Loki Rxton 9 New Orange Version 39 Shore A | After 70+ hours

[Haito]

Loki Rxton 9 39 — orange sponge, black topsheet

I will add photos when I get back home.

Setup and testing

I've played with the 2.1 mm (max) version from 14 September to 26 October: six weeks, averaging about 12 hours a week, so roughly 70 hours in total. I've used it exclusively on forehand, on my W81 ADC, the normal version, which weighs 91 g. On the backhand I have the red Rxton 9 37.5. Despite the name, this is not the same rubber as the red one: the sponge feels completely different. The sheet weighed 74 g before cutting, with glue and the first two layers of Kailin, with 32 g cut off, putting the cut sheet at roughly 42 g. I still need to reweigh it, because one corner might have touched the table during the pre-cut weighing.

It cost me about 30€ with all the import taxes. With promotions it can drop to about 22€, and it's listed for 35€ on AliExpress.

Out of the package

Out of the package, it can lift the ball. It loses that after a few sessions. It doesn't smell of booster out of the factory, and it doesn't come with the protective glue layer that H3 Neo comes with.

Two layers versus six layers of Kailin

When the sheet was new, I boosted it with two layers of Kailin. That wasn't enough: the sheet barely curled. About a month later, I boosted it again, this time with six layers of Kailin, and it curled properly.

On two layers, it played fairly dead. The short game was easier, but driving was harder, and I couldn't hit through the sponge on the majority of my strokes. It felt like the opposite of catapult. On six layers, it has a similar bounce to Loki Arthur China, and it hasn't changed since that reboost.

For me, six layers of Kailin is the sweet spot for this rubber. If you use National booster, I'd guess that's about two, maybe three layers, but I haven't tested that. This wasn't a controlled comparison either: it's the same sheet boosted twice, a month apart, so the second boost went on top of the first and the sheet had a month of use behind it.

Opening and countering

Opening against backspin was super easy with both boosts. With six layers, the spin was stupid. The stroke changes, though: with six layers you play more forward, while with two layers you need to go more up.

Countering was easy with both boosts too. The incoming ball usually has enough speed to sink deep into the sponge, even without much booster. Where it falls short is when I try to put more of my own power into the counter or the follow-up topspin. That's where it lacks support, and I have to limit my power.

Smashing

Smashes are good. They're not effortless, but I don't have to limit my power on smashes either.

Blocking

Blocking is more predictable with a lot of booster. With only two layers, I had trouble putting high topspin balls on the table.

Serving and receive

Serves didn't change between the two boosts. I had trouble producing obscene amounts of spin, but it's easy to keep the ball short and place it on the table. With the Rasanter C53, which comes boosted from the factory, I had trouble placing the ball well. That was on a separate blade of the same weight, which I think was from the same batch.

Attacking long serves is quite easy, and it gets easier the more it's boosted.

Engaging the sponge

With my technique, I can hit through it too easily. It's perfect when I make a technical mistake and don't engage my body. When I do engage my body, it lacks support, mainly on those counters and follow-ups I mentioned. If you only use your hands, that's not enough to fully engage it, but once you develop the skill, it's super easy to go through the sponge. That's why I'd like to try a harder version.

Compared with Rasanter C53

Boosted, it feels pretty similar to the C53 when the C53 is new. I can switch between them without adjustment. The difference is that this one keeps its playing properties longer than the C53. My match play also improved a fair bit after switching from the C53, although I can't pinpoint exactly why.

Compared with Arthur China

Arthur China is easier to hit through and faster at the lower speeds. I think it's also easier to generate more spin with Arthur China, but I think its spin limit is lower.

Cleaning and wear

I have to clean it very regularly, sometimes even mid-session. It accumulates gunk and gets slippery, and you need to dry it regularly. I ran an experiment: after cleaning it with Revolution Rejuvenator, how many trainings could I play cleaning it only with water? One or two trainings were okay; in the third, it deteriorated. Soap or Revolution Rejuvenator brought the topsheet back to a fresh, new state.

After roughly 70 hours, the topsheet doesn't show any major wear, and I don't perceive any degradation in it. The sponge keeps its bounce and doesn't seem to be losing much.

