Carbon vs Wood

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What kind of blade(specific kind like ALC, ZLC, 7 ply) do you mainly play with/like best? What rubber do you use with it? Why?
Keep in mind: Polite and factual debate only!
no conspiracies, no ranting, no gate keeping, no forcing your opinion down others’ throats!
Not enforced, only my plead.
 
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Before TMXi, I mostly play with inner ALC blades and all wood blades. Love the all wood feeling, and the power of ALC, so I compromise and choose inner ALC lol Plus, I'm good at generating spin on my loops, meaning I've got the extra safety to add more power without overshooting the table.

Rubbers are H3 on FH, and ESN Tensor on BH, I think that's most commonly seen combination if you were trained by a Chinese coach or started playing in China (both true for me).
 
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Imo, inner ALC blades paired with H3 doesn't make a too fast setup for a beginner. If a beginner wants to play with tacky chinese rubbers, I think H3 H37 both sides is a perfect start. Rubber is not heavy. Slow enough to force you to do full stroke both sides. Plus the blade can give a bit of an extra when hit harder. As he progresses, he can increase hardness, but the blade can stay the same, which I think is a good thing. I happened to make such setup, Vodak Horejsi APC + H3 H37 (black commercial, red provincial, but that is a conincidence), for my friend. He is a beginner, not absolute beginner though.

Well, in his case, it is not accurate to say that "he wants to play with tacky chinese rubbers". I've sort of forced it down his throat :) because I myself have so much fun with those rubbers... But we have this proverb: don't look at the teeth of the horse which was given to you ;-)

To be honest, it doesn't matter that much. 5-ply with slower ESN rubbers would be equally fine. Beginner of course, can't know, what he actually likes. But your setup, I think, is good.

Btw. this topic was probably discussed almost as often as tenergy alternative, don't be surprised if not very many answers...
 
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If anyone remembers a post I made a while back, I switched from my fang Bo b2x to my Stiga Infinity.

Currently I’m using my Fang Bo B2X over my infinity. The reason being that 3 weeks back I had overboosted my infinity to the point that I didn’t like it and it felt unpredictable.

During this time my Fang Bo B2X was actually the slowest blade I had (at least on the lower gears). I enjoyed the fact that I was able to do everything easier due to the carbon and I knew where the ball was going- unlike my infinity at the time.

For the sake of consistency, I have stuck with my B2X.

although this is an inner structure blade it feels very similar to an outer carbon blade, while still maintaining the benefits of inner.

i think I would like outer structure more- but I don’t truly know since I haven’t had a chance to play with an actual inner style feeling blade.

as of right now I use h2 neo 39 deg as my fh and 729 blue sponge as my bh. But I’ve rotated between tg2 and h3

I now boost my rubbers with 5 extremely thin layers of haifu
 
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Before TMXi, I mostly play with inner ALC blades and all wood blades. Love the all wood feeling, and the power of ALC, so I compromise and choose inner ALC lol Plus, I'm good at generating spin on my loops, meaning I've got the extra safety to add more power without overshooting the table.Rubbers are H3 on FH, and ESN Tensor on BH, I think that's most commonly seen combination if you were trained by a Chinese coach or started playing in China (both true for me).
Neither trained by a Chinese coach nor started playing in China but switched to (heavily speed glued) hard, tacky rubbers on my FH in the mid 1980s ;) Restarted TT in 2018 with ESN junk on the FH and switched to H3 after around half a year, tried a couple of hybrid rubbers since then and still returned to H3.
Blades: Neither liked 7-ply blades with 38 mm celluloid and speed glue nor now with 40 mm plastic balls. If I had the time to continuously train 10-12 hours a week I would probably continue to use my 5+2 outer ALC V14Pro or try to find something similar just a bit slower, spinnier, more flexible and with better feeling.
Weapon of choice: Cornilleau Hinotec Off- 5-ply Hinoki outer, Limba and an Ayous core. Great feel, fast enough, great smell (unless I've put on some new H3Neo).
FH rubber: H3(Neo) 39°, boosted
BH rubber: Hurricane 8-80 37° because it is stable, predictable, does what I want, grips the ball well when contacting it very thinly. Fast enough and not too bouncy.

