DAM Effzett Intenze Spin 9' 7-28g and 9’ 14-42g lure rod reviews - £99.98 UK price (my new go-to, sub-£100 lure rods, wow these things are good)

I can’t remember ever reviewing two lure rods in the same blog post, but I have been itching to tell you about these two DAM Effzett Intenze Spin rods ever since I first took them out fishing and as they started to grow on me. As per the title of the post we’re talking about the DAM Effzett Intenze Spin 9' 7-28g and 9’ 14-42g lure rods, but for my ease of typing let’s go with the names for these rods as 7-28g and 14-42g. I have nothing at all to do with these rods by the way, but as per this blog post here, I went looking because why the hell not, and I can sometimes get my hands on bits and pieces of gear from the various tackle brands which reside under the Svendsen Sport umbrella. DAM is one of those brands, and these are two of the lure rods I asked to see because the specs sounded interesting when I went trawling through their catalogue. I knew absolutely nothing about these rods before they arrived and I can guarantee you that whoever is responsible for designing or sourcing these Intenze Spin blanks at DAM HQ has absolutely no idea that I asked to see them or that I have been pressing them into service for shore based bass lure fishing. Please accept my apologies because there are no photos here of the rods in action, and this is because I have either been fishing on my own with them, or the times when I have been fishing with a mate I have not shot any casting photos for various reasons which tend to revolve around either where we are fishing or because it’s peeing down with rain. Summer is over!

So we’re talking about two lure rods from the same range which jumped out from the catalogue as at least having interesting specs and therefore worth a look. For a few years now the HTO Nebula 9’ 7-35g has been my gold standard of “budget” lure rod, but the prices have increased over time and they are often out of stock. The Maximus High Energy-Z 27M 9' 7-35g is another fantastic lure rod for the money, but availability again can be an issue (back in stock at the moment though), and I see that the price has gone up to £110 as well - no more can this rod be in my “I want a good lure rod and it has to be under £100 category”. As I said in the blog post here, nobody at Svendsen Sport ever tasked me with looking for a good, “budget” lure fishing rod for bass, so it is merely me wanting to see if I can find a decent rod or two under the £100 mark. As much as I love my high-end lure fishing tackle, it’s such a thrill to come across much cheaper gear that is actually bloody good - and these two DAM Effzett Intenze Spin 9' 7-28g and 9’ 14-42g lure rods are just that in my opinion. Hell, I landed my biggest ever bass the other day on the 7-28g one, so I know they work!

So what are these two rods? To me the 7-28g is a true 7-28g if that makes sense, in that I can absolutely leather a 28g Seeker and then slow down a bit for the larger profile of a Patchinko, but it’s when you drop down a bit in casting weights that this rod really comes to life. This thing has got a stunning tip on it, and it’s really rather amazing with the smaller surface lures and soft plastics around the weight of these new Gravity Sticks especially - the 9' 7-28g is a proper bit of finesse if you need it to be. The tip looks a bit thinner than what we would perhaps class as normal in our bass fishing world, but it’s not at all a floppy tip on the end of a stiff rod kind of thing. I really don’t like lure rods like this at all. Nope, take this 7-28g out fishing and use the sort of lures and techniques which the casting weight suggests and we’re talking about a proper, proper lure rod. For me this 7-28g is not really the rod for big, bouncy seas (the 14-42g is though), but a lot of lure anglers never fish conditions like that and therefore this rod could do a hell of a lot for a lot of bass anglers. This 7-28g is a different rod to the 9’ 7-35g Nebula, but having seen a lot of anglers fishing with the Nebula now, I can assure you that this DAM rod is more generous if one’s timing isn’t always spot on in the cast (same with the Maximus High Energy-Z 27M 9' 7-35g). I gave the 7-28g rod to a mate the other day to have a few casts with, and it was interesting to hear him say after only two casts something along the lines of “wow the tip on this thing is bloody amazing”. The 9’ 35-g Nebula is obviously still a hell of a rod, but I have fished with this DAM Effzett Intenze Spin 9' 7-28g enough now to have formed the opinion that even though the Nebula is bloody awesome and can handle the heavier 35g lures, the subtlety of this 7-28g and how effortless it is to fish with really pulls me in.