Other competitors

The other competitors, for me, would be H3 and Battle 2. When I played with Battle 2, the centre of the topsheet quickly developed a mark. I didn't own a suitable H3, but I played on a number of blades with a similar H3 Orange, and it felt way more dead and made it harder to generate spin on all shots. Those weren't my setups, so I treat that as an impression rather than a direct comparison.

Who is it for?

If you want to avoid booster, avoid this rubber. I'd recommend this particular combo to players who want to develop using their body in the stroke, because it rewards that, but it's usable without it. If you only use your hands, you won't fully engage it. If you already fully use your body, you need something harder to play at 100%.

Verdict

Properly boosted, this is an easy rubber to open with, the spin is stupid, counters are easy, long serves are easy to attack, and placing serves short is easy. It feels close enough to a new C53 that I can switch without adjustment, it holds its playing properties longer, and my match play improved after the switch. It's also forgiving when I'm lazy and don't use my body. The compromise is that when I do put my own power into counters and follow-ups, I go through the sponge too easily and have to hold back, and it needs a lot of cleaning to keep its grip. Of the two preparations, I'd pick six layers of Kailin without hesitation. Next, I want to try a harder version or the blue version.

On the above picture, the black sheet is the rubber being reviewed.

 

[Kilogramme]

How about the throw angle ? You don't mention it, either here or on the 37.5 post. Where do you rank it ? I guess the main diff between the OS and BS should be throw angle, like between h3 BS and OS.

 

[Haito]

How about the throw angle ? You don't mention it, either here or on the 37.5 post. Where do you rank it ? I guess the main diff between the OS and BS should be throw angle, like between h3 BS and OS.

To be honest I never understood that concept. I always was only able to play with rubbers that are described to have low throw angle. Its hard for me to gauge something that I cannot experience you know... When we were in Gouda, my body subconciously adapted to all the setups. Whether it was D09C, Glyzer, MK hybrid, or Rxton, Hurricane, and whatever else there was, I just played with it, without any conscious effort. In the EJ part of the session I played with the Dima, so he would have to actually tell us whether there was a difference in the incoming ball. I can just tell you about what I felt and what landed. Last time I consciously could measure what people experience throw angle is about 2-3 years ago, before I cut off the EJ journey for a while and focused on training. Since I focused on training with the robot (and recently the gym), I kind of no longer can pay attention to the throw angle.

What I pay more attention is the angle where the ball slips, but that is not only the property of the rubber, but its also how used up it is kind of thing. With both of the rubbers I did not had any slippage no matter the angle so far.

So... I am really sorry, but I have no idea how to answer that question :|

 

[Archo]

Throw angle is the angle the ball leaves the swing relative to the swing path. A lower throw rubber will need you to close the angle more and it usually results in a flatter arc and vice versa.

 

[Haito]

Throw angle is the angle the ball leaves the swing relative to the swing path. A lower throw rubber will need you to close the angle more and it usually results in a flatter arc and vice versa.

Yeah, I know the definition, I just no longer perceive it. Why, no idea 🤷

Quite literally, when we were in Gouda, i played with at least 10 different setups, totally different rubbers. Cannot tell you what the throw angle of any of those is, my body just adjusted without me knowing. Glyzer and H3 i think are as different as they make them, and still I cannot tell u what throw angle they have. All I know is that I put loop on the table and I played a fair bit of counters with dima. First ball sometimes went long, but then it immediately stabilized. Don't get me wrong, I am no pro, my skill is very far from good, but I think I did put the power down. When my technique was much worse I could feel that some rubbers want more forward (I guess low angle) some wanted more up (high angle?), but for a while I did not have to worry about it...

What I am trying to say is that, with exposure and practice I kind desensitized myself to consciously feeling it...

 

[Archo]

Yeah, I know the definition, I just no longer perceive it. Why, no idea 🤷

Quite literally, when we were in Gouda, i played with at least 10 different setups, totally different rubbers. Cannot tell you what the throw angle of any of those is, my body just adjusted without me knowing. Glyzer and H3 i think are as different as they make them, and still I cannot tell u what throw angle they have. All I know is that I put loop on the table and I played a fair bit of counters with dima. First ball sometimes went long, but then it immediately stabilized. Don't get me wrong, I am no pro, my skill is very far from good, but I think I did put the power down. When my technique was much worse I could feel that some rubbers want more forward (I guess low angle) some wanted more up (high angle?), but for a while I did not have to worry about it...

