OOAK Table Tennis Forum

1. Yes, ever since I first bought aftermarket rubbers it hasn't occurred to me to do otherwise.
2. I don't get approached to make up bats, but if they are my teammates or people I practise with and am friendly with, I just offer.
3. I don't so much encourage them to make their own, as make the offer to do it and add, "unless you'd rather assemble it yourself."

I'm not any kind of handyman, home mechanic, renovator or anything like that. But I assemble my own bats and I build my own bicycle wheels…

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"Once you get past a certain threshold, everyone's problems are the same: fortifying your island and hiding the heat signature from your fusion reactor." –Doctor Impossible

I can't see taking my rackets to the shop every time I need to change rubber... And making up one racket is somewhat enjoyable (though it's more tedious these days because I make a point of weighing - and scanning, if it's a new type - every sheet and blade before I actually put the thing together) but I can see that, if faced with making a half dozen rackets for a club, I'd likely get the shop to do it for me.

AND I've quit using water based glue. What a MAJOR pain in the neck. It's so easy to make a tiny mistake after which you have to peel it all off and start again, and it takes ages to dry.

Yeah, I've had people come to me to make up rackets.

Iskandar

1. I usually do my own rubbers, but the last time I bought from a booth at a tournament I was umpiring, so in between umpiring commitments the booth owner did the gluing & cutting as part of the service.
2. I did most of the gluing for my children, including an ox pimples that I did at work at lunch time in the foyer. No charge of course. No-one else
3. As my children haven't really gotten serious they aren't likely to do it themselves.

The last time I took rubbers off my old Nittaku carbon splintered a little so I had to get it repaired then I put the new ones on. Since then as I said in 1 above.

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Retriever (sometimes golden, but often leaden)
Moderator, Inverted Retriever Technique sub-forum - http://ooakforum.com/viewforum.php?f=74