How to boost rubber

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Hello :D
I saw that many of you are talking about boosting rubbers
Until i got my current rubbers i played with euro/japanese rubbers and i always thought that my rubbers dont need boosting.
But now i am not satisfied with speed of my rubbers and i want enhance speed.
I did some research on internet and most people recommend boosters or some oil like baby oil or rapeseed oil.
So what do you recommend :D
 
says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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Tuning your rubber will give you some more speed (nice) but you are mainly getting better feel, softer sponge, and more spin. All this allows you to hit the shot harder and still land it.

Sometimes you ruin a rubber overdoing it or doing it wrong, so try it out on those 4 for $15 rubbers you get or an older sheet of something you got laying around.

Tuning oil is great to get a too-hard sponge down to a manageable firmness. It is also great to "customize" the performance of your rubber. Americans are very spoiled with older cars doing this as a passion and so are Europeans. It is in their culture to tinker around.

The (Stated) intent of the ban on tuners for comps is to make the comp fair and take away advantages gained by the tuner.

The (real) intent of the tuner ban is to get us to buy moar rubbers and moar and moar and moar and moar (see a pattern ??!!) insane expensive rubbers.

I can see the advantage gained by a fellow tuning H3 to perfection vs a player who has H3 stock without tuning and they both face each other. That is clearly an unfair advantage if one follows rules and one doesn't.

I cannot see the advantage gained by one player who tunes his 868 $4 USD rubber from ebay on a Yinh 896 balde playing vs someone who has T05 on a TBS blade. In terms of raw power, that is like a Cooper Mini trying to race vs a BMW M5. If the course if super hairpin curvy enough, maybe a mini can hold up. Of course TT is a completely different animal.

Official rules are clear on how all this is measured and we could also get into it about how Rubber Cement is cheating when you used it to adhere your old rubber a week prior.
 
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Tuning your rubber will give you some more speed (nice) but you are mainly getting better feel, softer sponge, and more spin. All this allows you to hit the shot harder and still land it.

Sometimes you ruin a rubber overdoing it or doing it wrong, so try it out on those 4 for $15 rubbers you get or an older sheet of something you got laying around.

Tuning oil is great to get a too-hard sponge down to a manageable firmness. It is also great to "customize" the performance of your rubber. Americans are very spoiled with older cars doing this as a passion and so are Europeans. It is in their culture to tinker around.

The (Stated) intent of the ban on tuners for comps is to make the comp fair and take away advantages gained by the tuner.

The (real) intent of the tuner ban is to get us to buy moar rubbers and moar and moar and moar and moar (see a pattern ??!!) insane expensive rubbers.

I can see the advantage gained by a fellow tuning H3 to perfection vs a player who has H3 stock without tuning and they both face each other. That is clearly an unfair advantage if one follows rules and one doesn't.

I cannot see the advantage gained by one player who tunes his 868 $4 USD rubber from ebay on a Yinh 896 balde playing vs someone who has T05 on a TBS blade. In terms of raw power, that is like a Cooper Mini trying to race vs a BMW M5. If the course if super hairpin curvy enough, maybe a mini can hold up. Of course TT is a completely different animal.

Official rules are clear on how all this is measured and we could also get into it about how Rubber Cement is cheating when you used it to adhere your old rubber a week prior.


Thanks for explenation,i will try it on my old butterfly bryce or on 868 rubbers.
And one more question-do i have to treat topsheet or sponge :D ?
 
says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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If you can get refined lamp oil (paraffin oil) get it. That stuff in inexpensive and works. Put on a light coat, wait an hour or two, and rub off all the old glue, then slap on a few more medium coats as the sponge absorbs it. You will have to try out this stuff a few times to get judgment of how much oil to use without ruining the sponge. Expect a dome. Let he stuff settle down at LEAST a full day or so before trying to glue it on blade. Even then, you might need to use the old tricks of sanding edges of blade a bit, using moar glue, and a press or many heavy books to keep rubber adhered to the blade.

All in all, tuning is a lot easier to do over time than SG, although you gotta wait a couple days in all and many players are too much in a hurry to use their rubber for that. If you are not an everyday player, then you tune again down the road the same rubber and go through the hassle of removing all the glue again and again, that gets old soon.

I am happy that both Aurus and Evo series perform well enough in stock version that I do not need to tune to get the rubber where I like it.
 
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If you can get refined lamp oil (paraffin oil) get it. That stuff in inexpensive and works. Put on a light coat, wait an hour or two, and rub off all the old glue, then slap on a few more medium coats as the sponge absorbs it. You will have to try out this stuff a few times to get judgment of how much oil to use without ruining the sponge. Expect a dome. Let he stuff settle down at LEAST a full day or so before trying to glue it on blade. Even then, you might need to use the old tricks of sanding edges of blade a bit, using moar glue, and a press or many heavy books to keep rubber adhered to the blade.