 
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I think it is very much personal and depends on personal preference. I never found a 5 ply I liked. Currently I found two setup groups I really like:
- good quality ALC, also rather thin blade (Vodak APC and Donic No.1 Senso)
- very thin 7 ply (~6mm, my Curious is closer to 5.9mm, TSP Swat would also fall into this category)

On forehand something that is rather hard (with exception to G1) and usually tacky on BH 42.5-45 tensioned rubber. I played the inner ALC blades for quite some time, but after a bunch of COVIDs and health issues dropped to the Curious which is club standard blade. The biggest difference after reducing the blade power (thin 7 ply has much lower initial speed) is that I can do full strokes slower and still put the ball on the table when I am out of breath. Because of the fact that I struggle with obesity and I had a bunch of issues after covids, my issues are much more pronounced.

The result was that both setups are very good in the first 1.5h of training, but after intense movement exercises I cannot recover full breath. With the carbon blades the ball would just shoot of the bat, with the slower blade I can keep spinning till the end of the practice, albeit much less spin than in the beginning.

The other effect is that I no longer have fear of ball going long. I just give it all the beans I can and it lands on the table.
 
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says [IMG]
I tried an incredible number of blades and rubbers in the OFF-/OFF range, but I keep coming back to all-wood blades. Stiga Infinity is a very solid blade for loop and currently trying some 7-ply blades (Xylo 7 and Szocs 1). Yesterday during practise tried ALC inner again, but quickly came (again) to the conclusion that I like all-wood feeling. So my vote goes to team all-wood! ;)

Rubbers....think I´ll never settle on a single rubber as I simply like trying out different stuff. Currently using Dynaryz CMD and Rhyzen CMD and I must admit these are pretty decent rubbers (for my playing style).
But when the new EL-D and FX-D rubbers are available, I´ll give these a try for sure ;)

PS: this actually reminds me it´s time to start selling some blades again :D
 
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I’ve tried inner ALC (HL5) and all wood IAcoustic/Violin) and most recently outer carbon (Viscaria)

I am perfectly happy with the 5 ply blades and, after struggling with the HL5x a little I thought that’s where I would stay for a while, until I tried the Viscaria. This blade seems to offer me comfort in the handle, enough speed but by no means too much, and a crispness and linearity that afords me good control and excellent blocking. I am going to try the Harimoto I recently bought from Duke soon as well to see how it stands up to the Viscaria.

Rubbers are mostly H3 neo N BS on FH and either T05 or D05/D80 BH.
 
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Can we please stay on topic please? @Carly Siman Whatever beef you think you've got, just talk to whomever you've got it with in private.

Now that's out of the way, I would really like to hear the feedback from Wrighty67 since he's got a new blade to play with. 😉
 

Brs

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Brs

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I like the acoustic carbon (the outer carbon). It uses some Nittaku-branded thing called FE carbon. I don't know if that is just ALC under their name, or if it is actually a different weave. Does anyone know?

Anyway it feels more controlled to me and simply nicer than a TBC ALC or viscaria, or any ZLC blade I have tried. With H8 forehand and moristo sp bh it's not fast at all. But I have no power so that's not my game regardless of equipment.

I've used the same blades (two NACs) since I started with SP bh in 2018 and have no desire to EJ or switch. My TT game has 99 problems but equipment is not one.
 
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I totally respect that players will use whatever they feel like what suits them the best but I am afraid I strongly disagree (that equipment is not one of your problems)
I am sorry but SP as a secondary weakside rubber is a HUGE problem in almost all cases (I am not saying you may not be one of them)
I am writing a separate post on weakside / strongside , primary side / secondary side rubbers as applied to forehand & backhand & I will explain this there further

From what did you infer that @brs uses pimps on his weak side? What if someone just uses pimps because he/she likes it? Is Matthias Falck wrong using short pimples because he could not develop good enough inverted forehand?

