hipnotic, I call you out!

hipnotic said:

Limba is denser and harder than Ayous. The medial ply in a 5+2 is usually horizontal, so the individual stiffness of that wood layer does not impact longitudinal stiffness directly. It does impact transversal stiffness, so all else being equal it will feel a bit more solid and harder. Harder blades tend to have a more linear behavior, so there will be an increase in the top end reaction. The frequency reading will be more or less the same, there might be a small increase because the mode we measure is the 6th, which reflects the out of plane deformation, and that will be smaller. So basically we would be increasing the relation between the 1st and 6th modes.

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Zwill said:

Dude, please! I am so bored by the same rubber threads about random generic ESN rubbers. I get the impression that people don't talk about blades since they don't actually feel the difference so they have not much to say.

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Zwill said:

Just a thought regarding the companies making blades buying the veneer from furniture companies. I guess it explains why there are so few type of wood being used. I don't really know the used wood on defensive blades, those might be a bit of an exception but like allround and offensive blades are construced from the same 5-6 wood pretty much, right? Limba, ayous, kiri, koto, hinoki/cypress, maybe balsa? There are a few moderately used like basswood, angrie, rosewood, spruce, wallnut, tung... not sure what else, but even these are kind of rare.
This goes down to what these furniture companies offer or more into the what is widely available? Or other wood are just not suitable, feasable or economically viable?

I think the one piece core is a good marketing tactic, I noticed it with Xiom mentioning it as a bullet point. Not sure any onther company did it before them.
I don't remember a BTY blade I had with a kiri core that was one piece, and it never felt like an issue.

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I think it's more of a "follow the leader" kind of thing. Maple and Basswood were widely used on blades, then Stiga started making blades with Limba, those became popular and others started using it as well. Why they used Limba in the first place I don't know, Limba is cheap, widely available and has decent properties for making blades, but there are others that would do the job as just as well. Same thing with Koto, was it popular before Viscaria? Now it's everywhere. If ZJK had played with a blade with Walnut, everyone would be using Walnut right now.

Xiom is either lying or they don't do it with all their blades because I've seen recent blades with multi piece cores.

Zwill said:

As of late I have a problem with BTY blades. Whenever I try a Mizutani SZLC or Viscaria or some recently made Innerforce ZLC blade if I do flat hits or blocks the blade makes a weird sound and loses all power. By weird sound I mean a "pia" sound. 15 or 20 year old BTY blades don't have this issue.
I have tried Maze ALC and black tag TB Spirit, and they don't have any of this issue.

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I had exactly same issue with Viscaria I recently bought

Zwill said:

Yes, break due to use, age, humidity, sweat and the combination of all of these. I wouldn't say spontaneously break, more like developing a crack and it grows and grows. I guess if it develops this rather slowly one won't even notice it until it breaks.

I have an innerforce zlc blade which initially when I got it it's freq was 1350hz, I just measured it it's not 1220hz and it sounds a bit funny too. It's not visibly broken just sounds very unhealthy even for a limba blade.

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maybe some internal hemorrhaging speak: partial de-lamination. Inferior quality of manufacturing as in wrong glue, not enough wetting out of the composite laminate or wrong pressure when assembling

Zwill said:

Yes, break due to use, age, humidity, sweat and the combination of all of these. I wouldn't say spontaneously break, more like developing a crack and it grows and grows. I guess if it develops this rather slowly one won't even notice it until it breaks.

I have an innerforce zlc blade which initially when I got it it's freq was 1350hz, I just measured it it's not 1220hz and it sounds a bit funny too. It's not visibly broken just sounds very unhealthy even for a limba blade.

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If the wood is stable in terms of humidity levels before the manufacturing process, there is no reason for wood to crack. Wood only cracks if there is a change in the volume, either caused by expansion or retraction, and those can only be caused by moisture exchanges or temperature. So, if a blade is properly stored, nothing will happen. In fact, it will warp before it cracks, and that is more frequent. I guess woods like Spruce or Hinoki are more prone to cracking, but only if an exterior force is applied, like hitting the side of the table with your blade. Those woods have a distinct difference between the seasonal growth rings. But I think that, other than independent blade builders, they are rarely used. Tung is basically Kiri, just a different name depending on the region it grows. Same as Ayous that can be called Obeche or Samba, Limba in the guitar world is know as Korina.

I have had that situation with a Butterfly blade before, only to find that the glue between the handle cups and the blade was completely deteriorated. I removed the handle cups and attached them again, and the blade returned to the normal frequency levels.

Zwill said:

Yeah, it would make sense if the handle wasn't attached to the blade well anymore, that would explain a lot.

I know the different names of ayous in fact I even remember Joola used to call them samba back in the days. I didn't know kiri is the same as tung, they look a bit different. But I guess cypress and hinoki look different but their wood is similar.

The other day a tried a Donic Waldner whatever blade with spruce outer layer (inner carbon blade tho), it's quite a nice wood to play with. Feels even softer than hinoki with similar elastic properties. I'm surprised it's not more widely used along with other pine wood. Hinoki was such a god tier wood back when I was small and speedglue was still a thing. I think spruce also doesn't splinter unlike limba or even koto.

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Kiri's scientific name is Paulownia, you can have Paulownia Elongata and Tomentosa, which are two species that I use, I don't know if there are more. So, they aren't exactly the same, different density and hardness, but at the same time they are very similar. Same happens with Ayous and Samba.

Those Donic blades are made by Soulspin. Very good blades indeed, and Spruce is very good for what is is, but nothing compares to the characteristics that Hinoki has.