First bat

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Hi all
newbie here, played TT back in school days, just returned to the sport, at 57 and joined a local club.
Won a few games and lost a few, some really good players at the club and getting some excellent coaching from them which is great.
Although already improving still way below the team level.
looking to buy my first proper bat, thinking at my level about £50 for now is a fair budget.
reading some reviews, considering the Butterfly Timo Boll SG99 or Butterfly Zhang Jike Wakaba, both prices at £50
Any advice is welcome.
Cheers
 
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You should put together a bat yourself. It's quite easy and then you'll have something to build on. Many of these factory assembled bats are not that good, and the blades are no good at all. While improving and learning the technique again, you'll need more linear rubbers and perhaps an allround 5-ply wooden blade.

An example is a Sanwei - Accumulator S blade and two Kokutaku - 868 Blutenkirsche rubbers. The blade is allround+ somewhere and the rubbers are really cheap, but good worth for the money and easy to play with both attack and defense. My advise is to start with something like this to see where you are going. And there are a lot of options to choose from.
 
I’m with mocker on this one. I would advise you to get an all wood 5 ply blade rated all, all+ or maybe off-.Something like a Stiga allround, there are plenty of different of options like mocker says.Do not get a fast carbon blade, this can wait until you are comfortable with the slower blade.This I would match with a fairly slow rubber like Yasaka Mark V. When this rubber is worn out you can step up to something like Yasaka Rakza 7. This combo will probably last you a long time…

Cheers
L-zr
 
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Thanks mocker and lazer for your time and solid advice. Wasn’t planning on building my own bat at this early stage, but suppose it makes sense to get straight into the tech side and learn how each part of a bat performs and also to upgrade as I hopefully progress. Cheers guys
 
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Brs

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Brs

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Tabletennis11.com would build you a custom all-Neottec setup for less than 50 pounds. Neottec magic control all+ 5-ply blade and two sheets Neottec katana 2.1 rubber. You could change the rubbers later yourself and keep the blade. Or a clubmate could glue them for you. It's very easy.
 
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Thanks for your advice Brs
I’ll check out that website. It’s all a learning curve for me but will enjoy the journey.
I’m pretty handy, so will manage the upgrades myself going forward. It’s more a matter of learning when and what to upgrade to as I hopefully improve. Thanks again to all for your time and help! Cheers
 
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50 pounds is more than enough to get a "custom" bat.

Other than customized what you want, the blade/rubber (even on unknown brands names to you / cheap brand names) would have better quality than hobby bats from big brand names.

Also, custom bat's blade can be reused.
This hobby bats, taking off those rubbers to reuse the blade is a nightmare (they don't use the same glue, and the rubber/sponges stick on like crazy).

So I agree, get a cheaper "custom" bat and after 6 months, a year. You can move on from there.
If you get hobby bats, I think after 1 to 3 months, you would want to change to the cheaper "custom" bat.
 
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You should put together a bat yourself. It's quite easy and then you'll have something to build on. Many of these factory assembled bats are not that good, and the blades are no good at all. While improving and learning the technique again, you'll need more linear rubbers and perhaps an allround 5-ply wooden blade.

An example is a Sanwei - Accumulator S blade and two Kokutaku - 868 Blutenkirsche rubbers. The blade is allround+ somewhere and the rubbers are really cheap, but good worth for the money and easy to play with both attack and defense. My advise is to start with something like this to see where you are going. And there are a lot of options to choose from.

+1 For Sanwei - Accumulator S ... If you can't find Accumulator S, then you could opt for Samwei M8 ..

Apart from Sanwei blades, you could also look @ Neotec Gamma All+ .. This would most certainly cost more than the Sanwei options, but I think, you can still manage this blade + rubbers for under £50

As for rubbers :


  • +1 For Kokutaku - 868 Blutenkirsche
  • Friendship Focus 3 Snipe
  • Sanwei T88-III
 
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