Question for H3 users

[Tony's Table Tennis]

H3 of blue or orange sponge is designed to be boosted and it is one of the best rubbers out there.
removing booster, you should rather just remove the rubber on your wishlist all together.

There are other rubbers out there as recommended, but nothing is even close to H3.

PS, I wonder why no one has mentioned the 37 deg version of H3.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

You can try Xuperman Powerplay-X rubber. I think it playes extremely well without booster. It has really elastic topsheet, and 41 degree sponge does not feel hard at all, it is softer then 40 degree BS Hurricane.

I never boost, mostly because of under-researched affects of booster on health, but i really like chinese tacky rubbers. It's just that a lot of them works much better without booster than Hurricane. Also you can try Jupiter 3 or Battle 2 Gold, both playes better than Hurricane without boosting.

 

[Tyce]

H3 of blue or orange sponge is designed to be boosted and it is one of the best rubbers out there.
removing booster, you should rather just remove the rubber on your wishlist all together.

There are other rubbers out there as recommended, but nothing is even close to H3.

PS, I wonder why no one has mentioned the 37 deg version of H3.

Honestly because I think it sucks. They took a rubber designed to be hard, and made it soft...ish. It feels like a piece of polyurethane shock dampening in a running shoe.
I don't like that feeling at all, Loki Rxton 3 Pro and Rxton 1 had that same kind of thing. It feels like plastic instead of rubber.

 

[Jslick89]

You can try Xuperman Powerplay-X rubber. I think it playes extremely well without booster. It has really elastic topsheet, and 41 degree sponge does not feel hard at all, it is softer then 40 degree BS Hurricane.

I never boost, mostly because of under-researched affects of booster on health, but i really like chinese tacky rubbers. It's just that a lot of them works much better without booster than Hurricane. Also you can try Jupiter 3 or Battle 2 Gold, both playes better than Hurricane without boosting.

Since you're worried about booster affects on your health....what makes you think that they could be negatively impacting your health? For me, I never actually come into physical contact with the booster, at least not for a prolonged time.

From my understanding, boosters are different than the old speed glues which contained many toxic solvents. I haven't taken a huge wiff of the national yellow, but when i'm applying to my rubbers, there is no weird smell or anything.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

Since you're worried about booster affects on your health....what makes you think that they could be negatively impacting your health? For me, I never actually come into physical contact with the booster, at least not for a prolonged time.

From my understanding, boosters are different than the old speed glues which contained many toxic solvents. I haven't taken a huge wiff of the national yellow, but when i'm applying to my rubbers, there is no weird smell or anything.

Booster is some kind of vaporizing oil liquid with unknown origin and chemical composition. It can EASILY be cancerogenus. And i do not want to take any more risk with my health.

I have unlucky genetics, so just to live like a normal human being i need to take 6+ medications daily depending on the season and constantly monitor various things. Even little things can harm me a lot and make my life even more miserable than it is from time to time. I do not have any capacity to take risks. Even the ability to play something like table tennis is absolutely NOT a given for me. And i'm really grateful to all the scientist and doctors who improved my life quality this much. Most of my life any physical activity beyond walking caused bad headaches and sudden blackouts.

So if I can not be sure that it is perfectly safe i would not use it. All my factory boosted rubbers are ventilated for about 1 or 2 days before glueing because i do not want to inhale any of it. And even than they probably still contain a lot.

So ITTF rules about banning booster is extremely stupid for me because now i can't even know what is inside this thing. I want rules to have transparancy about what chemicals we can and can not use on rubbers, it would be better for everyone. People like me would know about what goes into it and mitigate risks, and pro atheletes would not need to hide boosting. It would make whole dialogue much more productive in terms of health concernes. And current rules just spur the behaviour that might be unhealthy without any outplay.

 

[Jslick89]

Booster is some kind of vaporizing oil liquid with unknown origin and chemical composition. It can EASILY be cancerogenus. And i do not want to take any more risk with my health.

I have unlucky genetics, so just to live like a normal human being i need to take 6+ medications daily depending on the season and constantly monitor various things. Even little things can harm me a lot and make my life even more miserable than it is from time to time. I do not have any capacity to take risks. Even the ability to play something like table tennis is absolutely NOT a given for me. And i'm really grateful to all the scientist and doctors who improved my life quality this much. Most of my life any physical activity beyond walking caused bad headaches and sudden blackouts.

