OOAK Table Tennis Forum

After a lot testing of Re-Impact blades, Kees and I got convinced someone should write a comprehensive guide on how to select the appropriate Re-Impact blade to suit a specific style, and how to best make use of the blade chosen as well. It should be completely objective, intended to be to the benefit of the players, not builders or sellers.

We decided on what was to go in it; then Kees wrote it, and I edited, formatted, put pictures in etc. I'm convinced of it's accuracy, and find it to be a highly useful and comprehensive guide.

Note that this is not a promotional article for Re-Impact. It's a guide written by a user and for other users, and should be highly beneficial for those that already use a Re-Impact blade, or for those considering buying one.

Anyway, here it is:

Re-Impact blade Selection and User Guide

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

As Haggisv has already indicated, this guide is a result of teamwork (it was very nice working with him, at that ). Still, you'll see my full name and title on this and might wonder why. Re Impact blades certainly aren't for everyone, but they are special in that they support very individual styles of play and do help players who wouldn't be able to play as well or even at all without them; that seemed a good enough cause to me, so I decided to do my bit and commit myself to it. I don't use my title here on this forum, as a rule, but for this once I decided to do so, to make clear that I am willing to stake my reputation as a scientist on the objectivity and thoroughness of this guide. I hope it will be of help to players.

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Without opponent, no match.

This is exactly that: a comprehensive guide. It's much more than someone having a hit or two and posting his experiences. A worthwhile read for sure, even if you're not into the combination blade thing.

I almost wish this extended into a broader range of TT topics, such as rubbers, different blade types, how the number of plies makes a difference, etc., but I'm happy with what we got.

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Nittaku Kamkit w/ Air Panamera OX
Tatco Hornet w/ ATP Leland Era

I congratulate you for your effort, meticulous and understandable to everyone.

Very well done.

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Competition bats:
Win-tec power def Tibhar 5Q sound Power Update 1.8 * Spinlord Agenda ox
TSP Balsa 3.5 Tibhar Genius+Optimium sound 1.8 * Grass D-tecs ox

Put to rest:
Galaxy T10 Bluefire M2 2.0 Palio Ck531a ox
Victas Koji Matsushita Tibhar Genius+Optimium sound MAX * Spinlord Dornenglanz ox
Donic Defplay Senso Tibhar Aurus Sound Black max * Grass D-tecs ox

Check out my quest for my new blade here: http://ooakforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=23241
Current standings:
Butterfly Matshushita powerdefence * Joola Chen Weixing * Nittaku KVU * Nittaku Shake defense* Tibhar stratus power defense * Victas Koji Matsushita * Yasaka Sweeper * Win-Tec power defence

Imagine having a guide like this for every brand!

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

Thread stickied

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

Very informative guide.

Some suggestions:

I suggest adding blade thickness (in mm) for each blades to the table list on article section 2.4,
or
have a thickness list of each blades below the last paragraph of article section 2.3,
since section 2.3 explains about how/why RI blades are thicker than conventional blades, also
assuming that not everyone in the forum already know about every RI blades' size spec.

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IMHO,

For readability purposes, adding few empty line break (double <br></br>)between paragraphs in long and comprehensive
article sections (i.e: article 3.2). Also
Maybe it's just me, but my eyes gets tired easily reading lots of body text in a single section, even if I am just skim-reading it.
Other than that, the hierarchy of the guide is clear enough to identify although personally I think using blue
(in headers and subheaders) on top of murky blue background is not strong enough for headers and/or subheaders.

It'll be even better if you put "rest area" for readers' eyes by placing bigger size picture (100% width x any height sized image)
in between these long body text in paragraph.
A close-up shot or artistic shot of a re-impact blade (with short footnote/image description) would be more than enough,
as well as making the catalog more well-designed

I understand that this is a comprehensive guide but I think it needs to be tidied up and retouched a bit
as it represents the neat hand-made work of A. Rendler.

Other than that, Good job Alex!
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Thanks for the feedback rkristia, much appreciated!

If the guide needs editing again, we will consider your good suggestions.

PS This excellent guide was written by Kees not me, I just helped out in a few areas, so he deserves the credit, not me.

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

Skim-reading a comprehensive guide you should expect missing things... Blade thicknesses are in Appendix B, p.14 ff.

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Without opponent, no match.

Great job Kees!



@Kees
What I meant is I think it would be helpful for the reader to state the thicknesses in section 2.3 or 2.4

P.S :
in Appendix B number 29. The thickness of Smart blade is not specified.

Thickness is not indicated by Achim, which could mean the blade (a recent model) is still under development. Mine is 11 mm thick.

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Without opponent, no match.

I've got the information in OOAK Shop here, can't remeber where I got it from . The thickness is quoted as 11.8mm.

