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Loki Rxton 9 37.5 — orange sponge, red topsheet
Setup and testing
I've played with the 2.1 mm version for six weeks, averaging about 12 hours a week, so roughly 70 hours in total. I've used it exclusively on backhand, on my W81 ADC, the normal version. All the other rubber tests I refer to here were also on the W81 ADC normal version. The boosted sheet weighed 71 g with one layer of glue, with 20 g cut off, putting the cut sheet at roughly 51 g.
Kailin versus Falco Tempo Long
I initially boosted the sheet with two layers of Kailin, then reboosted the same sheet about a month later with two layers of Falco Tempo Long. The red 37.5 sheet was still playing fine before I reboosted it.
For me, the initial Kailin preparation was much, much better. After the FTL reboost, the rubber felt considerably deader. Pushes also behaved differently: at the same racket angle, the Kailin-phase pushes flew straighter and more aggressively, while after FTL they wanted to follow a more arcing, parabolic trajectory. This wasn't a controlled comparison between fresh sheets: the rubber had another month of use and a previous Kailin treatment, so I can't isolate the booster as the sole cause.
Drives
Backhand drives felt great. By a drive, I mean going through the ball. Placement was easy, and I got a lot of spin without deliberately brushing or even trying to generate spin.
Looping and countering
For looping, both preparations wanted a proper stroke. To get the loops I wanted, I had to engage the rubber deeply and accelerate. FX-D, LAC, Rasanter C53, and K3 all let me produce more spin lazily. The Rxton demanded more work before its loops became satisfying.
Looping against dead and backspin balls is where it gets fun. Opening is easy as long as I use my body. For a while, I was producing balls that were spinny AF but still landed in the net. If I tried to do everything with my arm, the ball didn't travel deep enough. Once I started using my legs more to drive the stroke, I felt much better penetration into the rubber, and the loops started working.
Oh boy, it's satisfying when that happens. The balls are downright acidic. They don't have much straight-line speed, but the spin is stupid. That combination is the main attraction for me, provided I actually use my body.
What I call “spinny speed” is the speed of a power loop. There's no loud crack, just a spinny shot that some people don't react to.
Countering is easy for me when I'm farther away from the table. Close to the table, I still have problems with it. That distinction matters: enjoying the opening loop doesn't mean every backhand exchange suddenly becomes easy.
Blocking
Blocking was extremely easy: passive blocks, active blocks, chop blocks—the ball just landed on the table without me consciously working to keep it there. If I got the timing right, it landed. With LAC, FX-D, and Rasanter C53, I had to actively press the ball down. With this, blocking felt much more natural.
Serving, receive, and short game
Serves were spinny too, but I needed high acceleration. Getting spin without body involvement or a strong wrist action was hard for me.
My overall impression was that the short game was much easier than with LAC, which I find very bouncy. Within that, I preferred the straighter, more aggressive pushes I got during the initial Kailin phase to the more arcing pushes after the FTL reboost.
Receiving short backspin serves is okay, although after FTL I started having problems when trying to push long: the ball popped up way too much. Long backspin serves are okay rather than great. I can push them consistently, but attacking them is iffy. I may be standing too close or getting the stroke wrong. It sometimes feels as though I'm bottoming out the rubber too quickly, but that's a guess; I suspect my technique first.
Long topspin serves are easy to punch or block back. Brushing them wasn't something I could do reliably—I felt too slow, which again seems more like a skill issue. Flicks are easy if I take the ball from the side and play forward. If I try brushing upward, the ball pops up.
Match results and wear
My win rate has jumped a lot with my current rubbers. They're slower than what I used previously, blocking in practice is much easier, and placement feels excellent. I can't isolate the red sheet's contribution to those results, but the setup is working for me.
After roughly 70 hours, I can't see any visible deterioration or signs of wear on this red sheet. The honeymoon still hasn't worn off either. That's promising for longevity, although I can't say yet how long it will ultimately last.
