Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra KF50S: A BFS Reel to Beat the Alphas Air TW!?

Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra - New "Lightest Stock Spool BFS Reel" Champion

The Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra KF50S has arrived in the "Budget" bracket of Bait Finesse System Reels. It looks pretty slick and has some eye-catching specifications. But what's under the hood? Read on for a shocking head-to-head with the famous Daiwa Alphas Air TW 2020 PLUS casting with a 0.46-g bead-head fly...

BIG UPDATE: As of 3rd June 2022 Tsurinoya responded to the feedback that many anglers found the original dynamic brakes of this reel a little too weak for maximum performance. Despite the astonishing increase in performance created when users simply placed a pair of extra magnets on each brake shoe (in the same way that Shimano brakes are upgraded to cope with Avail ultralight spools), the manufacturer increased the braking strength by locking out the original brake shoes to create a static braking system... However, reports suggest that the performance in casting are now similar between the upgraded magnet dynamic brakes and the new, static brake system (e.g. Bass N Bonsai's head to head casting video from 15 mins 30-seconds with a 1.7-g crankbait - where it also seems to perform better than the Aldebaran 22).

I've now updated this article with my experimental results - showing why the new "static" braked version of this reel has the exact same phenomenal performance as my extra-magnets modified original left hand wind reel.

Heads up: I've now included my affiliate links to products in this article - this doesn't alter the price to you but if you choose to order through that route it provides vital support for the free content on this blog (with my great thanks).

Basic Overview

The latest incarnation of the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf is the "Ultra" KF50S and has a classy matt-finish in a near-black/gun-metal grey that looks like it came either from the USAF Stealth Bomber or Batmobile workshop. It weighs in at a remarkable 135g (4 ¾ oz), with an ultralight 30-mm diameter spool (spool arbor diameter is 25mm). It's a carbon-bodied reel with an alloy drag-star, carbon crank-handle, aluminium alloy main gear, aluminium spool, dynamic magnetic casting brakes and clicking drag. This is what it looks like when flip casting with the affordable Tsurinoya Ares C472UL rod:

The reel comes in Left Hand Wind (KF-50SL) and Right Hand Wind (KF-50SR) options.

Now, carbon-bodied reels have a reputation of allowing the line to pass behind the spool if you backlash  - does the Dark Wolf Ultra buck this trend?

Well, it certainly looks as if the manufacturers have been very bold in making the gap between reel-body and the edges of the spool very small indeed. Previously, a larger safety margin of manufacturing tolerances have been allowed on budget reels. Very often the use of carbon as a body material (with a degree of inherent flex, plus the moulding process perhaps being less precise than machined metal bodies) is said to be responsible for needing to play it safe and allow a larger gap. 

That way, the variation between batches carries less risk of having a spool which rubs against the body of the reel. However, as I say, the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra looks to have gone for much tighter tolerances and a very small gap around the edge of the spool (shown above).

To get a guided tour of the look and overall character of the reel I can, as usual, recommend the Reel Test's Unboxing video. In addition to that, I'd like to add that - to me - this reel feels significantly more refined than, say,  the GH100, PW100 or Zephyr in terms of construction. The brake dial is far more free and easy to operate. In particular, I recall you need to put a lot of PTFE grease on the moving parts of the GH100 brake adjustment mechanism to avoid bending your thumbnail back trying to adjust the brakes while fishing. 

A small detail that I actually really appreciate is that the spool shaft pin (e.g. above) was well-made, a good fit and even has a small collar to let you know when it is sitting exactly centrally in the spool-shaft. 

Take care to remove the tiny C-clip which holds the pin in place before pushing out the pin!

In some of the other budget BFS reels that I own that pin has come loose after being removed for the first time.

However, it seems that the most significant factor about the build quality is probably that snug (but free-running) fit between the spool and the reel body. I'll get into how that translates into actual performance a little bit further into this review... After some essential facts and figures.

You can check current pricing and availability here:

Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra Vital Statistics

Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra: Design vs. Performance

On paper the dynamic casting brakes and incredibly light stock spool suggest the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra could be a budget reel with exceptional performance. The question is, whether this potential carries over into the real world? Super-tuned baitcasting reels, ultralight lures and specialist rods make for some incredibly complex interactions.

