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The following is a translation of an article I previously posted on a Korean community forum.
It’s a supplementary explanation about why blades are usually constructed with an odd number of plies.
I have written before about different aspects of blade making, but I thought it might be helpful to go deeper into the topic of ply numbers, so I’m sharing this article.
As a blade designer for Nexy, I always feel a certain caution when writing articles like this. Information needs to be shared at a level that’s helpful, but not so detailed that it fuels excessive curiosity or equipment obsession. I’m also wary of the possibility that people who used to make blades without much understanding might start gaining systematic knowledge through my writing.
Still, my job is to share information and keep pushing beyond what I’ve already shared. If I just hold on to what I know, Nexy’s growth will slow. That’s why I’ve chosen to be bold in opening up this knowledge.
Table tennis blades are generally made with an odd number of plies.
Of course, there are exceptions such as single-ply blades (typical of Japanese penhold, e.g. hinoki one-ply), or three-ply blades (like Tibhar’s well-known hinoki blade H-3-9).
But the more common structures are five-ply and seven-ply.
With the advent of synthetic materials, when these are counted as one ply, a five-ply with synthetic material becomes equivalent to seven-ply, and a seven-ply with synthetic material becomes nine-ply.
There are also rare cases of 11-ply or 13-ply constructions, and some companies promote multiple carbon layers. But unless it’s a very specific case (like Tibhar’s Quad Wing series), adding many layers usually brings no real advantage.
From here, a few natural questions arise:
In this article, I’ll try to answer these five questions step by step.
In the past, some players who used one-ply hinoki penhold blades were so impressed with their power that they assumed hinoki itself was an inherently fast material. That’s actually a misunderstanding. The kind of hinoki used for one-ply penhold blades is quite soft and not particularly fast by nature. The speed comes from the thickness—about 10 mm—used in these blades, which allows hinoki’s unique “gripping” feel to be preserved while also giving sufficient pace.
If we were to make a shakehand blade of standard thickness (about 6 mm) from a single ply of hinoki, it would be extremely slow. But the reason thin one-plies are avoided is not only speed—it’s also about durability.
When you make a blade from a single piece of wood, the biggest issue is that over time the wood can warp or crack as it dries. Hinoki, with its distinct grain, tends to twist if the grain lies horizontally. To minimize this, a thick cut is required, and vertical grain orientation is preferred. Vertical grain reduces the risk of shrinkage and also improves performance: blades cut with diagonal or off-grain hinoki often produce weak shots and unpleasant vibration.
Another crucial step is long, careful drying. At Nexy, we use wood that has been processed into board form and then dried over an extended period, so by the time we make blades, most deformation has already occurred. Even so, if the grain isn’t straight or if the wood is too thin, warping risk remains, which is why single-ply blades are made from thicker material.
Other woods, because of higher risk of deformation, are rarely used for one-plies. An exception is Ayous, which has little grain structure and resists humidity changes. For this reason Galaxy/Yinhe makes some Ayous one-plies. In Korea, where summer and winter differ greatly in temperature and humidity, material choices are even more limited.
(A useful analogy: the soundboard of a grand piano, often made of spruce. Seasonal humidity changes in Korea frequently cause soundboards to crack. High-end pianos have built-in humidity control, but in winter it’s still common for soundboards to split. Similarly, wood stability is critical in blade construction.)
To prevent warping more effectively, multiple plies are glued together with alternating grain directions. Since wood fibers usually run lengthwise, they shrink in that direction as they dry. Crossing the grains balances the forces and prevents warping.
This leads to the answer: the center ply must be lengthwise grain and as solid as possible, because it transmits ball impact cleanly to the handle. If the center ply were cross-grain, the feedback would be cut off mid-blade. That’s why the middle ply is always vertical grain.
Then comes the second ply in cross-grain, and finally the outer ply in vertical grain. This way the user feels the ball’s impact transmitted naturally down to the handle. It also looks and feels more consistent.
If you build an even-ply blade, the problem is at the center. You’d have to put two vertical-grain plies in the middle. These two could move together in one direction, overpowering the outer plies and causing warpage. If you cross them, then the outer plies end up mismatched, creating asymmetry and again leading to warping. That’s why odd-ply is the rule.
At Nexy, some 5th-generation blades (like Chakra, Arke) use front and back surfaces with different compositions—a bold attempt at asymmetry. When I first designed the Mushiro blade, Tibhar warned it might warp because of the asymmetry. But I had confidence: the core wood was stable, the outer plies were thin, and the carbon layer was placed at one-third depth. The result: no warping, and a success.
Now, with the 5th generation, we’ve refined this know-how. Other brands might fail if they copy it blindly. You could say one of the reasons our 5th generation represents the culmination of a decade’s work is precisely our ability to realize stable asymmetry in blade design.
It’s a supplementary explanation about why blades are usually constructed with an odd number of plies.
I have written before about different aspects of blade making, but I thought it might be helpful to go deeper into the topic of ply numbers, so I’m sharing this article.
