Do newer model racquets have true superior breakthroughs in materials/technology?

[yonexRx32]

Originally Posted by -Kap-

What's so hilarious about it? D3O is a non-Newtonian fluid, and its properties change depending on the forces applied to it. Its application in racquets may or may not live up to the marketing hype, but there's no reason to discredit TennezSport for confirming that the material, itself, does what the manufacturer claims it does.

Sure there is a reason to ridicule his claim. He is trying to position himself as an authority in the matter by stating he holds the racket and can confirm that it works as described. It is obvious that just by holding to racket you cannot confirm or infirm what is going on at a molecular level. The same way you cannot confirm that a car can break the barrier of sound just by judging its color. "By looking at the exterior of this deep red automobile and I can confirm that it does 800mph." or "I hold the Enquirer in my right hand right as I speak and I can confirm that Jennifer Lopez rear end weighs 65 lbs".

[AR15]

The main breakthroughs have been in finding more ways to separate you from your money.

[-Kap-]

Originally Posted by yonexRx32

Sure there is a reason to ridicule his claim. He is trying to position himself as an authority in the matter by stating he holds the racket and can confirm that it works as described. It is obvious that just by holding to racket you cannot confirm or infirm what is going on at a molecular level. The same way you cannot confirm that a car can break the barrier of sound just by judging its color. "By looking at the exterior of this deep red automobile and I can confirm that it does 800mph." or "I hold the Enquirer in my right hand right as I speak and I can confirm that Jennifer Lopez rear end weighs 65 lbs".

I'm not looking to get into a debate here, but re-read his post. He said nothing about holding a racquet or saying that a racquet lived up to its claims. He was simply talking about the material, itself.

Originally Posted by TennezSport

Well I have actually held D3O in my hands and I can tell you that it is a reactive material...

Does D3O "work"? Hell yeah. They even use it in military-grade ballistic armor. (You'll find some info on it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D3o ). Does it do squat in a tennis racquet? That's another matter altogether, and the point behind this thread, so let's keep the discussions about how these materials and technologies affect racquets.

(By the way, based on what svarthofde reports, D3O seems to cause a weakness at that racquet's throat, so it looks like it's a failed technology for racquets).

[martini1]

Actually, after graphite (like POG or PS6.0), they got the super hard arm breakers (graphite plus a whole bunch of other material to make it stiffer than anything). The super powerful sticks are a break thru IMO.

The next round of break thru would be keeping the high power but up the control and feel, with the help of new strings, etc.

But I do not believe every 2 yrs when they bring out new sticks there are actually new techs. Most of the time they just play with the power/stiffness/weight distribution/material compositions like with sliders to give it a different feel

[UCSF2012]

Is it marketing BS? Or is it that consumers can't perceive changes?

Hypercarbon/Graphite Xtreme - super stiff, super strong graphite. Allows rackets beams to get thinner while maintaining strength. Reduced chances of strings caving in.

BLX - Its dampening effect is night and day.

Port grommets - sweetspot is HUGE!!!

Cortex - allows a racquet to break faster than expected.

Karophite Black - guaranteed to give you tennis elbow in a month or your money back

Low friction grommets/rounded ends - lets the strings slide with reduced chances of string breakage

...the list goes on and on......

[yonexRx32]

I think you just proved my point with his quote. Moreover, just because a company says it included D3O (or g8e or h5n) in a racket it doesn't mean it's there. The consumer would have no way to verify it.


"Does D3O "work"? Hell yeah."

How do you know? Just because it says so on wikipedia? I have news for you, the wikipedia page to which you are referring was written by the same company that is marketing the material. It is a small piece of propaganda for their own purpose.

Do you also think the biomimetic paintjob on Dunlop works? At least you could check the veracity of their claims.
1) Take two biomimetic rackets of the same weight.
2) Strip the paint job of one of them and apply a primer to even the weights
3) Climb to the top of a 3 story building and let them drop.
4) Ask someone at the base of the building to record which one gets there first.

If there is a significant improvement in racket speed, you should be able to see the one with the biomimetic paint hit first. My bet is that you won't. You might if you drop it out of an airplane at 30,000 feet, but not if the racket travels at the speed it does during a tennis game.