What I am trying to say is that, with exposure and practice I kind desensitized myself to consciously feeling it...

Fair. It's much the same for me; I hit a bit with Rakza Z EH a few days ago and the first shot felt different, but I adjusted basically immediately. It helps the blade was similar enough.

I do always actively notice H3 OS vs H3 BS but they're my main rubbers. There's a lot of value to thousands and thousands of reps in familiar scenarios and not just a few practice hits. I think it's the thing non-EJs tell you to do.

 

[Kilogramme]

Yeah, I know the definition, I just no longer perceive it. Why, no idea 🤷

Quite literally, when we were in Gouda, i played with at least 10 different setups, totally different rubbers. Cannot tell you what the throw angle of any of those is, my body just adjusted without me knowing. Glyzer and H3 i think are as different as they make them, and still I cannot tell u what throw angle they have. All I know is that I put loop on the table and I played a fair bit of counters with dima. First ball sometimes went long, but then it immediately stabilized. Don't get me wrong, I am no pro, my skill is very far from good, but I think I did put the power down. When my technique was much worse I could feel that some rubbers want more forward (I guess low angle) some wanted more up (high angle?), but for a while I did not have to worry about it...

What I am trying to say is that, with exposure and practice I kind desensitized myself to consciously feeling it...

I get it. I do feel it, but not allways. It really depends. When I had T19 in BH, on many shots when I wanted to accelerate, or flip the ball tended to go out. So to compensate I had to close the racket, due to the higher throw. I ended up doing a lot of slice, and being scared to accelerate with the BH. I switched back to a lower throw (medium) than T19, with the H8-80. Less slice, and less off table problem when accelerating with BH.

Additionally, I tried D09C on someone else HL5, and the ball was flying in the air, too high throw. Funny enough the player I switch the racket with, tried low throw rubber on my HL5, all his ball went in the net. Then after 10 balls we adapted but it was funny. So for the same blade (almost) we tried high and low throw, and indeed there is a difference. But yeah we adapted ofc. I feel more freedom on what I can do with lower throwing rubber. Especially Chinese tacky rubber. I can do a slow spinny brush with high arc, and hight brush hit powerful shot barely above net. So I kinda get both arc. Whereas with ESN Tensor, i feel like you can brush as much, you need to sink into the sponge to do anything, or there is slippage.

 

[Haito]

I get it. I do feel it, but not allways. It really depends. When I had T19 in BH, on many shots when I wanted to accelerate, or flip the ball tended to go out. So to compensate I had to close the racket, due to the higher throw. I ended up doing a lot of slice, and being scared to accelerate with the BH. I switched back to a lower throw (medium) than T19, with the H8-80. Less slice, and less off table problem when accelerating with BH.

Additionally, I tried D09C on someone else HL5, and the ball was flying in the air, too high throw. Funny enough the player I switch the racket with, tried low throw rubber on my HL5, all his ball went in the net. Then after 10 balls we adapted but it was funny. So for the same blade (almost) we tried high and low throw, and indeed there is a difference. But yeah we adapted ofc. I feel more freedom on what I can do with lower throwing rubber. Especially Chinese tacky rubber. I can do a slow spinny brush with high arc, and hight brush hit powerful shot barely above net. So I kinda get both arc. Whereas with ESN Tensor, i feel like you can brush as much, you need to sink into the sponge to do anything, or there is slippage.

Soo... This stopped for me whenever I've learned to engage legs in the stroke. Whenever I get an issue that is caused by invalid ball x sponge penetration, I tell myself "use your legs you bloody idiot". And that seems to resolve the majority of the cases. Even when I try to smash, majority of my errors seem to be related to not using enough legs, same for spiny loops. My body seems to be quite weak. A person in my life who is really close to me, and is 55kg of net weight is using the same weights for training (as in, we have the same limit, I cannot do more than 40kgs on shoulder pull machine, she is doing the same).

Right now (especially on the Gouda meet), I've made metric ton of issues where my ball went out of court or dropped in the net. Right now I am working hard on fixing that. I've done about 2-3 sessions where I just focus on originating the BH stroke from the legs. My balls are back on the table with spin.

