Up Close: Octbox D25 Mk18 The Best Yet!
Match Fishing gets its hands on the brilliant new Octbox D25 MK18.
The Octbox team really are the best at listening to what their customers want. The head of design, Rick Tyler, spends hours on the phone to his many customers and always looks for ways to incorporate what they are saying and to improve the highly popular seatbox range.
The D25 MK18 is the perfect example of listening to customer feedback and making improvements.
First up, let’s have a look at the appearance of the box. The Octbox has always been a substance-over-style seatbox for me. A box that does every job it has been designed to do perfectly and practically, while remaining super strong and well made. But it has never been much of a ‘looker’.
The MK18 definitely is though, thanks to its nice new logo and colour scheme, along with a smart new footplate design that really does look the part. One gripe I had with previous versions of the Octbox was the number of handwheels on the system. Of course they were necessary to allow everything to be fully adjustable, but it looked a little… knobby!
However the new box is now ‘knobless’ thanks to the headless grubber bolts that are adjusted by using an allen key (provided). The headless bolts are on the key areas that only need to be adjusted once, for example the height of the seatbox. Set it up perfectly for your height once and it should never need to be adjusted again. It looks loads better, that’s for sure.
The next big improvement is the compact keepnet adaptor system that is designed to house three nets. One net sits in the middle of the footplate while the two are then housed directly next to them on the frame. The nets sit perfectly, exactly where you need them.
One thing that cannot be questioned is the MK18 strength. During tests at Cambridge University, the box could support an incredible 1,500kg with the inner legs extended! Which is amazing considering this is one of the lightest seatboxes on the market.
Always wanting to improve the stability of the seatbox, Rick has designed non-pivoting alloy grip feet. These are fixed in position, which removes any lateral movement whatsoever and further improves the stability of the system.
A new and improved bait waiter is supplied with the box. This compact system neatly fits underneath the frame of the box and can house four standard-sized bait boxes. Further additions to the bait tray can be made with various add-ons available, which allow the capacity of the tray to be increased. It is a more compact solution than the previous side tray.
The basic seatbox is supplied with a shallow drawer and deep cross drawer. But again various units can be purchased to increase storage.
There are simply too many improvements to really do justice in this review. This is the best Octbox yet. The many new features and tweaks to an already superb system make this a must-see for all Octbox fans, or anyone looking for a new seatbox.
RRP: £550
Verdict: The best Octbox to date; a host of improvements make this system even better!
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