What other players say
Two comments from other TTD members are worth including here. Their exact setups aren't established in these excerpts, so I treat them as related Rxton 9 impressions rather than identical tests of my 37.5 red sheet.
@dingyibvs, in Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat, post 592610:
@Mumon, in Loki RXTON 9 new sponge, post 592716:
Who is it for?
I wouldn't recommend this to beginners. It needs the consistency to engage the sponge properly, and I don't think beginners will have that yet. For me, it makes more sense for someone who uses their body and can reliably put enough into the stroke to make those loops work.
If you want something similar but easier, Rxton 7 could be an option. Especially if you play mostly with your hand, I'd point you toward Rxton 7 as the easier choice.
LAC is similarly demanding in my view, but for the opposite reason. I find it way too bouncy and think that bounce will be too much for most people. With the same mistake, Rxton 9 puts my ball in the net, whereas LAC sends it long. They ask for different kinds of control.
Verdict
I'm keeping it on my backhand. I haven't found anything close for what I want there, and the loops are super satisfying. For me, the appeal is heavy-spin looping when I commit to the stroke, together with very easy blocking, spinny drives, and placement. The compromise is how much work those loops take, plus the close-table counters and attacking receives I'm still working on. If I want to generate spin with lazy strokes, the other rubbers I mentioned make that easier. Of the two preparations I tested, I'd pick Kailin without hesitation.
Thank you @dingyibvs @Mumon and @DBsystem78 for joining me in this journey
EDIT:
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Loki-Rxton9-ITTF-Approved-Sticky-Red_1601942436333.html <- this is the one I got.
EDIT: This rubber is 25$ with taxes from Loki or 35€ locally. Its something you can get express from EU for like 10€ more, or you can order from China from pennies. A competitive rubber to this offering costs like 50€ (H3 prov). I believe this is way way better than 729 Battle series, and I am used to beating holes into the Yinhe Jupiter 2 (which is also much more dead than this).
Setup and testing
I've played with the 2.1 mm version for six weeks, averaging about 12 hours a week, so roughly 70 hours in total. I've used it exclusively on backhand, on my W81 ADC, the normal version. All the other rubber tests I refer to here were also on the W81 ADC normal version. The boosted sheet weighed 71 g with one layer of glue, with 20 g cut off, putting the cut sheet at roughly 51 g.
Kailin versus Falco Tempo Long
I initially boosted the sheet with two layers of Kailin, then reboosted the same sheet about a month later with two layers of Falco Tempo Long. The red 37.5 sheet was still playing fine before I reboosted it.
For me, the initial Kailin preparation was much, much better. After the FTL reboost, the rubber felt considerably deader. Pushes also behaved differently: at the same racket angle, the Kailin-phase pushes flew straighter and more aggressively, while after FTL they wanted to follow a more arcing, parabolic trajectory. This wasn't a controlled comparison between fresh sheets: the rubber had another month of use and a previous Kailin treatment, so I can't isolate the booster as the sole cause.
Drives
Backhand drives felt great. By a drive, I mean going through the ball. Placement was easy, and I got a lot of spin without deliberately brushing or even trying to generate spin.
Looping and countering
For looping, both preparations wanted a proper stroke. To get the loops I wanted, I had to engage the rubber deeply and accelerate. FX-D, LAC, Rasanter C53, and K3 all let me produce more spin lazily. The Rxton demanded more work before its loops became satisfying.
Looping against dead and backspin balls is where it gets fun. Opening is easy as long as I use my body. For a while, I was producing balls that were spinny AF but still landed in the net. If I tried to do everything with my arm, the ball didn't travel deep enough. Once I started using my legs more to drive the stroke, I felt much better penetration into the rubber, and the loops started working.
Oh boy, it's satisfying when that happens. The balls are downright acidic. They don't have much straight-line speed, but the spin is stupid. That combination is the main attraction for me, provided I actually use my body.