Style of Bearings in the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra

For instance, to cast the very lightest lures it is necessary for the combined inertia of the spool AND bearings to be extremely low. That is why micro-bearings are sometimes used for super-ultralight bfs applications. However, if the brakes on the reel are of a static design (i.e. apply a fairly constant amount of braking throughout the cast for each brake-dial setting), then adding microbearings often does not help casting performance.

The Dark Wolf Ultra uses regular (rather than micro) ball bearings - so don't be fooled by the low diameter of the bearing races.

Bearing Sizes for Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra

WARNING: Without the brake modification on the DYNAMIC BRAKES given later in this article, microbearings are unlikely to give a good result

However, if you've made the brakes modification and you love making those super-tuning adjustments, feel free to use the FD affiliate link for a pair of the correct-size Roro bearings. This does not affect the retail price for you and FD receives some commission for referring a sale to Roro (with thanks!) - the BFS ST bearings in either Stainless Steel or SiC will work really well:

Braking System Basic Characteristics

Usually, the rpm of the spool in a cast with a lure at the lower (and upper) weight-limits of a reel's capability needs significantly stronger control right after the spool starts spinning. Then, later in the cast with a light lure - it can be an advantage for the brakes to let the spool run a little more freely and squeeze out extra distance. With static brakes, achieving enough control at the beginning of the cast often means that the braking is harder than optimal in those middle and later stages.

The use of dynamic brakes in the Dark Wolf Ultra could be a good way of extracting the best performance out of such a light spool. However, this does raise the thorny issue of whether there is a difference in braking performance between left hand wind (LHW) and right hand wind (RHW) reels with this style of magnetic brake.

For Shimano FTB brakes, the pivot point for the brakes is flipped between the RHW and LHW models. In contrast, to date, it seems that none of the "non-Japanese" brand reels (barring the KastKing Kestrel Elite and Valient Eagle 2) using this design flip the pivot-point. As shown in the labelled photo above, this means there COULD be a difference between LHW and RHW braking. The problem was, until I did a lot of research into eddy current brakes I didn't know of any physics which could (potentially) produce such a difference...

Now, having done that research and built my own mock brake system - it makes perfect sense that the new "locked out" static braked version of the reel works just as well as the magnet-upgraded original version of the left hand wind reel. Here's how it actually works:

With all that said, the fact that you can blast casts as hard as you like (even when throwing a 1-g trout magnet as hard as you can) and the brakes on a Left Hand Wind reel will control the spool probably says all you need to know.

To keep up with all the latest developments, testing results, BFS stories and insider knowledge check out the Free VIP BFS and Finesse lure club newsletter offer (below). I'm currently offering an additional free welcome gift to new subscribers (which isn't compulsory - but is hopefully something you'd enjoy!)

Out of the Box Casting & Fishing Comparison

Before we get to a cast-battle with the Alphas Air, here's a real-world fishing test. For this exercise I switched back and forth between the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra and the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro while casting one of the lures which is really important to me in my BFS fishing (the Zoner Minnow 50SP), weighing in at 1.7g (1⁄16 oz) with single hooks fitted.

There are several key comparisons to make here. First of all, the Clamber is an aluminium-bodied reel and the only other "budget" (though more expensive) reel beside the Dark Wolf Ultra that I have not experienced loops of line migrating behind the spool after a blow-up. Secondly, the brakes on the Clamber are a "MagTrax" style static design. In other words you can adjust them to different strengths, but for any given setting there is pretty much the same amount of braking force applied throughout the cast. OK, the induction will be a bit stronger when it is spinning really fast, but you won't get that classic dynamic-brakes-style drop off of braking in the mid/later parts of the cast.

The spool of the Clamber has a noticeably larger diameter and is around a gram heavier (but still very light).

The first thing to say is that both reels performed well - AND they have distinctly different "personalities". That said, the distances achieved for an under-braked Dark Wolf Ultra with the Zoner Minnow on an Acehawk CU Double 5'6" UL rod and 4lb Berkley Trilene fluorocarbon were very similar to the Clamber.