As a blade designer for Nexy, I always feel a certain caution when writing articles like this. Information needs to be shared at a level that’s helpful, but not so detailed that it fuels excessive curiosity or equipment obsession. I’m also wary of the possibility that people who used to make blades without much understanding might start gaining systematic knowledge through my writing.
Still, my job is to share information and keep pushing beyond what I’ve already shared. If I just hold on to what I know, Nexy’s growth will slow. That’s why I’ve chosen to be bold in opening up this knowledge.
Odd-number ply construction
Table tennis blades are generally made with an odd number of plies.
Of course, there are exceptions such as single-ply blades (typical of Japanese penhold, e.g. hinoki one-ply), or three-ply blades (like Tibhar’s well-known hinoki blade H-3-9).
But the more common structures are five-ply and seven-ply.
With the advent of synthetic materials, when these are counted as one ply, a five-ply with synthetic material becomes equivalent to seven-ply, and a seven-ply with synthetic material becomes nine-ply.
There are also rare cases of 11-ply or 13-ply constructions, and some companies promote multiple carbon layers. But unless it’s a very specific case (like Tibhar’s Quad Wing series), adding many layers usually brings no real advantage.
From here, a few natural questions arise:
- Why are Japanese penhold blades made with one single hinoki ply?
- Why are there virtually no even-ply blades? (Tibhar’s IV-L is a rare four-ply example.)
- Why is the five-ply structure regarded as the “standard” composition for blades?
- Why is the seven-ply considered a “reinforced” version of the five-ply, especially for speed?
- Why are nine-ply, eleven-ply and other high-ply all-wood blades so rare?
In this article, I’ll try to answer these five questions step by step.
1. Why is a Japanese penhold blade with hinoki made from a single ply?
In the past, some players who used one-ply hinoki penhold blades were so impressed with their power that they assumed hinoki itself was an inherently fast material. That’s actually a misunderstanding. The kind of hinoki used for one-ply penhold blades is quite soft and not particularly fast by nature. The speed comes from the thickness—about 10 mm—used in these blades, which allows hinoki’s unique “gripping” feel to be preserved while also giving sufficient pace.
If we were to make a shakehand blade of standard thickness (about 6 mm) from a single ply of hinoki, it would be extremely slow. But the reason thin one-plies are avoided is not only speed—it’s also about durability.
When you make a blade from a single piece of wood, the biggest issue is that over time the wood can warp or crack as it dries. Hinoki, with its distinct grain, tends to twist if the grain lies horizontally. To minimize this, a thick cut is required, and vertical grain orientation is preferred. Vertical grain reduces the risk of shrinkage and also improves performance: blades cut with diagonal or off-grain hinoki often produce weak shots and unpleasant vibration.
Another crucial step is long, careful drying. At Nexy, we use wood that has been processed into board form and then dried over an extended period, so by the time we make blades, most deformation has already occurred. Even so, if the grain isn’t straight or if the wood is too thin, warping risk remains, which is why single-ply blades are made from thicker material.
Other woods, because of higher risk of deformation, are rarely used for one-plies. An exception is Ayous, which has little grain structure and resists humidity changes. For this reason Galaxy/Yinhe makes some Ayous one-plies. In Korea, where summer and winter differ greatly in temperature and humidity, material choices are even more limited.
(A useful analogy: the soundboard of a grand piano, often made of spruce. Seasonal humidity changes in Korea frequently cause soundboards to crack. High-end pianos have built-in humidity control, but in winter it’s still common for soundboards to split. Similarly, wood stability is critical in blade construction.)
2. Why are there almost no even-ply blades?
To prevent warping more effectively, multiple plies are glued together with alternating grain directions. Since wood fibers usually run lengthwise, they shrink in that direction as they dry. Crossing the grains balances the forces and prevents warping.
This leads to the answer: the center ply must be lengthwise grain and as solid as possible, because it transmits ball impact cleanly to the handle. If the center ply were cross-grain, the feedback would be cut off mid-blade. That’s why the middle ply is always vertical grain.
Then comes the second ply in cross-grain, and finally the outer ply in vertical grain. This way the user feels the ball’s impact transmitted naturally down to the handle. It also looks and feels more consistent.
If you build an even-ply blade, the problem is at the center. You’d have to put two vertical-grain plies in the middle. These two could move together in one direction, overpowering the outer plies and causing warpage. If you cross them, then the outer plies end up mismatched, creating asymmetry and again leading to warping. That’s why odd-ply is the rule.
At Nexy, some 5th-generation blades (like Chakra, Arke) use front and back surfaces with different compositions—a bold attempt at asymmetry. When I first designed the Mushiro blade, Tibhar warned it might warp because of the asymmetry. But I had confidence: the core wood was stable, the outer plies were thin, and the carbon layer was placed at one-third depth. The result: no warping, and a success.
Now, with the 5th generation, we’ve refined this know-how. Other brands might fail if they copy it blindly. You could say one of the reasons our 5th generation represents the culmination of a decade’s work is precisely our ability to realize stable asymmetry in blade design.
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