Bottom line: Just because a company claims something cool, it doesn't make it true, nor does it make it false. Some of the claims can be easily disproved or checked. Others not so much. Vacuous statements such as"There is tremendous research that goes into" and "I held it in my hands and I can it does what company X claims" "we work with many customers to make them understand" do not add to the conversation nor do they provide arguments for whatever point the author of such statements wants to make.

[AR15]

Originally Posted by UCSF2012

Is it marketing BS? Or is it that consumers can't perceive changes?

Hypercarbon/Graphite Xtreme - super stiff, super strong graphite. Allows rackets beams to get thinner while maintaining strength. Reduced chances of strings caving in.

BLX - Its dampening effect is night and day.

Port grommets - sweetspot is HUGE!!!

Cortex - allows a racquet to break faster than expected.

Karophite Black - guaranteed to give you tennis elbow in a month or your money back

Low friction grommets/rounded ends - lets the strings slide with reduced chances of string breakage

...the list goes on and on......

Does any of this improve your win/loss record?

Golf clubs have also made big strides in technological improvements over the past 20 years, BUT i don't think handicaps have been reduced to any meaningful extent.

The tennis racket manufacturers make tiny improvements to their rackets, but their main goal is to sell more rackets by differentiating themselves, not make you win more games.

[db10s]

Aerogel is legit. You can buy some online. But you can also buy Uranium on Amazon.

Here's a nice list of all of the "innovations"

http://www.tennis-warehouse.com/technologies.html

[db10s]

Here's some more info on D3O

http://www.d3o.com/partner/d3o-materials/

[-Kap-]

yonexRx32, there have been a lot of informative posts in this thread, and I don't want to derail it with our chatter back and forth, so I'll keep this short, and hopefully sweet.

D3O is proprietary, high-priced silly putty. It easily deforms under low stresses, and stiffens under high sheer forces. With silly putty, you can mush it with just a fingertip, but roll it into a ball and it'll bounce with minimal deformation. Throw that ball hard enough, and it'll crack as if it was solid. It's not magic or propaganda; it's viscosity and physics.

When a poster here is fortunate enough to have some "inside information" and/or share personal experience that most of us are not privy to, like being able to demo a prototype racquet, or in this case, getting hands-on experience (pun intended) with an interesting material, I welcome that and think it should be encouraged. This doesn't make him/her an authority figure by any means, but by the same token, it doesn't automatically make him/her a shill for the racquet manufacturers.

Finally, I agree with a lot of your cynicism when it comes to marketing and bogus claims, as marketers' main purpose is to give you a perceived value, which is how they sell their products or services. How much <insert latest revolutionary material> is actually in this new racquet, and does it even make a difference? Who knows? They throw a miniscule glob of pig fat into a can, and suddenly it's no longer "Baked Beans" but "Pork and Beans". Whee!

For what it's worth, my racquets are old-school 100% graphite, with no "technologies" to speak of, and I think they're amazing. Out of curiosity, have you used any "technologies" that you felt made a difference?

[yonexRx32]

Originally Posted by db10s

Aerogel is legit. You can buy some online. But you can also buy Uranium on Amazon.

Here's a nice list of all of the "innovations"

http://www.tennis-warehouse.com/technologies.html

Indeed, Aerogel is legit. As its name implies it is a gel in which liquid vesicles were replaced with air bubbles. Hence its foam like properties; very voluminous yet very light.

Now let's proceed to read the gobbledygook at the link you provided.

Aerogel < It has strength up to 4,000 times its own weight> What does this mean? Strength is defined in terms of force per unit of length or per surface. Weight is a measure of the force with which the earth attracts an object. Can you say that an iron bar has x times the strength of its own weight? Not if you attended eighth grade science classes. Or that a pencil has x times the strength of its own weight?

<Aerogel's nanometer-sized molecular network> duh... Molecular networks are at nanometer scale. Saying nanometer-sized molecular network is as saying molecular sized molecular networks, or mice sized mice, or golf ball size golf balls.

<Aerogel racquets offer incredible power with touch and feel without compromising weight> Non-quantifiable nor verifiable statements. How many watts is incredible power? Without compromising weight? As opposed to the kind of touchy-feely stuff that tends to be weight compromising?

Pretty much all the descriptions provided are laughable and make for good entertainment. They would make good material to lighten up the mood in high school science class. Grammar and syntax are also lacking, as written by someone with only introductory level English.

Therefore I am asking; does this make you confident that the technologies are what they are purported to be?