Using the Clamber, my release point had to be a bit earlier and the casting stroke probably had a bit more zing in it. On the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra, I could release later and the lure would fly straight and - probably because of the lighter spool - it was a little easier to throw low trajectory casts parallel to the water on the Dark Wolf. Potentially the dynamic braking dropping off later in the cast might also help to prevent the lure riding up in the air under tension from the rod tip...

With all that said, the Clamber proved to be more resistant to blowing up the spool with my style of casting on small to medium sized rivers.

BUT that was before the easy modification to the Dark Wolf Ultra brakes... (and before Tsurinoya switched to stronger, static brakes)

You can check current pricing and availability here:

Fishing with the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra

I've now fished extensively with the Dark Wolf Ultra (I may need to shorten that to "DWU" to save some space ha ha!). It has performed well out of the box - and exceptionally well when the braking strength is increased. From winter chub fishing to trout, grayling and perch on a wide range of light and ultralight lures - it rapidly became my "go to" workhorse reel.

Subscribers to my BFS VIP club newsletter will have heard tales of multiple memorable trips with this reel. Below is a trout bathed in gorgeous spring sunshine from one of those red-letter days (accompanied by my friend Glenn)

Turning the (carbon) crank feels very good, with the gearing very smooth and positive. I was surprised to remember, again, that this is a carbon-bodied reel. So far, the thumb bar is crisp and positive and the reel re-engages with an equally reassuring snap (with the anti-reverse proving reliable also). I quite like the slightly understated drag clicker sound - it gives enough feedback to know when a fish is pulling line, without being an obnoxious "screaming reel". I did notice a touch of juddering to the drag clicker sensation rather than the silky smooth purr of very expensive reels. 

Note: I have seen one other customer report that the snap of the clutch re-engaging was overly loud and forceful. It seems in his reel, the springs were a bit stronger than necessary (though this issue seems to be rare).

The drag adjustment was accurate and easy via the alloy, clicking drag star (much better than the GH100 for instance) - and the clicking spool-tension adjustment dial felt similarly well-engineered. Casting brakes adjustment is easy and accurate - though this is one area where there is a marked "plastic" feel to the mechanism movement.

Overall though a very quality feel to a BFS reel at an amazingly affordable price point. I do like the positive, solid feeling of the smooth and almost "ported" handles. There is a tiny amount of play when you rock the crank back and forth away from the reel body - again nothing problematic.

Is the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra Under-braked?

In the original "out of the box" version - although opinions were divided - for me; yes this reel was under-braked. That's when I did a small experiment which turned everything on its head.

NOTE: for any reels purchased after June 2022, this modification is NO LONGER necessary.

Adding Magnets to the DYNAMIC BRAKE DWU: We're Not in Kansas Anymore...

The video above shoes a modification that uses £2.69-worth of materials and takes just seconds (and doesn't even require any tools). Doing this couldn't possibly make the Dark Wolf Ultra compete with JDM reels... could it?? Enter the neodymium magnets...

OK, confession time, yes the components cost a few pennies each, but they only come in packs of 50 when you buy from dedicated magnet retailers. However, it still only cost me about 15 quid (including VAT and shipping) to do a lot of experiments to discover the optimum recipe to tune those brakes.

NOTE: I only include this information in case you happen to buy an original (free-moving brake-shoe) edition of the Dark Wolf Ultra. The most recent version does not require the additional magnet(s) - and most likely would not even have the room to effectively fit extra magnets between the existing mechanism and the inside of the spool without rubbing...

My first big worry was that adding any extra magnets would have meant the brakes would no longer fit inside the spool (sinking the experiment before it was even begun). While this was true for adding even a 0.5-mm thick magnet to the existing magnet next to the pivot in each brake "arm", all the other positions would accept at least one extra magnet.