All in all, tuning is a lot easier to do over time than SG, although you gotta wait a couple days in all and many players are too much in a hurry to use their rubber for that. If you are not an everyday player, then you tune again down the road the same rubber and go through the hassle of removing all the glue again and again, that gets old soon.

I am happy that both Aurus and Evo series perform well enough in stock version that I do not need to tune to get the rubber where I like it.

Wow now you told me that i am afraid to try tuning my main rubbers :D
But i will try it on my old rubbers :)
Thanks for warning :D
 
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yeah, make sure don't use too much oil and let it set - may take days, or week+, depending on the sponge.
quite fun to try out, but lots of days of waiting until you can use it.
if you put too much, you may damage the rubber too
 
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I had used paraffin oil on H3, TG3, TG2. Every time, bubble is popped up and my rubber got damaged. Any suggestions.
 
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I had used paraffin oil on H3, TG3, TG2. Every time, bubble is popped up and my rubber got damaged. Any suggestions.

Paraffin last longer.. i think you are over doing the application. One thin layer is enough per day. Let it stand air dry for 24hrs

Sent from my HTC One M8 using Tapatalk
 
says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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It is also easy to apply too much oil and the oil runs down the side of the sponge and gets where the sponge meets topsheet. Sometimes, you can separate the topsheet that way. Not the end of the world as you can re-glue it, but that is a big hassle to carefully separate the rest and reglue/wait.

Tuning rubbers you never use anymoar or really cheap ones is a good way to get valuable experience.

Who says failing isn't a good thing?
 
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It is also easy to apply too much oil and the oil runs down the side of the sponge and gets where the sponge meets topsheet. Sometimes, you can separate the topsheet that way. Not the end of the world as you can re-glue it, but that is a big hassle to carefully separate the rest and reglue/wait.

Tuning rubbers you never use anymoar or really cheap ones is a good way to get valuable experience.



Who says failing isn't a good thing?

Can i use booster,is it better than using some oil,can i ruin my rubber with booster ?? :D
 
says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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Boosting, tuning, treating, and whatever term we want to use are doing the same thing - applying some kind of substance like a certain oil to improve the properties or performance of your sponge, which in turn, makes the rubber perform more comfortably or better in some way(s).

There are all kinds of stuff one can use to treat the sponge, some home made (lamp oil or baby oil) some you buy from a TT equipment company (like Haifu or Falco tuning/boosting oil)

We can make a huge instruction manual and many have essentially done that, but when it comes down to it, a person simply has to do it himself and fail a bit to learn. One can avoid some failure by asking others and paying attention, but one really learns from personal experience and sometimes an occasional failure. It is also a lot more fun and adventurous to do stuff on your own that YOU did without anyone leading or helping.

ITTF made really clear about additives to the "covering" being illegal once you buy the rubber and what they do to detect it. National associations copy/paste ITTF rules and so on all the way down to your local hall. We can debate what a "covering" consists of and how right or wrong it is for a "manufacturer" to tune the daylights out of a sponge at the "factory" and still be legal for sale for you to use while if you do the same thing yourself to the same rubber it is illegal. We all get that argument and it will pop up on just about every tuning thread ever made.

The above few paragraphs are about everything one needs to know, so go out and get your experience and let us know how it worked.
 
This user has no status.
This user has no status.
Member
May 2014
201
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296
Read 4 reviews
Boosting, tuning, treating, and whatever term we want to use are doing the same thing - applying some kind of substance like a certain oil to improve the properties or performance of your sponge, which in turn, makes the rubber perform more comfortably or better in some way(s).

There are all kinds of stuff one can use to treat the sponge, some home made (lamp oil or baby oil) some you buy from a TT equipment company (like Haifu or Falco tuning/boosting oil)


We can make a huge instruction manual and many have essentially done that, but when it comes down to it, a person simply has to do it himself and fail a bit to learn. One can avoid some failure by asking others and paying attention, but one really learns from personal experience and sometimes an occasional failure. It is also a lot more fun and adventurous to do stuff on your own that YOU did without anyone leading or helping.

ITTF made really clear about additives to the "covering" being illegal once you buy the rubber and what they do to detect it. National associations copy/paste ITTF rules and so on all the way down to your local hall. We can debate what a "covering" consists of and how right or wrong it is for a "manufacturer" to tune the daylights out of a sponge at the "factory" and still be legal for sale for you to use while if you do the same thing yourself to the same rubber it is illegal. We all get that argument and it will pop up on just about every tuning thread ever made.

The above few paragraphs are about everything one needs to know, so go out and get your experience and let us know how it worked.

I think you are right.The best choice is to try it on some old rubbers so i will do my best and let you know how it work.Thanks :D ;)
 
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