So if I can not be sure that it is perfectly safe i would not use it. All my factory boosted rubbers are ventilated for about 1 or 2 days before glueing because i do not want to inhale any of it. And even than they probably still contain a lot.

So ITTF rules about banning booster is extremely stupid for me because now i can't even know what is inside this thing. I want rules to have transparancy about what chemicals we can and can not use on rubbers, it would be better for everyone. People like me would know about what goes into it and mitigate risks, and pro atheletes would not need to hide boosting. It would make whole dialogue much more productive in terms of health concernes. And current rules just spur the behaviour that might be unhealthy without any outplay.

sorry to hear about your health conditions. i'm glad you have them under control and are able to play table tennis. definitely nothing wrong with being extra cautious with your health. I'm not encouraging you to use booster by any means....

HOWEVER.... i'm not sure what you mean by "vaporizing oil liquid". I'm by no means a scientist, so my understanding isn't complete, but haifu national yellow is oil-based, where as the speed glue of olden days were solvent based. Haifu national yellow is a thick liquid. It does not evaporate if you were to leave the lid open. The way i understand it, the sponge of the rubber absorbs the oil and expands. There's really no vapors involved in the whole process.

This is different than the speed glue which does in fact produce strong fumes from the solvents evaporating into the air. The glue goes into the sponge, evaporates and that causes the sponge to have tension. So a completely different process due to the differences in the property of booster vs speed glue.

Now, thats not to say that it CANNOT be cancerous, but i do have to disagree with you that its a vaporizing liquid oil .

 

[BlotOnPaper]

HOWEVER.... i'm not sure what you mean by "vaporizing oil liquid". I'm by no means a scientist, so my understanding isn't complete, but haifu national yellow is oil-based, where as the speed glue of olden days were solvent based. Haifu national yellow is a thick liquid. It does not evaporate if you were to leave the lid open. The way i understand it, the sponge of the rubber absorbs the oil and expands. There's really no vapors involved in the whole process.

If this was 100% true than booster effect would be permanent and this is not the case. Booster effect wears off. And a lot of times quite quickly. If it does not evaporate then where it goes?

In my understanding it IS vaporable, but the evaporation is slow. With oily chemicals, for example some petroleum products, vapors can be really toxic and even little exposure can be dangerous. And i can't be sure that the boosters that a lot of people use in table tennis does not contain any amount of hazardous and vaporable chemicals.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

Also, some boosters deffinetely have a smell. Factory boosters especially. I can't say for things like seamoon and other boosters, sold in liduid form, i do not use them, but i deffinetely heard a lot of people talk about smell that booster produce. But i can't neither confirm nor deny that.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

Booster looks like volatile oil, because it wears of not in years, but in months and even weeks. So it really must be vaporable, it would not make sense for it to be fixed oil and then wear off in like 3 weeks

 

[Jslick89]

If this was 100% true than booster effect would be permanent and this is not the case. Booster effect wears off. And a lot of times quite quickly. If it does not evaporate then where it goes?

In my understanding it IS vaporable, but the evaporation is slow. With oily chemicals, for example some petroleum subproducts, vapors can be really toxic and even little exposure can be dangerous. And i can't be sure that the boosters that a lot of people use in table tennis does not contain any amount of hazardous and vaporable chemicals.

I suppose there are ways to test this some what scientifically:

1) weigh rubber after booster and glue has been applied
2) once the booster effect appears to have worn off, remove rubber and re-weigh the rubber. Calculate the difference.

howerver, would be hard to measure how much of the booster is absorbed into the paddle.

Here are some of the reasons chat gpt gave for why the booster effect could wear off (even without vaporization):

- Sponge tension decompresses over time. the booster softens and expands the sponge, creating tension. over time, the sponge gradually loses that artifical tension, just like how a stretched rubber band relaxes if left stretched.

-sponge memory effect, where a sponge wants to return to its original density and shape. even if booster hasn't evaporate, the sponge structure settles and the boosted feeling fades. its likened to how you sit on a sponge mattress, and its stretched inwards, but then you get off and the mattress slowly finds it way back to its original shape. (you can see physicals changes can happen without chemical changes, like off gassing, occuring).