In contrast, I found that I could fit two 0.5-mm magnets onto the existing magnet at the "free" end of each brake arm. So began a game of mix and match with different numbers and strengths of magnets in each available position. Without boring you with the details - I eventually found a winning combination. This is shown below and it uses a single 1-mm thick magnet at the "free" end (these are more than twice as strong as 2x 0.5-mm magnets) and a single 0.5-mm magnet in the next-door position (i.e. the next-but-one to the free end).

Can the Dark Wolf Ultra Out-Cast the Alphas Air TW 20?

For a budget reel, posing that question seems like insanity. Yes, out of the box it is comparable with the Clamber Hyper Micro, but we have seen in the 5-way BFS Reel Cast Battle how dominant the superiority of the Alphas Air was. In reality, the Alphas wasn't in that "battle" as a competitor - it was there to set an essentially unreachable benchmark. For the budget reels, it was a race for second place.

With that in mind, my main hopes were that I could squeeze out a little more distance from the Dark Wolf than the Clamber Hyper Micro - and perhaps make the Dark Wolf a little less likely to blow up the spool when whipping out ultralight lures.

I tied on a 50-mm Zoner Minnow again and got out the tape measure...

After the first few casts with the new magnets, I realised something special had happened and that we should forget the "budget" BFS competition. On the correct brake setting, the Zoner FLEW and the spool had no hint of fluffing up. Now this meant a battle with the Alphas...

I hope to put together a short video of the "Cast Battle Royale". In the meantime, the brief details are that I put 50-m of 4lb Berkley Trilene Fluorocarbon on both reels and mounted each of them on identical 6' Kingdom "King Pro" rods with the tips rated for lures of 1-8g. To ensure consistency, I only used a single Zoner minnow (cutting it off one set up and tying it onto the other one) - just in case there were any small differences between other Zoners in my collection. Then I started casting against the tape...

By having the two 0.5-mm magnets and the two 1-mm thick magnets, the divisions between each click of the brake setting allowed a fine-enough adjustment for optimal casting. Conversely, using just the 1-mm magnet seemed to create larger "jumps", which restricted distance when going "one click above spool blow-up" brake). Using four 0.5-mm magnets achieved stronger braking (two to three clicks below "3" on the dial was about right) with fine adjustment also - but did not seem to yield additional distance. That meant having a total of 6 magnets was unnecessary. I continued the cast battle with four magnets, arranged as shown in the labelled photo shown previously.

To cut to the chase, I was astonished that the Dark Wolf Ultra logged multiple casts over 15m with the 1.7-g, hollow Zoner. The longest one was 15.53 metres (just about half an inch shy of 51 feet). The longest cast managed by the Alphas Air TW in this test was 15.08 m... with several around or just below 15m.

Because the 50-mm Zoner Minnow doesn't have an internal weight-shift system, sometimes it will flare and flap - so both reels also logged casts of between 12 and 14 metres too.

Try as I might, I was unable to beat the longest cast of the Dark Wolf Ultra with the Alphas Air TW. Both reels were incredibly stable in spool control and avoiding fluff ups once dialled in. For this rod, the wind conditions, line and weight of lure, I found a brake setting of two clicks below 4 the best for throwing the Zoner hard on the Dark Wolf.

For the Alphas Air TW I homed in on a brake setting of 9 for the same conditions. For both reels, one click lower than those settings tended to result in the spool fluffing up when throwing the cast with some force. 

NOTE: This test was carried out with uncleaned, stock bearings in both reels.

Although hard to believe that this sentence is being typed but, for this lure and rod combo, the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra with stock, un-cleaned bearings Out-Cast the mighty Daiwa Alphas Air TW with stock spool & bearings

NOTE: This was only possible using the added magnets in the configuration shown above 

Current pricing and global availability:

What's the Lightest Lure the Dark Wolf Ultra Can Cast?

Those first results with the Zoner sent me down a rabbit hole of testing.

For instance...

This ended up as a series of comparisons using out of the box, un-cleaned bearings, acetone-cleaned bearings and Roro BFS SIC bearings...plus a bunch of different lures. However, for these tests I kept the rod and line consistent as follows:

First up: The 1-gram (1/28th oz) Trout Magnet Trials

With a total combined weight (hook, weighted-head and soft lure) of just 1-g, Trout Magnets are typically assumed to be only compatible with spinning reels. As well as some of the super-tuned premium Japanese reels, the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra plus magnet upgrade opens the door to this super Ultra Light lure fishing as part of affordable BFS...

