.

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