[UCSF2012]

Originally Posted by AR15

Does any of this improve your win/loss record?

Golf clubs have also made big strides in technological improvements over the past 20 years, BUT i don't think handicaps have been reduced to any meaningful extent.

The tennis racket manufacturers make tiny improvements to their rackets, but their main goal is to sell more rackets by differentiating themselves, not make you win more games.

Would you like for me to hit the tennis ball for you too? You can sit on the bench and take credit for the win.

There are more players today serving 130's than in the 1990's. 110lb girls are now hitting as hard as boys. Scrawny guys are now ripping heaters. Maybe there are some game-improving technologies behind that. It's up to the player, not the racquet manufacturers, to perform on the court.

[db10s]

Originally Posted by yonexRx32

Indeed, Aerogel is legit. As its name implies it is a gel in which liquid vesicles were replaced with air bubbles. Hence its foam like properties; very voluminous yet very light.

Now let's proceed to read the gobbledygook at the link you provided.

Aerogel < It has strength up to 4,000 times its own weight> What does this mean? Strength is defined in terms of force per unit of length or per surface. Weight is a measure of the force with which the earth attracts an object. Can you say that an iron bar has x times the strength of its own weight? Not if you attended eighth grade science classes. Or that a pencil has x times the strength of its own weight?

<Aerogel's nanometer-sized molecular network> duh... Molecular networks are at nanometer scale. Saying nanometer-sized molecular network is as saying molecular sized molecular networks, or mice sized mice, or golf ball size golf balls.

<Aerogel racquets offer incredible power with touch and feel without compromising weight> Non-quantifiable nor verifiable statements. How many watts is incredible power? Without compromising weight? As opposed to the kind of touchy-feely stuff that tends to be weight compromising?

Pretty much all the descriptions provided are laughable and make for good entertainment. They would make good material to lighten up the mood in high school science class. Grammar and syntax are also lacking, as written by someone with only introductory level English.

Therefore I am asking; does this make you confident that the technologies are what they are purported to be?

I was laughing the entire time...

And for aerogel strength watch the videos on this page http://www.buyaerogel.com/

[yonexRx32]

"For what it's worth, my rackets are old-school 100% graphite, with no "technologies" to speak of, and I think they're amazing."

Not to be pedantic, but I don't think there is a 100% graphite racket. If the racket is manufactured using a thermoset process, you have to account for the amount of epoxy which binds the layers of graphite sheets. Even the graphite (carbon) sheets are not 100% graphite. Overall, you may have less than 50% graphite in a racket. This is a conservative guess. I wouldn't be surprised if it's even less than 40%. If the racket used a thermoplastic process, you are looking at less than 35% graphite fiber, no matter what it says on the racket. The remainder is nylon.



"Out of curiosity, have you used any "technologies" that you felt made a difference?"

I think one has to differentiate between technologies (wood, metal, "graphite", composite, etc) and designs (large ports, box frame, large head, rocker system, rollers, "kinetic", etc).

For my use, the "graphite" technology works well. I prefer thermoplastic frames (dunlop max 200g, prince vortex), but there are a few regular frames I also like.

In therms of industrial design, the large ports seem to do what Prince claims, with the foreseeable drawbacks; some loss of control and accuracy. Replace the ports and you regain some control but lose some comfort and spin. I bought the Prince EXO3 Graphite because of reviews on TW, because it simply looked good, and because it was on liquidation. Didn't live up to my expectation.

The kinetic approach (I own PK redondo and kinetic) also seem to work. I think the rationale behind it is plausible. The kinetic rackets are comfortable. How much is it due to the sand inside the frame and how much to a more flexible material is hard to assess without draining the sand out of a racket. The PK Redondo is a comfortable racket, which makes me think that the kinetic might be comfortable even without the sand inside it. The Redondo is definitely one of my favorites (also says 100% graphite on it, though I know that's not true).

The power pads work for me. They definitely change the feel of the racket. I don't think they affect the power or reduce arm strain. Leather grips work for me. No other innovations I can think of. My daily rackets are Dunlop Max 200g Pro. Once I started playing with them I couldn't really enjoy any other racket. The Redondo is relegated to backup with the Head Liquidmetal Radical (nice, weighted at 12.5 ozs though I don't think there any technology there)

[-Kap-]

Originally Posted by UCSF2012

Cortex - allows a racquet to break faster than expected.