 

[Kilogramme]

Soo... This stopped for me whenever I've learned to engage legs in the stroke. Whenever I get an issue that is caused by invalid ball x sponge penetration, I tell myself "use your legs you bloody idiot". And that seems to resolve the majority of the cases. Even when I try to smash, majority of my errors seem to be related to not using enough legs, same for spiny loops. My body seems to be quite weak. A person in my life who is really close to me, and is 55kg of net weight is using the same weights for training (as in, we have the same limit, I cannot do more than 40kgs on shoulder pull machine, she is doing the same).

Right now (especially on the Gouda meet), I've made metric ton of issues where my ball went out of court or dropped in the net. Right now I am working hard on fixing that. I've done about 2-3 sessions where I just focus on originating the BH stroke from the legs. My balls are back on the table with spin.

Well, it is more about skills/technic than equipment. But for sure, training is better than equipment. But yeah, if you have something you enjoy playing with and that suits your playstyle that is the best.

I have boosted (tried) my R9 NEO, small curl. I will glue it in an hour, and try it tonight. My booster bottle is so empty, I feel like I barely put booster on the sponge haha. I had to put the booster directly on the sponge then use the brush to share evenly on the sponge.

After talks with @Grumms I might go for the Jiechi booster, as it seems to be lasting a long period of time. Still wait for a week of training and match next weekend to decide.

 

[Haito]

After talks with @Grumms I might go for the Jiechi booster, as it seems to be lasting a long period of time. Still wait for a week of training and match next weekend to decide.

Which variety? I might also try it. I want to hunt for booster refill on the 11.11 sale.

 

[Wakkibatty]

How about the throw angle ? You don't mention it, either here or on the 37.5 post. Where do you rank it ? I guess the main diff between the OS and BS should be throw angle, like between h3 BS and OS.

IMO, the throw angle of the 39 degree R9 OS seems higher than the original R9N, which would put it at the low end of the average throw angle range.

In other words, it seems to have a medium low throw angle, but is still significantly higher than the original R9N.

Booster does seem to alter the throw angle slightly, but as I only boosted mine very lightly, it's pretty hard to judge.

 

[Grumms]

Which variety? I might also try it. I want to hunt for booster refill on the 11.11 sale.

I always bought the green one. Beware, on my last purchase, hair of the brush were falling down a lot, I replaced it with the brush of the previous bottle.

 

[Kilogramme]

Which variety? I might also try it. I want to hunt for booster refill on the 11.11 sale.

What is the 11.11 sale ? A special discount on AliExpress? I think the green, because the black seems mostly unavailable on the different seller I saw. And the green is stronger apparently.

 

[Archo]

What is the 11.11 sale ? A special discount on AliExpress? I think the green, because the black seems mostly unavailable on the different seller I saw. And the green is stronger apparently.

Nov 1 to Nov 18 is running a sale period where some items are discounted, and there's also discount coupons. Nothing will be 50% off or anything, but you can expect 20 to 30% from the normal price.

 

[Haito]

What is the 11.11 sale ? A special discount on AliExpress? I think the green, because the black seems mostly unavailable on the different seller I saw. And the green is stronger apparently.

11.11 is a sale on Aliexpress on 11.11. Aliexpress hosts a quarterly sale, but 11.11 is usually the biggest throughout the year.

 

[Haito]

Nov 1 to Nov 18 is running a sale period where some items are discounted, and there's also discount coupons. Nothing will be 50% off or anything, but you can expect 20 to 30% from the normal price.

+ 10% coupons on top of that (its not really 10% but you get 15€ off, for orders above 86€, on items pages there is a red text, you click on it, and then you can put that code in the checkout).

 

[Grumms]

There's even discounts if you pay with PayPal. Just got a Xiaomi Pad 7 for 180€.

 

[Haito]

There's even discounts if you pay with PayPal. Just got a Xiaomi Pad 7 for 180€.

How is that applied? Just if you click with paypal its cheaper?

 

[Grumms]

How is that applied? Just if you click with paypal its cheaper?

Yes, it adds a 20 or 33€ discount line in the checkout depending on the amount of the order. 20€ on Xiaomi Pad 7, 33€ on Pad 8 and above.

 

[Haito]

Yes, it adds a 20 or 33€ discount line in the checkout depending on the amount of the order. 20€ on Xiaomi Pad 7, 33€ on Pad 8 and above.

So its selected products?