Just before getting into the actual tests, perhaps it's worth quickly considering the question of whether this is just a completely BS "circus trick" exercise - or whether it has a legitimate fishing application? In other words, just because you can - doesn't mean you should (and why not just use a spinning reel?) are all valid points.

Putting just the "fun" factor to one side for a second, there is a control to how you put your bait down on the water which is just different in a baitcasting reel compared to a spinning reel. Also, if you turn the reel handle to re-engage the bail-arm on a spinning reel, you tend to introduce line-twist, which can cause some horrendous problems with braided line over time...

That means you should manually flip the bail arm closed with your free hand before grabbing the reel handle again to start your retrieve. The thing with that is, one of the best presentations with a Trout Magnet is to cast directly upstream and then a natural drift back towards you.

With a baitcaster, the casting sequence of thumb-bar press (with your reel hand) on the backswing and then simply turning the crank handle to re-engage the spool and begin retrieving gives efficient casts with instant, great contact with your lure. It also feels really good to cast a lure with a well-balanced baitcasting rig. 

That just makes the whole thing fun (when it works!).

Now for the Results:

** Trout Magnet with Un-cleaned Stock Bearings **
Best Brake Setting: 2 Clicks below 4

Here are the 7 longest casts, with the maximum distance in bold:

** Trout Magnet with Acetone-cleaned Stock Bearings plus Deuthlon Cast Lube **
Best Brake Setting: 2 Clicks below 4

Here are the 7 longest casts, with the maximum distance in bold:

** Trout Magnet with Roro SIC 1-5g Bearings **
Best Brake Setting: 1 Click below 4

Here are the 7 longest casts, with the maximum distance in bold:

Trout Magnet Results Summary for Dark Wolf Ultra Plus Magnet Upgrade:

I ordered my Trout Magnet Kit Here (my Amazon Associates Link):

Pushing the Dark Wolf Ultra KF50S Limits With Super Ultra Light BFS (SULBFS?!)

Some people might say I don't know when to let something drop. 

Personally I can't see what they mean, so the obvious next thing to do was to try BFS with bead-head nymphs from my river fly fishing fly boxes...

Whether or not this falls completely into the "circus trick that's fun to do" rather the "completely legitimate fishing advantage" genre remains to be seen. Probably it will be more likely to belong in the "fun/because you can" category since competition fly fishing methods have developed so many effective ways of presenting these flies. 

The Trout Magnet is a bit different, since the 42-foot range while using 0.10-mm diameter line direct to my rod tip is definitely outside of presentations with a Euro-nymphing rig.

However, what if you find yourself on stream without your fly rod? That tends to happen quite a lot when you don't own any fly gear...

Having the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra (again, as long as you do the magnet upgrade) opens up so many diverse and fun fishing opportunities - and at such an affordable pricepoint. It really is quite unbelievable - and this experiment is a great way of showing just what can be possible.

Nymph Weight Line Up and Longest Cast Results

Here is what I tested so far:

The really interesting thing for me was how much difference both the overall "air resistance vs. streamlined" profile makes - BUT even more - how the flight-profile affected things. The hackled nymph (far left) doesn't weigh much less than the slim olive nymph (second from left) - but that olive nymph flew a lot further. However the hackle isn't the only story - the cut-down Trout Magnet with the 3-mm, pink tungsten bead (second from right) wouldn't cast as far as the lighter bead-head nymph in the centre.

This is because the Trout Magnet tends to spin in flight and suffer from air-resistance. The polyphitus nymph (far right) has all the weight concentrated at the bend of the hook and flies straight when cast. As well as being the heaviest nymph, this greatly contributed to it far out-casting the cut-down Trout Magnet...

Current pricing and global availability:

Can the Added Magnets Handle "Power BFS" Weight Lures?

