OOAK Table Tennis Forum

We just got the TSP Blockman II blade in the shop... we've been trying to order it from TSP for a while but it never seemed to be available.

This blade is really slow, and should work very well for a close-in push & blocker style game. It absorbs the pace off the ball very well, and not through vibration like some of the other defensive blades do (like Toxic 3), but the wood seems to absorb the pace, although I can still feel more vibration than a balsa blade. It looks like it's a little less than 7mm thick. I does not look it has any balsa in it.
It's also quite light, the one I checked was only 73. Quality is high, it's made in Japan.

I would suggest it would work well with a OX LP like Dtecs (since the blade is so slow it should be controllable) or an anti or thin inverted on the backhand, and a fast & spinny rubber (or fast short pimple) for forehand, for good contrast.

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Very interesting blade which could help my game

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Setup 1: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS acid green OX BH
Setup 2: Setup 2: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango PS black 2.00mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS red OX BH
Setup 3: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & & Spinlord Dornenglanz OX red BH
See the ball, be the ball...

It's designed for blocking with long pips apparently - originally was a CP version only. And this is the 2nd version, adjusted for the plastic ball (a bit thicker, etc.). I just got mine from Amazon Japan. Standard 80g+-, mine is 83g, thickness is 6.5mm. Size is pretty standard 158mm x 153mm. Superb finish (Made in Japan), zero sharp edges when I grip it. I tried it with Nittaku Goriki Kaisoku Max rubber on the forehand and Butterfly SuperAnti 2.2mm on the backhand. I didn't have much hope it would work well with the Anti as it's supposedly on the softer side, but it does and does it greatly! The same anti on other blades (Stiga Hypertech, BTY SK carbon) was much faster and felt 'too grippy', but on the Blockman II it got much slower, and the reversal was suddenly there too. Most of all, it excelled in keeping the serve return short, as well as blocking short and low. At the same time, the SuperAnti having a few more gears up its sleeve than the frictionless anti rubbers, it's also great for chopping as well as controlled at hitting underspin or higher bounce balls. But again, this blade boosted my confidence in blocking a lot, and quite effective with the reversal too. On the forehand, the Goriki Kaisoku rubber being a bit unusual by itself (designed by the guy who came up with the Goriki blade series at Nittaku, supposed to feel and play like half-inverted, half-short pips), was able to do very spinny serves, and great touch for drop shots and pushes. A bit on the slower side as a combo though counter hitting and blocking felt good. I will try the blade with MX-P and G-1 these days, just so I can understand it better, and to see if looping with get better. Likewise, I will try the Goriki Kaisoku rubber on my standard blade of 10 years (Stiga Hypertech), so I know how it fares to the tensor rubbers.
To re-cap, I expected vibration and the softness of the blade to negatively affect the combo with the SuperAnti, but it did not. It plays as if it is a stiff slow blade, keeping the blocks low and short.

"univesse", Consider the Joola Golden Tango 1.8 for your FH it work brilliantly on my TSP Trinity Carbon so I reckon it would also do well on your blockman.

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Setup 1: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS acid green OX BH
Setup 2: Setup 2: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango PS black 2.00mm FH & Tibhar Grass D.TecS red OX BH
Setup 3: Blade: TSP Trinity Carbon | Joola Golden Tango black 1.8mm FH & & Spinlord Dornenglanz OX red BH
See the ball, be the ball...

I had not seen your response, gotta check my settings.. The Trinity Carbon seems much faster than the Blockman II (which is rated Slow+). Anyhow, I did try the Blockman II with MX-P and G-1 and the verdict was that I seem to run out of energy and slack on attacking which is never a good thing. I.e., it's a bit slow for looping. I've used Off- blades for some 25 years (Primorac OFF- and Stiga Hypertech) so I'm used to hitting hard to get the ball going but the Blockman is still too slow for my forehand, and have a hard time swinging through 2200+ US rated players. I still like it but it's currently on my Ebay

What is the blade composition? At least the top ply?

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Blade: Donic Persson Powerplay
FH: Inverted rubber..
BH: Dr Neubauer Super Block Extreme

Sorry, just seeing this now.. looks like I had not logged in for a while.
The top layer is Ayous, and the core layer is cedar.
I still have the blade and will try it out again one of these days~