What blade is this?

[Michael Zhuang]

It has ma long face on the handle butt. It appears to be 5w. A friend passed it to me to seal it for him, and he has a grip on the handle so i cant see anything there. Nothing on the blade head either.

 

[ricospin]

This a Nittaku blade but a part of their Ma Long line of blades.

 

[Michael Zhuang]

Do you know the name?

 

[ADurao]

It has ma long face on the handle butt. It appears to be 5w. A friend passed it to me to seal it for him, and he has a grip on the handle so i cant see anything there. Nothing on the blade head either.

to me it looks like any blade painted at home (the lines are all crooked). Don't show your face for that sale, let your friend sell

 

[Michael Zhuang]

to me it looks like any blade painted at home (the lines are all crooked). Don't show your face for that sale, let your friend sell

Nobody is selling. My friend just asked me to seal it for him, and I gave it back to him already. He is using it. I just don't think he knows what blade it is, he said he bought it used.

 

[ADurao]

Nobody is selling. My friend just asked me to seal it for him, and I gave it back to him already. He is using it. I just don't think he knows what blade it is, he said he bought it used.

sorry, I read sell ahahahah! if I find something similar to this blade which I doubt I'll say. big hug

 

[Michael Zhuang]

But you're right, I haven't seen a DHS blade with this design pattern on the handle. So I can't figure out what blade this is.

 

[DukeGaGa]

From Ma Long's picture in the handle it looks like the older version HL5, but the pattern on the handle doesn't match what I remember.

 

[Michael Zhuang]

The older version of HL5 has the standard arylate carbon, doesn't it? I don't see carbon in this one, so I thought it was a 5W

 

[DukeGaGa]

The older version of HL5 has the standard arylate carbon, doesn't it? I don't see carbon in this one, so I thought it was a 5W

Yes, which is why I think it looks weird and have no clue what it is. I can't think of any other blades that uses Ma Long's photo on the handle, well, other than counterfeit/clones.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

This a Nittaku blade but a part of their Ma Long line of blades.

Funny that it seems you almost totally ignored this but ricospin may be on to something. It is really possible it is not a DHS blade but, instead a Nittaku blade.

However, the only way you are going to figure out what blade it is is to take the tape off the handle, or maybe the rubbers off the blade face.

If your friend really does want to find out, that is what he will need to do. But if the blade plays well and he likes it, he should not worry about what blade it is.

 

[Michael Zhuang]

I searched google images for "nittaku ma long", but I don't see any blade with that design pattern.

 

[lodro]

Funny that it seems you almost totally ignored this but ricospin may be on to something. It is really possible it is not a DHS blade but, instead a Nittaku blade.

However, the only way you are going to figure out what blade it is is to take the tape off the handle, or maybe the rubbers off the blade face.

If your friend really does want to find out, that is what he will need to do. But if the blade plays well and he likes it, he should not worry about what blade it is.

Michael already had the rubbers off, he said in #5 that his friend gave him the blade so that it could be sealed.
Also, even if the blade plays reeeeal good, his friend might not want to play it anymore if it turns out to be a $ 5000 rare , limited edition blade 😁

 

[Michael Zhuang]

Ill add this photo, but it doesnt really show much more. Again nothing on the blade head, and not the typical dhs swoosh design.

I thought for sure somebody would know, because how many ma long blades could there possibly be.

I did have a hit with it, and it hits really well in my opinion. Kinda like a YEO but maybe faster.

 

[ricospin]

A club member that I know uses this blade. I haven't seem him in a while. What leads me to believe that this is a Nittaku blade is the ambiguity behind it. All the DHS Ma Long blades have been documented and have been advertised as such -"Used by Ma Long in..." like the PG7. I've only looked that club member's racket once, but I'm pretty sure it had nittaku on there somewhere.

I could have seen a different blade, but had a picture of Ma Long, however I'm somewhat certain this an older make.

 

[Michael Zhuang]

https://a.aliexpress.com/_mO2Z7Rw
i did come across this which sort of looks similar. Could it be just some pre-made blade?

Seems to play too good for premade, and he said he paid $80 for it used.

All the nittaku blades ive seen seem to have something on the blade head. This has nothing.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

One thing to know, in the period from when ML stopped using the Butterfly TB ALC to when he settled on his current blade, he used blade after blade after blade and DHS had not settled on the design of the handle they now use on the ML blades. The Nittaku ML blades all look like they use a similar handle design to the DHS ML blades.

But there was a point where they played with several different designs.

So, this blade could come from that period where ML seemed to change his mind on blades over and over. This was somewhere between 2011 and 2014.

And that blade is pretty old and banged up. So it could just be from that period whether it is from Nittaku or DHS and Nittaku and DHS are not fully separate companies. Note that there are Nittaku versions of H3. The two companies work together.

 

[Michael Zhuang]

Alright. So assuming that it is just a old design, what are all the dhs or nittaku 5w ma long blades? It must be among those.

 

[DukeGaGa]

One thing to know, in the period from when ML stopped using the Butterfly TB ALC to when he settled on his current blade, he used blade after blade after blade and DHS had not settled on the design of the handle they now use on the ML blades. The Nittaku ML blades all look like they use a similar handle design to the DHS ML blades.

But there was a point where they played with several different designs.

So, this blade could come from that period where ML seemed to change his mind on blades over and over. This was somewhere between 2011 and 2014.

And that blade is pretty old and banged up. So it could just be from that period whether it is from Nittaku or DHS and Nittaku and DHS are not fully separate companies. Note that there are Nittaku versions of H3. The two companies work together.

All I got from this is, Ma Long is a EJ.... 🤣

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

All I got from this is, Ma Long is a EJ.... 🤣

For sure, at one point he was. In the time between 2008 and 2012 he went from using several Nittaku blades including the Acoustic to using a TB Spirit, to TB ALC and then he used at least seven different DHS blades before he settled on the blade he has been using since about 2014. So, in that time he used at least 12 different blades. But, I have a feeling he used dozens of different DHS blades from all wood Clipper clones to several different versions of inner fiber ALC blades. I remember, before the W968 blade that he uses there was a W997 blade that he used for a while. Who know how many small changes they made to the W997 and W968 blades before he settled on exactly what he wanted.