What I call “spinny speed” is the speed of a power loop. There's no loud crack, just a spinny shot that some people don't react to.
Countering is easy for me when I'm farther away from the table. Close to the table, I still have problems with it. That distinction matters: enjoying the opening loop doesn't mean every backhand exchange suddenly becomes easy.
Blocking
Blocking was extremely easy: passive blocks, active blocks, chop blocks—the ball just landed on the table without me consciously working to keep it there. If I got the timing right, it landed. With LAC, FX-D, and Rasanter C53, I had to actively press the ball down. With this, blocking felt much more natural.
Serving, receive, and short game
Serves were spinny too, but I needed high acceleration. Getting spin without body involvement or a strong wrist action was hard for me.
My overall impression was that the short game was much easier than with LAC, which I find very bouncy. Within that, I preferred the straighter, more aggressive pushes I got during the initial Kailin phase to the more arcing pushes after the FTL reboost.
Receiving short backspin serves is okay, although after FTL I started having problems when trying to push long: the ball popped up way too much. Long backspin serves are okay rather than great. I can push them consistently, but attacking them is iffy. I may be standing too close or getting the stroke wrong. It sometimes feels as though I'm bottoming out the rubber too quickly, but that's a guess; I suspect my technique first.
Long topspin serves are easy to punch or block back. Brushing them wasn't something I could do reliably—I felt too slow, which again seems more like a skill issue. Flicks are easy if I take the ball from the side and play forward. If I try brushing upward, the ball pops up.
Match results and wear
My win rate has jumped a lot with my current rubbers. They're slower than what I used previously, blocking in practice is much easier, and placement feels excellent. I can't isolate the red sheet's contribution to those results, but the setup is working for me.
After roughly 70 hours, I can't see any visible deterioration or signs of wear on this red sheet. The honeymoon still hasn't worn off either. That's promising for longevity, although I can't say yet how long it will ultimately last.
What other players say
Two comments from other TTD members are worth including here. Their exact setups aren't established in these excerpts, so I treat them as related Rxton 9 impressions rather than identical tests of my 37.5 red sheet.
@dingyibvs, in Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat, post 592610:
@Mumon, in Loki RXTON 9 new sponge, post 592716:
Who is it for?
I wouldn't recommend this to beginners. It needs the consistency to engage the sponge properly, and I don't think beginners will have that yet. For me, it makes more sense for someone who uses their body and can reliably put enough into the stroke to make those loops work.
If you want something similar but easier, Rxton 7 could be an option. Especially if you play mostly with your hand, I'd point you toward Rxton 7 as the easier choice.
LAC is similarly demanding in my view, but for the opposite reason. I find it way too bouncy and think that bounce will be too much for most people. With the same mistake, Rxton 9 puts my ball in the net, whereas LAC sends it long. They ask for different kinds of control.
Verdict
I'm keeping it on my backhand. I haven't found anything close for what I want there, and the loops are super satisfying. For me, the appeal is heavy-spin looping when I commit to the stroke, together with very easy blocking, spinny drives, and placement. The compromise is how much work those loops take, plus the close-table counters and attacking receives I'm still working on. If I want to generate spin with lazy strokes, the other rubbers I mentioned make that easier. Of the two preparations I tested, I'd pick Kailin without hesitation.
Thank you @dingyibvs @Mumon and @DBsystem78 for joining me in this journey
EDIT:
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Loki-Rxton9-ITTF-Approved-Sticky-Red_1601942436333.html <- this is the one I got.
EDIT: This rubber is 25$ with taxes from Loki or 35€ locally. Its something you can get express from EU for like 10€ more, or you can order from China from pennies. A competitive rubber to this offering costs like 50€ (H3 prov). I believe this is way way better than 729 Battle series, and I am used to beating holes into the Yinhe Jupiter 2 (which is also much more dead than this).
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