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OOAK Table Tennis Shop | Re-Impact Blades | Butterfly Table Tennis bats
Setup1: Re-Impact Smart, Viper OX, Victas VS 401 Setup2: Re-Impact Barath, Dtecs OX, TSP Triple Spin Chop 1.0mm Setup3: Re-Impact Dark Knight, Hellfire OX, 999 Turbo
Recent Articles: Butterfly Tenergy Alternatives | Tenergy Rubbers Compared | Re-Impact User Guide

When we were, recently, testing some new Re-Impact blades we had an experience which is typical and I think posting it here will be informative, as it concerns active and conventional sides of blades, and illustrates some points made in the Guide.
My two sons have very different styles of play, directly related to the way they are built. The eldest (20) is broad, not very tall, and powerful; the way he moves isn’t especially delicate. His brother (18) is taller, slender, agile, and not very powerful; the way he moves is very fast and precise. The blades they were testing were new models, currently under development, one with a double balsa core and active on both sides, the other without any balsa at all, conventional at both sides. To me, testing them in a preliminary way, they had seemed about equally fast. To my youngest son the conventional blade seemed on the slow side; my eldest, however, thought the active blade seemed the slowest. Playing with the blades in competition using similar rubbers, the youngest on the active blade, the eldest on the conventional one, to me it seemed they were, again, both about equally fast. Quite fast, in fact.
This is typical. As the youngest one doesn’t have the power the eldest one has, he is using a very compact stroke, which is more economic. The active blade, reacting at the point of contact with the ball only, ensures that what power he has will go into the ball – all of it. But timing his strokes he has to be exactly right for this to happen. His elder brother prefers to make his strokes broader, using much more power less precisely; the active blade will only be fast when his timing is exactly right, which it mostly isn’t, so this blade doesn’t support his kind of stroke, and therefore seems slow to him; whereas the conventional blade does support his stroke, hence transfers his power into the ball – but less precisely, therefore less of it, which comes down to him producing with this blade the same speed as his younger brother with the active one. If he had the precision of his younger brother, and still his own power, the active blade would seem faster to him to a similar degree as now it seems slower to him.

My youngest still plays the active Re-Impact blade in competition. My eldest has changed to a carbon-lined blade which suits him even better. Nothing is as conventional as carbon, actually, as it is so hard that it will spread out the impact over most of the blade's head; the basic speed of carbon blades is generally high, but it does take power to use them well, whereas precision is rather less required.

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Without opponent, no match.

Hallo Kees... es ist dir doch sicherlich aufgefallen, das ich Dich nach Deinem Körpergewicht gefragt habe; jetzt weißt Du, warum! Wenn jemand schmal und schmächtig ist, dann benötigt der auch eher den Katapult eines Holzes und den sehr präzise wirkenden Ballanschlag, der nur am Tisch vergrößert wirkt. Will man sowas auch noch aus der Halbdistanz sicher und spinlos spielen, benötigt man beidseitig relativ harte Schwämme, die den Katapult Des Holzes ausbremsen können. Meistens sind solche Spieler eher Tisch-, also selten Halbdistanzspieler. Also benötigen die Spieler Hölzer, die nach der modernen TTL spielen; also wo man mit extrem kurzen Spielbewegungen richtig Dampf machen kann, was wiederum mit einem konventionell ausgelegten Schläger gar nicht möglich wäre. Die schnelle Ballannahme braucht eine präzisere Spielführung als die lange Ballannahme und mit KN bemerkt man das natürlich viel schneller als mit normalen Spielbelägen, weil die wesentlich direkter spielen und auch direkter gespielt werden müssen. Wir haben es also mit wesentlich mehr Spielauswirkungen zu tun, die wieder immer individuell angepasst gesehen werden müssen. Das, was deine beiden Söhne ausgetestet haben, ist als äußerst wichtig anzusehen; "zeigt es doch einen ganz wichtigen Unterschied zwischen Aktiv- und konventionell ausgerichteten Hölzern an!"
Es ist daher auch logisch, das ein konventioneller Spieler meist ein langsameres Schlägerholz wählt, wenn dieser normal spielt und eher ein schnelleres unter den konventionell ausgelegten Hölzern wählt, wenn dieser mit KN spielt.
Deswegen ist es auch genauso logisch, das ein schmächtiger Spieler eher das katapultreiche Tischholz wählt und ein gewichtiger Tischspieler meistens mit Material am Tisch spielt, um das Aktivholz beherrschen zu können.
....

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Re-Impact GmbH. 49448 Lemförde "21 years of Rendler woods".
since November 1999 from A. RendlerGbR to Re-Impact GmbH
Phone +495443-9209999 mailto://[email protected]/ http://www.re-impact.de/