Preliminary Review of 13 Fishing Whiteout Ice Rod Spinning Combo ML 27.5" and Wicked Ice ML 26" rod
A few unique things about the rod is the Evolve Blackjack Reel Seat and Evolve Solo Guides. The real seat is okay okay for a tradition hand grip but it is perfectly suited for a trigger style or pencil grip hand position. The Wicked Ice excels over the Whiteout on the traditional hand grip with it's white colored Evolve reel seat. The ML Wicked has me somewhat concerned about the top grip connection to the rod blank. They put a metal cap there, probably aluminum however there are signs of wear from the metal cap on contact with the rod blank. That spot has epoxy and line threading onto the hook keeper, but there are small burly graphite or carbon fibers from what abrasion occured during the build process.
The Whiteout ML rod did measure to 27.5" in length while the Wicked measured to 26.5" in length. Both rods have four line guides plus tip guide.
The line guides are single foot on the Whiteout. There were several in store models with really poorly line wrapping. Lots of crisscrossing patterns and I had to spend time to find one with all straight lined up line wrapping. Which also reduce the epoxy coating appearance when compared to one of poorly line wrapping finish. The line guides appears to be very well polished stainless steel. Due to the small footing and distance of rings from the rod blank, this rod totally rocks the pulsating effect to the max. If swapping out for an inline reel or a fly reel, this rod will perform superbly. The Wicked has ceramic ring inserts and I like those better.
The rod load flex of the Whiteout nearly matches the Wicked from a visual appearance. The Whiteout does feel to be more forgiving compared to the Wicked Ice in ML power. I feel that the Wicked Ice ML power is closer to a M power. Both rods also show a good spline check with line guides positioning.
The spinning reel at least appears to be of decent quality in just free cranking. However when you get to the line roller, it's basically nothing more than just a round ring that doesn't spin. A reel sporting seven ball bearings and not even a nylon bushing in the line roller to help after I inspected the line roller. I had originally planned on loading some line onto it, but I will just remove the spinning reel as I have a spare reel available.
While I plan on testing the Whiteout rod out, it's not going to be priority on my list. I see myself leaning more so to put my fly reel on this rod than anything else, but I would rather utilize an UL power for that purpose. For myself the Wicked will see more use.
