Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06: BFS Reel with Ultra-light Spool

Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06

I recently got lucky and managed to get hold of a pre-market sample (through the UK distributor) of the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06. This is a really bold offering in the Bait Finesse System reel world; a CDM (Chinese Domestic Market) reel with a very light stock spool BFS reel. Plus, the Hyper Micro also sports an aluminium body at a low price for the industry, drag clicker and a bunch of other features that baitcasting reel fans often request.

To my eye, this is a truly lovely looking reel – so let’s dive in for some first impressions (there's a list of specs below the video...)

Specifications of the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06

Quick Reference Vital Statistics for Reel Tuning Addicts: Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06

Major Components – First Impressions

When palming the reel, it feels good – very light, but also robust. As well as being a candidate for the lightest available stock spool in any BFS reel (including JDM offerings), the design of the spool (below) seems to be an improvement over the GH100 from Fishband:

The way that the extended lip at the edges of the spool (above) fits into the side plates seems like it should protect against some instances of line getting trapped round the brakes/inside the body. The engineering tolerances also seem to be pretty accurate (e.g. below):

Though things move incredibly fast in the BFS reel development realm (especially in the world of affordable CDM reels), the Clamber remains an appealing option. Its light spool is of a larger diameter than the current super-ultra-light spool offerings such as the Tsurinoya Genius and the Soloking Acura (both carbon-bodied reels). This gives it the 70cm per handle turn of line recovery for its 6.6:1 gear ratio.

An update of this article has been forced by a recent price drop - so I have to flag up that the reel is now available from B&U's Official Store on Aliexpress for a much lower price than its original launch (which was around £150). My affiliate link for this product in this article doesn't add to the price you pay - but it does earn me a modest (but important) commission if you choose to buy after following that link.

Here's where you can check out the pricing I found (FREE international shipping offered to certain destinations) :

Weighing the spool (with and without bearing) for the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06

After calibrating the microbalance, I was able to get it to consistently measure at 6.16g without the bearing (shown in picture earlier in this article) and 7.71g with the bearing (pictured below).

Is the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06 a “JDM-killer”?

Does the CR-HM06 display as perfect tolerances as those on a top-end JDM reel? I’d say not quite. With that said, it is going to be difficult to stand up and declare that a “competing” reel of twice the price has tolerances that are more than twice as good… I like that this reel is forcing me to make those proportional judgements.

In the same way, creating a reel with these performance specifications – and yet keeping it affordable - means that Fishband will have to make some delicate choices on components and materials. In other words, by its very nature it HAS to make different choices than a reel with much higher manufacturing costs and retail pricing.

You can check for availability of left hand and right hand versions along with current pricing offers below:

My suspicion is that the aircraft grade aluminium must make it a significantly more expensive reel to produce than the GH100 or PW100. At the same time, opting for the simpler brake system (compared to the GH100) is probably going to create at least some cost-savings – if not in production, then perhaps in copyright battles!!

I guess the bottom line verdict is that, if you can afford to run Alphas Air TW 20s, Aldebarans, Millionaires, Conquests etc. for all your reels, you will still do that – and be very happy about it.

At the same time, I don’t think we’ve ever seen a reel in the “more affordable” bracket that is aiming so boldly at extreme BFS performance with truly ultralight lures as the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06.

Plastic vs. Metal

Inside the reel, there are a fair number of plastic components – though, I have to say, when turning the handle, pressing the thumb-bar or adjusting the spool tension – operations feel positive and accurate.

The spool tension (metal, grooved knob above), in particular, actually feels better than the Alphas Air. Out of the box, at least, pressing the thumb-bar is not a “mushy” experience at all. I’ll need to report back after 12 months of use to see how well that holds up over time.

I also found the drag star, brakes and spool tension adjustment to be accurate and positive. To me, the drag adjustment and brakes adjustment (see 10-setting/40 division brake-dial above) both seem quite a lot more reassuring and consistent than the GH100 – at least on my examples of both reels.