 
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I am afraid the answer is a big NO. Because ,
1. there was no need for PingBirdPong to preach in the first place. He started it.online & now you want to order ME to take this offline ? REALLY ?
2. There is no reaosn for Lazer to post what he posted defending PingBirdPong
3. Ther was no no reason for you to preach me about off topic issues . If you don't like what I posted, just ignore it. Theer is no reason for you to go out of your way just to defend PingBirdPong's preaching & demand that no one else respond to it. That is insane
4. I was ONTOPIC . What I replied to was indeed part of PingBirdPong's first post preachings

Have a nice day

Now I'm starting to doubt your ability to read... where did I ever say offline, I said in private, which means DM or direct messaging. Or if you want, keep it to the original thread, or even get the moderator involved if you feel like you were in the right.

The title of this thread is "Carbon vs Wood". The first sentence of the OP is "What kind of blade(specific kind like ALC, ZLC, 7 ply) do you mainly play with/like best? What rubber do you use with it? Why?" And then everything after that is a statement that the OP hopes everyone should put on their best behaviors when posting, which clearly you aren't.

So which part are you on topic? You didn't post anything related to the question, only thing you're trying to do here is confront OP with some beef you've got from before. And lazer's post is perfectly understandable, because you seem to not understand what the thread is about. So yes, I'm having a great day teaching you some manners, and no I don't hope you have a nice day.

 
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No the problem is your comprehension issues. I understand he wanted to talk about Carbon Wood PRIMARILY but he posted some extraneous unwarranted personal attackd thinly veiled as prechings that many of you have chosen to dwell on endlessly
I can go round and and round on this endlessly if you want to continue not to talk about the primary topic of this thread. Your choice. But don't expect to keep aracking me and expect me to go away. Not happening.
You can stop or you all who defend PingBirdPong please do come again and again with your sweet nothings and ruin the thread

Do you find this offensive?


Keep in mind: Polite and factual debate only!
no conspiracies, no ranting, no gate keeping, no forcing your opinion down others’ throats!
Not enforced, only my plead.

 
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If you don't like what I posted, just ignore it. Theer is no reason for you to go out of your way just to defend PingBirdPong's preaching & demand that no one else respond to it. That is insane

Pun intended!

I usually stay out of this, but you are only wreaking havoc in the thread, which the OP started in totally harmless way! Why do you have to always suppose the worst in others?
 
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No the problem is your comprehension issues. I understand he wanted to talk about Carbon Wood PRIMARILY but he posted some extraneous unwarranted personal attackd thinly veiled as prechings that many of you have chosen to dwell on endlessly
I can go round and and round on this endlessly if you want to continue not to talk about the primary topic of this thread. Your choice. But don't expect to keep aracking me and expect me to go away. Not happening.
You can stop or you all who defend PingBirdPong please do come again and again with your sweet nothings and ruin the thread

If you want to continue, then please go ahead, I've done my part in trying to keep the thread on topic. Also, I've reported your posts because clearly you're just trolling.

 
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Well as I explained, it seemd that PingBirdPong went out of his way to post all that extraneous information as if he was preaching to the forum. Now I understand if he posted thesame AFTER someone made rude posts in this thread.

Preaching? If being respectful and not being rude and being civil is what’s being preached I’ll gladly listen to said preacher.

 
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I will now continue to ignore Carly Siman.

I recently bought an inner structure XVT Blade called the archer B.

It looks promising, reminds me of an infinity vps with inner carbon structure (or maybe alc.s too since it has spruce as the second layer.)

The blade’s price is very cheap, wouldn’t hurt to try.

My inner EJ really wants a fzd alc.

It’s very interesting to see this many people like an inner structure. I thought outer would’ve been more popular.

 
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