Karophite Black - guaranteed to give you tennis elbow in a month or your money back

Love these!

[DevilDog]

Originally Posted by yonexRx32

Indeed, Aerogel is legit. As its name implies it is a gel in which liquid vesicles were replaced with air bubbles. Hence its foam like properties; very voluminous yet very light.

Now let's proceed to read the gobbledygook at the link you provided.

Aerogel < It has strength up to 4,000 times its own weight> What does this mean? Strength is defined in terms of force per unit of length or per surface. Weight is a measure of the force with which the earth attracts an object. Can you say that an iron bar has x times the strength of its own weight? Not if you attended eighth grade science classes. Or that a pencil has x times the strength of its own weight?
<Aerogel's nanometer-sized molecular network> duh... Molecular networks are at nanometer scale. Saying nanometer-sized molecular network is as saying molecular sized molecular networks, or mice sized mice, or golf ball size golf balls.

<Aerogel racquets offer incredible power with touch and feel without compromising weight> Non-quantifiable nor verifiable statements. How many watts is incredible power? Without compromising weight? As opposed to the kind of touchy-feely stuff that tends to be weight compromising?

Pretty much all the descriptions provided are laughable and make for good entertainment. They would make good material to lighten up the mood in high school science class. Grammar and syntax are also lacking, as written by someone with only introductory level English.

Therefore I am asking; does this make you confident that the technologies are what they are purported to be?

You must have skipped eight grade. You should look up the definition of force and tensile strength (physics).

[-Kap-]

I haven't used many racquet technologies, myself, but my coach back in college raved about his PK Kinetic, and swore that it cured his aging, aching elbow. I gave it a few swings, and I remember it being pretty comfortable (and shaking it like a maraca). I'd actually love to try one again.

I thought Wilson's PWS (perimeter weighting system) was a sound idea. That extra bit of material in the hoop mimicked having a little lead at the 3 & 9 positions. I thought their Aire Shell handle system, which was supposed to reduce shock, may have worked a little too well, because the Pro Staff that I had that used it had a distinct lack of feel.

I had a lot of fun playing with a Prince Extender RipStick for a while, but it didn't necessarily improve my game. Serves and slices felt effortless (and wicked) with a 29" racquet, but depth and directional control on groundstrokes was more challenging due to the length and sub-10oz weight. Switching back to 27" 12oz racquets felt immensely better.

[v-verb]

Originally Posted by -Kap-

...

I had a lot of fun playing with a Prince Extender RipStick for a while, but it didn't necessarily improve my game. Serves and slices felt effortless (and wicked) with a 29" racquet, but depth and directional control on groundstrokes was more challenging due to the length and sub-10oz weight. Switching back to 27" 12oz racquets felt immensely better.

Another former RipStick user! I loved my pair but had to stop using them last summer when my wrist got injured (old age sucks) due to the huge swingweight (2 extra inches will do that).

I had been using them on and off since the 90s and they killed on serves!

Since switching back to POGs and Borons my wrist has had a chance to recover.

[Zolar]

Originally Posted by danotje

I think it is all interesting, but like someone said, I don't think there has been much since graphite. Maybe O-ports, hammer tech and string patterns (a la 99s), but I don't know that they revolutionized the racquet industry.

One breakthrough that I don't think has gotten any notice is PK's Kinetic system. Along with some other elements, it helped me get over TE. The really intersting part, though, is that it makes the frame very solid and stable. Volleys are very controllable with those frames. I was desperate to save my arm, and I wasn't buying the hype, but I took a chance anyway. Now I'm pain free and playing better than just 6 months ago. I have worked on my technique a lot, so it isn't necessarily the racquet, but I'm a believer in Kinetic. Revolutionary? Probably not. Evolutionary? Definitely.

I agree 100 percent. Myself and several friends have been cured of tennis elbow with this racquet. I then moved on to the Babolat Pure Control and have avoided arm problems since. I hear it's the head light, overall heavy racquet that helps, but the PK 5G,( with 5 grams of whatever sloshing around in the head ) maybe has something to do with it?

[yonexRx32]

Originally Posted by DevilDog

You must have skipped eight grade. You should look up the definition of force and tensile strength (physics).

I don't need to. I know what I am talking about. If you ever get to 8th grade, you might learn that too. Tensile strength is measured in Pa, which is Newtons (unit of force) per square meter. Nice try