OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Hi all, I need your advice.

I really like the hard tacky Chinese rubbers. I know these rubbers are performing at their best on a flex blade.
Due to a neck injury I can't play with a heavy set-up anymore. The max weight of the blade is preferably 80g. Total weight about 170g.

I am FH looper who defend/push with his BH. I play with a 1.5mm Bloom spin on my backhand and a Battle II or H3 on my FH.

"edit" found the Nittaku Septear Lead as a possible blade so far. Anybody out here have any idea's?

Kind Regards!

I bought a Nittaku Septear Lead (only 73g) to try this blade with the sticky Chinese rubbers.

The 1.5mm Bloom spin on my backhand was very good for blocking, pushing and chopping. Lot's of control and insane backspin on return. BH opening with this rubber was also very easy! Liked it a lot, just can do anything.

Played with a H3 prov blue sponge (1 layer falco long) on my FH.

Opening and looping/spinning close to the table was easy. Also blocking and pushing were good. Further away from the table though looping/counter looping was more difficult. It felt like some ball were "dropping" or "falling of" from my blade. Maybe my technique isn't good enough or the H3 in combination with the blade is not good for this.

Would counter looping be easier (than H3) with DHS H3 neo prov/Friendship Battle 2?

Kind Regards.

IMO blade is more important when playing away from the table. A thicker and heavier blade performs better.

I don't know if blades actually "flex" - if you look through the old threads from five years ago you'll see what I mean. What I think people mean by "flex" is a feeling that the blade is "soft" - something to do with vibrations. Actually, if you scan threads from 8-10 years ago you'll see all sorts of terms that have fallen into disuse - "dwell time", "flex", etc.

In any case, I've got a Septear - it's one of the several 7 ply Hinoki blades I bought some years back. It's light, and I thought it was a little slow. Maybe I should give it another try, along with that Darker 7P-2a.

Iskandar

Swapping the H3 to a Euro Tensor would give you the power you miss but you might sacrifice some control and ability to hit short spinny loops at the table due to the catapult effect. If you like the hard feel of H3 then a rubber like Rasanter R45 or Omega VII pro might be worth a try in say 2mm.

He could experiment by flipping the bat around - he's already got Rasanter on the back side.

Iskandar

I know, but I need to reduce the weight a bit due to an injury.

I played with that Rasanter R45 on FH but it doesnt have the "kick" that chinese rubbers have. Years ago players from lower level couldn't return my FH spin if I hit it perfectly. Nowaday's, with the new plastic ball, players from lower level can easily return my spin. If I play with the chinese rubbers they can't return it like it was in the past. That's why I like the Chinese rubbers. The problems is that they are heavy and if you go away from the table you need to hit harder (more physical demands). So I was searching for a "lighter" blade to make up for the heavy chinese rubber but also helps me to hit with the chinese away from the table. Flex blades will help away from the table in my opinion.

In my signature is my old set-up. The ma long 5 blade is to heavy for me now.
I played with Rasanter allready on my FH side.

I like the Septear Lead very much. Very good feeling and control. It feels and looks like a $200 blade. The Hurricane 3 neo on the FH was a little faster than H3. Monday in training I will try the boosted Battle 2. I know this feels a lot faster than the H3 and plays more like a European rubber so my hopes are high that this rubber will "solve" my problem away from the table.

Flex/soft is hard to understand. In my experience the not so stiff blades are working better with the hard rubbers.

Yeah, there's definitely a lot of difference between blades. Much more than the differences between rubbers. Some are definitely faster than others, some "feel" softer or harder than others (carbon blades "feel" hard). But I don't think they actually flex, unless it's the sense of a drumskin. They don't actually bend, if you tried to bend them, they'd break at the handle joint before they will actually bend.

Lightweight blades? Have you looked at Re-Impact? They specifically make them for players with injuries. I'm pretty sure they've got blades for playing back from the table, they have a lot of different designs. I use the Sanwei M8 - cheap blade, but IMHO better than anything else I've tried. Similar to the Stiga Allround, but lighter. Then again, where I play you can't retreat very far from the table, and the players are all fairly low level. They are pretty light - I have examples from 72 to 82 grams. They're so cheap I bought several.

Iskandar

I think they will bend but just a little. Like normal wood does. See this site from SDC
https://www.sdcttblades.com/nerdy-stuff ... s-hardness

I have the re-impact chevalier. With Bloom spin 1.5mm on the BH and Rakza X 2.0mm on the FH. It is good with those rubbers. I tried the H3 on the FH but is was no succes. Maybe I have to try the Battle 2 prov also on it.

Haha, there is the Sanwei M8 again. Good blade for the money. I also have it but like the also cheap Palio King Yue a little more.

The thing I was challenging people to try was to clamp the handle of a blade to a table. Then put weights on the tip of the blade and see how much it bends before it breaks. I don't think it'd bend very much before cracks start to appear. And whatever weight you put on the blade, it's going to be exerting far more force than the ball would when you hit the hardest possible smash. And any bending would take place at the end of the handle, like that graphic shows.



I'd contend that what we're actually feeling is vibrations. And mostly in the second mode, and very tiny ones at that. It's when a blade has a stiff outer skin that we think of a blade as "hard" or "stiff". Blades with soft outer skins have lower frequency vibrations and and feel "soft" or "flexible".

Did you try H3 with a thinner sponge on the Re-Impact? They say, with their blades, to use thinner sponge because the skin flexes (like the illustration on the right) and replaces part of the sponge.

Iskandar

I think theory about bending handle is false. The reason is that penhold grip players do not use handle much but they still feel difference between stiff and flexy blades.

Good point. That's pretty much what I am arguing. It's actually the "drumskin" vibrations (i.e. the second mode) that we are feeling. And I think it's more of a feeling than anything else.

Iskandar