Yinhe Big Dipper 5 Review: A Budget No-Boost Alternative to Hurricane 3 Neo with Some Tradeoffs

[victormanriquey]

Hey all!

This week I'm back with a small pause in my Donic BlueGrip adventures and with a review of a rubber that I wanted to test in depth for a long time, I'm sure many of you have wondered how the Big Dipper 5 plays as well!

It's an interesting budget rubber, for the price it has, the value is really good, it is not better than a boosted provincial H3N (feeling, spin and trajectory mostly), although it gets close in important areas (speed, serves, pushes, blocks, etc)

For the full blogpost check this out: https://www.tabletennisequipmenthelp.com/blog/yinhe-big-dipper-5-review

And for the TL;DR if you are in a hurry, see this table:

Category	Yinhe Big Dipper 5
Weight	Heavy-ish, around 71-73g uncut and ~50g cut to my blade
Sponge & Topsheet	Hard and tacky rubber feeling, similar to the Hurricane 3 Neo
Speed & Gears	Many gears, starts explosive then calms down a bit after break-in period
Spin potential	Very high, but a bit less than a good Hurricane 3 Neo
Throw angle	Medium throw overall, flatter trajectory than expected
Drives & Loops	Good but not as confidence-inducing as Hurricane 3 Neo
Serves	Very spinny, similar to Hurricane 3 Neo serves, bit tougher short serves
Pushes	Very good for aggressive and short pushes
Flicks	Good on forehand but requires confidence and closed angle
Blocks	Very good control and passive blocking
Flat hits	Similar to Hurricane 3 Neo, it's just not the rubber for this
Boosting	No immediate need, could possibly benefit from it
Price & Durability	Amazing value for the money, durability seems very good

Hope you like the review and I'm sure this one is going to spark a good discussion, so bring your questions, comments, concerns or anything else and let's discuss!

Thanks for reading and taking the time as always,

Victor

 

[oophyte]

Previous generation BDs were semi-tacky and fast. Would you say that it is a departure from that and more aligned with the H3 niche?

 

[victormanriquey]

Previous generation BDs were semi-tacky and fast. Would you say that it is a departure from that and more aligned with the H3 niche?

I have not tried the previous BD gens so I cannot comment on it, but definitely not a comeback to H3, those were very very tacky and the new tacky normal is indeed only semi tacky, and indeed BD5 is for sure faster than a normal H3

 

[golden_son]

Great review, as always. I do wish you had experience with the original BD to compare it to, as I've had a good experience with the OG BD but heard mixed reviews of BD5 in comparison. One thing I've seen mentioned is that BD5 is more tensioned and has a flatter arc than the original, leaning slightly more toward ESN-hybrid than Chinese-hybrid. I suppose it's cheap enough I'll just need to try it for myself.

 

[Sqan]

So how would you compare it with the other H3 neo alternatives? Would you say this takes the cake over Jupiter III, Rxton 9, or even Battle II? I know you mentioned the spin it produces seems to be better than those, but is that the only area it excels in (compared to the others)? Love your reviews!

 

[TTpastor]

For me as low end intermediate it's seems a way to hard for the backhand in hardness 39 (good for blocking though), and I think I need to brush more on the forehand. But I just started again after 30+ years and need to develop my forehand as I have mostly used my backhand back in the days. It also seems rather dead to me, which I have seen other reveiews mention, I think I need a bit more catapult.

Edit. I find the dwell time a bit low I think.

 

[Larshos]

I have not tried the previous BD gens so I cannot comment on it, but definitely not a comeback to H3, those were very very tacky and the new tacky normal is indeed only semi tacky, and indeed BD5 is for sure faster than a normal H3

If you're willing to pay for shipping from Norway, I have a sheet of BD1 (39°) new in package I could send you for testing.

 

[victormanriquey]

Great review, as always. I do wish you had experience with the original BD to compare it to, as I've had a good experience with the OG BD but heard mixed reviews of BD5 in comparison. One thing I've seen mentioned is that BD5 is more tensioned and has a flatter arc than the original, leaning slightly more toward ESN-hybrid than Chinese-hybrid. I suppose it's cheap enough I'll just need to try it for myself.

Thanks! Yeah agreed, I never had the chance to try it so tough to say
And indeed, that tensioned + flat arc is the main problem the rubber has, in a way it's like the BlueGrip S1 or NUZN 48 but more extreme. For 15 euros is worth a try if you play on a soft/flexy blade, then this effect is less noticeable, but on the B2X it was accentuated by the blade

 

[victormanriquey]

So how would you compare it with the other H3 neo alternatives? Would you say this takes the cake over Jupiter III, Rxton 9, or even Battle II? I know you mentioned the spin it produces seems to be better than those, but is that the only area it excels in (compared to the others)? Love your reviews!

Thank you! I need to test Rxton 9 still, but it is definitely better than Rxton 5 in the speed and spin area, so for a high intermediate Big Dipper 5 for sure better than Rxton 5, but for beginners and low intermediates, Rxton 5 better, less tempo, more control. Same for Arthur China btw. In my opinion, and for what I need at this moment, both Rxton 5 and LAC need boosting, otherwise I needed to force my technique to much to get tempo out of them.

Jupiter 3 is different, I feel more tension there, softer sponge, more real hybrid than chinese hybrid, I actually really enjoyed it on BH for 37 degrees, felt a bit similar than 8-80, a tad faster maybe

Battle 2 is a tough one, I mentioned yesterday to somebody in reddit that I used to play B2 prov blue on a violin for some months, and back then I felt like it was a great rubber, also very flat arc and fast but the violin compensated for those a lot. I have a fresh sheet at home to be tested, will do an update soonish when I have time, I have some other rubbers in the backlog that come first But if my memory doesn't fail me, I think B2 was faster, spinnier and even lower arc, more similar to H3N BS 39/40

 

[victormanriquey]

For me as low end intermediate it's seems a way to hard for the backhand in hardness 39 (good for blocking though), and I think I need to brush more on the forehand. But I just started again after 30+ years and need to develop my forehand as I have mostly used my backhand back in the days. It also seems rather dead to me, which I have seen other reveiews mention, I think I need a bit more catapult.

Edit. I find the dwell time a bit low I think.

Yeah dwell is low indeed, and for the backhand i would not do 39, very hard indeed!

For the forehand a 38 could work if you want softer, but if you need more catapult then others are better, look fo the nuzns, bluegrips, dna hybrids, etc