The Stock Bearings Question

One VERY interesting observation is that the heavily-greased bearings seem to loosen up quickly. Even just a short amount of time spent spinning the spool and winding the crank – and not even putting it on a rod – made a big difference. I can see why manufacturers wouldn’t want to ship reels with dry, steel bearings. At the same time, I suppose there could be problems with light oil leaking away during transit?

Fishband are reported to have sourced specific bearings to achieve the best performance for the CR-HM06, so I'm fascinated to see how they perform in the field of battle! 

I was keen to bottom out just exactly how well the reel performs with absolutely zero modifications. Of course, there has been an incredibly high bar set in that respect by the Alphas Air TW 20; especially with Daiwa’s K.T.F. (Karil Tuned Factory) collaboration on that reel - and now with the updated crop of reels with low diameter, ultralight spools such as the Dark Wolf Ultra, Black Knight II, Soloking Acura and Tsurinoya Genius/Elf (that you can find reviewed on Fishing Discoveries too).

A shock result for me was finding that acetone-cleaned (stock) bearings actually perform about as well as replacement (RoRo BFS) bearings. I still don't really know why the upgraded bearings (with smaller and lighter ball-bearings inside) don't provide the noticeable jump in performance I've found with all the other reels mentioned in this article. However, swapping out the bearings would save you from cleaning and lubricating the stock bearings (as an aside, I prefer cast lube from Deuthlon for that job).

Here's what my investigations into the Hyper Micro performance also found:

Casting with the Fishband Clamber Hyper Micro CR-HM06

6-g Distance Comparisons

3-g Distance Comparisons

2-g Distance Comparisons

Flip Casting Comparisons

Cast Results With Cleaned and lubricated Bearings Cast and Rorolure BFS micro bearings

My original plan was to repeat the above (2-day) operation of cast measurements (1 day) followed by statistical analysis, interpretation and plotting of the figures. However, the industry moves so fast that the original five models were quickly joined by multiple new contenders in the affordable BFS reel category.

So, instead of performing such a lengthy and detailed analysis, something I can do which may be of value to you is to just run through my overall experiences and findings with this reel. That way, I don't need to also run through the same suite of tests with four other reels (i.e. do four times the work - on the same day to keep conditions comparable) - plus saving on the statistical analysis time too.

As I've mentioned in brief already, I was surprised that there wasn't really any difference in cast distance between the specialised roro BFS bearings with lures in the 1.7g to 6g range. In fact, the surprising thing I found was that I probably prefer to clean and lubricate the original stock bearings. You might ask "why would that be?".

Well:

• For whatever mystical science and engineering reasons, installing the BFS bearings seems to make the Hyper Micro just slightly more sensitive to differences in lure weight. What I mean is, the reel feels like it becomes a little less forgiving when you switch lures and may need small tweaks to the brakes to maintain distance while still avoiding back lashes. This is particularly true the lighter you go with your lure.
• The stock bearings, once cleaned, gave a small improvement in distance and, with the tiniest drop of lubrication, remained more forgiving - at least of my personal casting style.
• So, for that reason (even though I love their products and I'm happy to be part of their affiliate programme) I wouldn't push you towards the Roro BFS bearings option - unless you REALLY didn't fancy cleaning and lubricating the bearings yourself.
• With all that said, following a short breaking-in period, everything works pretty well out of the box - especially for lures of 2g and above.

Overall, the Hyper Micro is an affordable aluminium-bodied reel which performs well for a range of BFS applications. It doesn't quite match the Daiwa Alphas Air TW 20 - whereas some of the newest crop of carbon-bodied reels with smaller diameter spools may actually out-cast the "factory version" Alphas. 

If it's an appealing option for you, feel free to check out the availability and pricing here:

PLUS, let me know what you think about the reel so far in the comments section below:

Paul