And now we come to the DAM Effzett Intenze Spin 9' 14-42g, and this thing really is something rather serious as well. It’s obviously a more powerful rod as the length and casting weight suggests, and like the 7-28g this 14-42g has got a fairly fine tip on it which isn’t remotely soft or floppy. Nope, this thing is a subtle weapon of a rod, and if you adjust your casting to suit the different lures and lure weights then I think this 14-42g is an absolute peach. The 30g, 35g, and 40g Surf Seekers and Sandeel Pencils 125 and 150 go out so well on this rod, and you can hit them as hard and fast as you can manage, but now slow down a bit with one of the Gravity Stick soft plastics and don’t allow the powerful mid and butt sections of the rod to take over if that makes sense. Smoothly turn the rod over like a good fly angler might turn a fly rod over to produce a decent loop, and we’ve got a rather versatile lure fishing rod if you are inclined towards the more powerful end of the rod spectrum for fishing with “regular weight” - which I am.

Talk about confidence in a lure rod - this 11lb lump from the other day came on the 7-28g rod

This is why I wanted to review the two rods together in the same blog post, because these are two lure rods which share the same DNA and complement each other very well. For regular conditions out on the coast and/or most estuary work I’d go for the 7-28g (my biggest ever bass from the other day came from an estuary on the 7-28g if that helps), and then for windier days, rougher seas, big currents, and deeper water I’d go for the 14-42g. As I said at the top, I had no idea what these rods might be like when I asked to see them, but damn it makes my day to have gone and stumbled across two cheaper priced lure rods which I really, really like, and which I think stand up against anything I can remember fishing with up to say the Nebula price. I do actually have some other more expensive spinning rods here from the Svendsen Sport “family” which I don’t like nearly as much as these two cheaper Effzett Spin ones.

Okay, so I have fished with more expensive lure rods which weigh a bit less than the 14-42g, but it’s obviously not as if these things are very heavy, and they do give me a lot of confidence with how hard I have pushed them so far and how I think they might last. I have used spinning reels from a Shimano 2500/3000 to a Penn Slammer III 3500 on these rods, and after five minutes of fishing I am happy using whichever reel best suits the kind of bass fishing I am doing. I am not somebody who obsesses about rod balancing and ultra lightweight outfits. The rod rings are SeaGuide K-Guides which aren’t Fuji but I like the look of them and they have been working great. The handle on the bottom of the rod butts are made from what feels like a grippy kind of rubber and even with soaking wet hands they have got a really good grip, as per the photo below.

Have a close look at the two photos below to get an idea of the reel seats on these two rods, because I can’t get away from them potentially being an issue if you tend to fish like me with one finger behind the reel stem and three in front - do this and you will most likely end up with at least a part of the tips of your thumb and forefinger resting directly on the rod blank and not on a bit of duplon like you might find on most lure rods. You need to know about this, but as with using different reels on these rods, it isn’t an issue for me. I go fishing with the rods and pretty quickly the reel seat feels normal, plus it’s a grippy kind of design and it’s not as if your hand suddenly slips off while you are fishing! For sure I’d prefer a longer bit of grip above the reel, but as I said, I merely came across them in a catalogue and thought they might be worth a look.

Which to me these rods seriously are. If I hadn’t liked them I would have asked for them to be picked up and you’d have heard nothing about them from me because what would have been the point? But I seriously like these two lure rods, and landing my biggest ever bass on one was rather satisfying when I think about some of the rods I have sitting here which are definitely not towards the budget end of things! Lots of expensive lure rods come through my doors for testing, I have spent plenty of my own money on some serious Japanese rods over the years, but my biggest ever bass gets hooked and landed on a “budget” lure rod which I am assuming comes out of China. There isn’t a rod longer than 9’ in this DAM Effzett Spin range, but I would love to see a 9’6’’ version of this 14-42g rod especially - I reckon that would be something else. Of course it makes me wonder how many other good lure rods there are out there for very sensible money, but for the time being I am going to change some of the fishing tackle details on this website to reflect the fact that these two rods are now my go-to lure rods at £150 and under - I like them that much. The Nebula range is still killer and I don’t envy HTO having to try and better them for the price at some point in the future, but I lucked out by finding these two sub-£100 DAM rods and I have fished with them enough now to know just how much I like them - a hell of a lot. If I think back to any of the sub-£100 lure rods I have fished with now, these two DAM Effzett Intenze Spin rods are the best I have come across so far (that Maximus High Energy-Z 27M 9' 7-35g is still bloody good by the way, but it’s over that £100 mark now). You all have a good weekend, and wherever you are and whatever local restrictions you might or might not be living under, please stay safe and well……………..

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