A few days after the Zoner Minnow cast battle, the reel was spooled up with 50m of PE #0.6 diameter (0.12mm) Berkley Fireline Crystal braid. A 10lb Seagur fluorocarbon leader tied directly to a Daiwa Prorex Toddler Crank (weighing 9g with the hooks removed). This rig was cast using the 2 to 12-g lure-weight tip of the Kingdom Pro rod used in the Alphas Air cast battle.

A quick visit to the local park had one main aim - Discover if the upgraded brakes could handle casting a lure weighing more than only the ultralight BFS baits...

Not only did the reel easily cast the lure, it was actually difficult to backlash the reel until reducing the brake-settings to below 2 on the dial. In fact, at anything over two clicks above 2, I found it impossible to backlash - even on relatively hard casts. Although I didn't take a tape measure, using landmarks visible on Google Maps suggests that casts were easily going 35m (115 feet). 

Again, I have to admit that the reel (with extra magnets) exceeded my expectations in this test.

Is Batch Consistency a Problem for the Dark Wolf Ultra?

Via the joy of social media, I've been able to compare some spin-times of spools with the brakes set to max across different people who own the reel in Left Hand Wind. This has lead me to believe that it is much more likely to be angler preference and angler casting-style that determines whether someone finds the reel under-braked. 

While I'd need to cast a few dozen LHW and RHW Dark Wolf Ultras side by side to really bottom that out, what I've seen so far is already interesting. When comparing videos of the  owners who are happy with the braking versus folks who want a little extra brake-force it seems impossible to separate those reels on the basis of "maximum-brakes spool-spin time". 

When compared to the Clamber Hyper Micro, there was a clear difference in spool spin-time (brakes set to max); with the Clamber being noticeably quicker to stop.  

With that said, it is unclear how significant the static brakes of the Clamber would be in that situation - and also it is unclear how that spin-time would truly translate into cast-control.

Probably a more reliable indication of batch consistency will be the much tighter tolerances between spool and reel-body. The decision to make that gap much smaller and not allow for the variation seen in other budget reels is a bold one and could be a sign of confidence in manufacturing standards from Tsurinoya.

Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra: Round Up

This little reel has surprised me at every turn. My interest was certainly grabbed upon hearing about a "5-gram-something" spool. However the typical question marks over whether budget reel build-quality and/or braking system would stifle the full potential of that spool were also front of mind.

In its purely "out of the box" state, the Tsurinoya Dark Wolf Ultra is a very good budget reel - in fact the only carbon-bodied reel where my line doesn't end up behind the spool and wrapped up in the gears inside the reel. There is no barrier to having a great BFS experience.

BUT - with the very quick, simple and cheap modification to the brakes it becomes an astonishing BFS reel...and genuinely one that can take on (and beat) some much more expensive Japanese reels.

OK, the brake dial operation feels a little plastic-like and there is a small amount of play in the handle (and long-term robustness is yet to be seen) - however, that doesn't take away from what has to be recognised as a brilliant engineering achievement. Let's not forget that I didn't even clean the bearings (let alone replace them) and there was no after-market special spool used either.

I still love all my Japanese (and Swedish!) reels, and they have a special feel and operation all of their own - but my goodness the Dark Wolf Ultra is great to fish with and it absolutely achieves the important goal of removing barriers to people taking up BFS. I don't see it as a threat or a negative thing for the innovative and supremely engineered high-end reels; I don't know of many Bait Finesse anglers who can stick to just one reel! 

Instead it gives everyone a fighting chance of having a great first experience with BFS - and maybe even the chance to out-cast some of those anglers with the most expensive gear. Kudos to Tsurinoya for the achievement.Perhaps with some tiny tweaks to the brakes (or even the inclusion of the magnets shown in this article); then the Dark Wolf can be a world-beater, right out of the box.

If you want to try it out yourself specific UK and US suppliers for the Dark Wolf Ultra are:

• Needhams Specialist Tackle (UK)
• Bait Finesse Empire (USA)

You may prefer to make some cost savings by ordering from Aliexpress - the trade off may be a longer delivery time depending on your location and stock levels at local suppliers. Latest global price and availability can be viewed here:

Let me know what you think and your own experiences in the comments below...

Paul