Yasaka Rakza Z - Anyone Played with It? Review?

goodhand · May 15, 2020

Yasaka came out with Rakza Z (at 52 degree) and Rakza Z Extra Hard (at 57 degree) rubbers recently, been getting rave reviews on revspin.net. Supposed to be very spinny and very fast. Just wondering has anyone played with it much yet? Is there any in-depth, objective reviews of it? Very much appreciate it.

yogi_bear · May 16, 2020

Oh i thought they are at 50 and 53 degrees.

ttarc · May 16, 2020

yogi_bear said:
Oh i thought they are at 50 and 53 degrees.

The normal Rakza Z has a sponge hardness between 47° and 52° and the Extra Hard between 52° and 57° (for comparison: Rakza 7 is listed between 45° and 50°). If one of these conversion charts is correct than that translates to DHS 37° to 39° and 39° to 42°. Hopefully total weight of rubber with packaging is an indicator of sponge hardness...

https://www.yasakajp.com/items/rakza-z/
https://www.yasakajp.com/items/rakza-z-extra-hard/
https://www.yasakajp.com/items/rakza_7/

ZeroTT · May 16, 2020

I don't get it. How can you sell a rubber that varies between 47 and 52 degrees hardness ??
That difference is huge. So buying a Rakza Z is like a lottery on hardness .
And there is also a chance that you buy a Rakza Z that is 52 and a Rakza extra hard that is 52 ?

I mean Tenergy 05 and 05fx are like 4 degrees difference and those feel completely different.

Why would you every buy a rubber like this where you don't know how hard it is?

mart1nandersson · May 16, 2020

ZeroTT said:
I don't get it. How can you sell a rubber that varies between 47 and 52 degrees hardness ??
That difference is huge. So buying a Rakza Z is like a lottery on hardness .
And there is also a chance that you buy a Rakza Z that is 52 and a Rakza extra hard that is 52 ?

I mean Tenergy 05 and 05fx are like 4 degrees difference and those feel completely different.

Why would you every buy a rubber like this where you don't know how hard it is?

It's a Japanese so they're just honest that there will be inconsistencies during manufacturing. TSP does the same. Most other companies are simply not open about this.

best_intentions · May 17, 2020

In terms of sponge hardness I think the key point should be what is Yasaka aiming for?

It appears that their goal might be:

Rakza Z at 50 degrees (73g)
Rakza Z extra hard at 55 degrees (78g)
(with the knowledge it could be +/- 2 degrees)

Weight is from a youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGs9kE9dmK8

Compared to Dignics 09c which is at 73g -- Butterfly uses larger dimensions so Rakza Z (50 degrees) is even heavier than 09C.

In this youtube review (from japan) hard to tell which side is Z or Z extra hard and how many rackets he is testing on...but in the 'test' the black side he hits the ball past the table quite a bit both at 1min50s and at 2min42s and in counter topspin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqnEcan71o8&t=709s

I 'think' the the first part of the test he is using all wood blade with Z Extra hard as BLACK. Z as Red

And in the 2nd part of the test he is using ALC blade with Z Extra Hard as RED and normal Z as Black.

yogi_bear · May 17, 2020

I can' t wait to receive mine. Still stuck in the courier hub.

Konrad Bak · May 17, 2020

When you buy 1,8- you will have 45-46 sponge, if you buy 2.0 you will have 47-48 sponge, 2,2= 49-50.
When we consider density, thickness, volume, weight we can find that 1,8 will be softer than 2.2

ZeroTT · May 19, 2020

All I can say is:

I bought batches of Tenergy 05 and 05 fx for me and several club members.
And I always checked the rubbers on weight and hardness because some people wanted the harder and heavier ones.

But the weight and hardness was always very consistent.
I'm talking about hundreds of Tenergy's over the years and the weight was always of by maximum 1 or 2 grams, not more. And the hardness was even more tight, it was sometimes of by 0.5 or 1 degree but 80% of the time it was just spot on.

ajtatosmano2 · Dec 31, 2020

ZeroTT said:
All I can say is:

I bought batches of Tenergy 05 and 05 fx for me and several club members.
And I always checked the rubbers on weight and hardness because some people wanted the harder and heavier ones.

But the weight and hardness was always very consistent.
I'm talking about hundreds of Tenergy's over the years and the weight was always of by maximum 1 or 2 grams, not more. And the hardness was even more tight, it was sometimes of by 0.5 or 1 degree but 80% of the time it was just spot on.

Timo Boll measures the rubbers he get. They vary in weight. Check out his youtube channel for evidence. Maybe you had a better source or I dunno?

yogi_bear · Dec 31, 2020

There are always variances in the weight. Even blades have weight differences.

IB66 · Dec 31, 2020

There are always going to be some manufacturing variations!! For example ceramic wall tiles, if you have large areas to tile you must ensure the supplier gets all the tiles from the the same batch, this ensures colour consistency etc. Same with paints.

Lula · Dec 31, 2020

I tried it for some trainings. Good spin and speed pretty okey too. Better for serve, return and opening loops due to the grippy surface. Good control too since it is a little slower. I had problem with the super high arc. I play pretty close to the table and the big arc did not work well. But the arc was good when doing banana flicks.

If the arc was lower i proably would have kept on using it. Now i went back to Donic bluefire. Can imagine Z works better if you play a bit further away from the table.

IB66 · Dec 31, 2020

I used it on FH.
I found it easy to play with, this was my first thought when I first used it, controlled, speed is enough, spin is good/high, the high arc is there but once you step back from the table and loop, the ball is dragged back onto the table. Kick is not as good as H3.
very good for serving.
More bounce than traditional tacky rubbers.

Berlood · Mar 18, 2021

My guess and opinion

ZeroTT said:
I don't get it. How can you sell a rubber that varies between 47 and 52 degrees hardness ??
That difference is huge. So buying a Rakza Z is like a lottery on hardness .
And there is also a chance that you buy a Rakza Z that is 52 and a Rakza extra hard that is 52 ?

I mean Tenergy 05 and 05fx are like 4 degrees difference and those feel completely different.

Why would you every buy a rubber like this where you don't know how hard it is?

i read that the range is considering the thickness you choose, not a variation in itself. Not sure if this is true but it made sense.

And about the rubber rakza z, I used it once for my backhand and hated it a lot... it was more dull than the mark V, every push was going in the net. Ever block was slow and my backhand fast serve was.... undoable. It’s a veeeery slow rubber. ☹️
Maybe I should have expected it. Anyway I’m never playing with it again, going to rakza 7 soft both sides now 😁 that rubber is a gem 🥳 so fast and it almost controls itself 😁

Yasaka Rakza Z - Anyone Played with It? Review?

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