-glue layers and topsheet might absorb some of the oil

-natural rubber aging...the topsheet and sponge oxidize and degrade from time and usage.


SO...what can we deduce.... especially if the rubber weights are very close before and after removal? most likely there is not a chemical off-gassing occurring from the modern day booster. this is different than speed glue where one expect nearly all of the weigh of the glue to fully evaporate within a couple of days.

 

[thisisit]

Booster looks like volatile oil, because it wears of not in years, but in months and even weeks. So it really must be vaporable, it would not make sense for it to be fixed oil and then wear off in like 3 weeks

^^this!

is why the internet became a place where you get stupider while feeling you get smarter.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

^^this!

is why the internet became a place where you get stupider while feeling you get smarter.

So... Why is this statement incorrect? Give your opinion if you know about the topic more

 

[joshmak10]

Honestly because I think it sucks. They took a rubber designed to be hard, and made it soft...ish. It feels like a piece of polyurethane shock dampening in a running shoe.
I don't like that feeling at all, Loki Rxton 3 Pro and Rxton 1 had that same kind of thing. It feels like plastic instead of rubber.

I agree with you man. I tried to give H3 37 another chance on BH of my Vis and absolutely hated it. Much too low of a throw angle, terrible for blocking, hard to activate the speed and spin. I much prefer D09c or D05 on the BH, but since I have no money right now, I took an old T05 from my club and ripped off H3 37 and stuck T05 on haha (surprisingly whoever got rid of it was very picky, it still had decent grip, it’s also my first time trying T05 so hopefully I’ll like it more)

 

[BlotOnPaper]

I suppose there are ways to test this some what scientifically:

1) weigh rubber after booster and glue has been applied
2) once the booster effect appears to have worn off, remove rubber and re-weigh the rubber. Calculate the difference.

howerver, would be hard to measure how much of the booster is absorbed into the paddle.

If there was truly zero evaporation then rubber would become heavier after every reboosting without loosing any weight. I think it would be noticable difference. But i don't have any information about instances where rubber becomes heavier every time.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

SO...what can we deduce.... especially if the rubber weights are very close before and after removal? most likely there is not a chemical off-gassing occurring from the modern day booster. this is different than speed glue where one expect nearly all of the weigh of the glue to fully evaporate within a couple of days.

I think you compare booster too much with speed glue. Speed glue was definitely bad. My problem with booster is that we DO NOT have really direct information about what is inside it, so i could not make decision based on knowledge. It can be harmless. But it also can be harmfull. And you don't provide strong proofs.

When we talk about health statements like "it's probably fine" killed a lot of people. So i am trying to avoid booster as much unless we have ANY information about it's true chemical content. I need information and not speculation about "it is probably okay". It must be stated on the package what is inside.

 

[Jslick89]

If there was truly zero evaporation then rubber would become heavier after every reboosting without loosing any weight. I think it would be noticable difference. But i don't have any information about instances where rubber becomes heavier every time.

rubbers do become heavier after every subsequent reboosting.....thats what i'm saying lol.

 

[BlotOnPaper]

rubbers do become heavier after every subsequent reboosting.....thats what i'm saying lol.

Some of my friends who boost their rubbers said exactly the opposite. So unless studied it's just speculation.

 

[Yurifi]

today I tried the H3N again (commercial 38 orange sponge), but not on my prime blade but on a reserve blade.

and it is, much slower, you need to work with H3N much more (even though my backup blade is quite springier and bouncier, even faster than my main blade). spin was same, but I always produce lots of rotation on the ball … and, 38 sponge and it gave a feeling it’s harder than 40 H8 (and even the blade is not as stiff, so probably on my main blade it would be even harder feeling).

but yeah, where H3N gives you absolutely nothing, H8 at least offers a little bit of help.

 

[Yurifi]

Some of my friends who boost their rubbers said exactly the opposite. So unless studied it's just speculation.

I mean, it is quite logic - you are adding stuff to the rubber … so they do get heavier. it’s the same with glue …

 

[BlotOnPaper]

I mean, it is quite logic - you are adding stuff to the rubber … so they do get heavier. it’s the same with glue …

They describes it to me like that: weight_1 - before boosting for the first time, weight_2 - after boosting for the first time. And their rubbers always comed back to weight_1 and not weight_2. After every reboosting. So i really can't belive both you and them because how we even getting such results.