ATXtennisaddict
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I want to use VS on the mains and ALU Power Rough on the crosses on my Prince Triple Threat Warrior. How much lower should I string my crosses again? Or can I string it at the same tension as mains.
anybody tried polys like pacific poly force or p poly force xtreme as cross this could be good
Glad Cofocus worked for you but I didn't have the same experience. It did not feel as solid as SPPP but it did have better tension maintenance.
I just strung up a new set of SPPP and it feels great. I guess I can live with 10 hours of good play given SPPP is a cheap string if purchased in a reel.
Pacific Poly Force with Pacific Space Power for crosses is a fantastic combo especially in a mid..... string @ 58 / 62
the best compromise for comfort, spin, ball bite and crispness and longevity,
2o hours on a KPS 88 and still going strong..... just edges the Silverstring / VS gut on the basis of it lasting so well, I got around 12 hours out of the SS/VS combo before the mains broke
Mark
Is VS gut in the mains and Solinco tour bite in the crosses a good combination? I play full poly now with tour bite but im getting a little curios to try and hybrid it with gut vs for some more power....
How about re-posting the article or the link so we don't have to search through 13 pages for it?Using Gut as a cross string is simply a waste of money. It also does not last as long. Did you see the article I posted on the subject earlier from TennisPlayer.net? It is very informative.
How about re-posting the article or the link so we don't have to search through 13 pages for it?
Thanks.
How about re-posting the article or the link so we don't have to search through 13 pages for it?
Thanks.
A little cut and paste action from the earlier thread:
You might all find this interesting, as well. From an article by Joshua Speckman in Tennis Player Magazine this month:
...
Many thanks, guys. Some very good stuff there.By popular demand (the unedited version - part 1):
Strings and Spin: Applying What We Know About Copoly
by Joshua Speckman
...
I'm looking forward to hearing about the results you get with those combos.After reading that article I now really want to give that set of gut I ordered a go with synthetics you sent me. I think that conquest combo will be awesome. I might string up another POG with a gut poly hyrbid too. From my experience with PHT main and a gut cross hybrid, I am sort of inclined to beleive it. When I used to have my tour 90s strung that way (pht mains gut crosses) I would notch the pht with the gut and then the gut would frey till it popped. I guess the process will happen in reverse, but I am hoping the resistance of the gut to notching might make it last longer. I guess like anything I have to give it a go to find out.
Many thanks, guys. Some very good stuff there.
VS Team mains and SPPP crosses will be my setup as I have now logged substantial time with this setup.
I get about a good 10 hours of play before I have to cut out SPPP due to strings feel pingy and not as solid. But once I restring it, it is back to that solid and comfortable feel while provide good power and control. Ranked in order of preference.
1. VS with SPPP
2. VS with Silverstring
3. VS with Scorpion
4. VS with Black Magic
5. VS with Black 5 Edge
6. VS with Cofocus
Nice info. Just curious, after the 10 hours you note, do you mount your racquet and just replace the crosses, or start fresh completely?
Posted this in another thread - but it seems to be more relevant here!
I recently came into a couple sets of VS gut and was considering stringing one of my racquets in full gut - however, reading this thread and some others I'm now fairly convinced that a full bed of gut, whilst comfortable etc will see me lose the majority of additional spin I'm currently enjoying so much.
I'm an all-court player, with a baseline bias - hit heavy topspin of both flanks with an EX03 tour 16x18. Volleying was interesting when I first dropped to such a low tension, but I've found the more I play and get used to the feel the more comfortable I am. That said - volleys are not as good as they were but my groundies are much better.
I am now pretty much decided on a setup with a gut main/BHBR cross hybrid; and have a few questions about this setup.
1) Anyone played with this setup? what did you think?
2) Recommended tension - given that I currently play a full bed of BHBR strung at 40lb (and love it) what would be a sensible tension for me to string the hybrid at?
3) What kind of string-life should I expect from a hybrid? I read in other threads of people cutting out their poly crosses a couple of times before the gut mains go. I should mention that with any gut setup I'd always use Babolat string savers - I've always found they enhance both string life and spin.
4) I've also got a couple of sets of BHSR but not tried it yet. Anyone tried them in a hybrid?
Thanks in advance!
I tried the Titan gut 16g / BHBR hybrid and found it gave me less control and spin when compared to Titan 16g / Luxilon Monotec SuperPoly 16L combo. I think this has to do with the greater stiffness in the Monotec SuperPoly.
So maybe worth stringing the BHSR, as it's stiffer?
What tensions would you suggest given my current preference for low tension full-beds; or does this have little/no bearing on a hybrid setup?
Sorry to ask so many questions!!
PART 2:
So can anything be done to keep the main strings sliding and snapping back longer?
Well, on clay courts, it might make sense to rotate rackets more frequently than normal during a match to minimize accelerated friction-wear from the dirt, and then wipe accumulated clay off the strings before playing again.
Rotating rackets more frequently may be important for copoly players.
Fischer notes that plastics like copoly will also melt and notch due to heat from friction. So in practice sessions, where a player might hit many more balls in an hour than in an entire match, it might not be a crazy idea to again rotate rackets frequently to keep the strings from over-heating.
Although it is not widely available outside of Japan, the silicone-based lubricant called Mira-fit may also prolong or revive the snapback ability of worn and notched strings. In a recent experiment, Crawford Lindsey showed that the commonly available lubricant WD-40 both revives the spin potential of notched strings and improves the spin generated by new strings as well. And it should also reduce premature wear by reducing friction and heat. These lubricants are currently legal for tournament play.
Another factor to consider is thickness, or gauge. Traditionally, thin, high-gauge strings have been favored for feel and spin. But the old explanation - that the strings allowed the ball to bite deeper into the pattern, increasing friction - doesn't square with what science is telling us about strings and spin.
But once the link was made between slippery copoly and spaghetti strings, researchers began wondering how copoly strings could be freed to move with less friction and more freedom within the constraints of a woven stringbed. "Thick strings are maybe less slippery, because thick strings, when you weave them there's a bigger angle to the weave," says Cross.
"But if they were only one micron thick there would be hardly any distortion of the strings and they would slide sideways and come straight back." At the other extreme, he says, "if they were a half-inch thick they would be really locked in together."
At present there is, however, no objective evidence that thinner strings do give more spin. Players routinely report that they do, but determining whether they are correct will have to wait for more research.
Finally, what about the great variety of shaped or textured copolys on the market – all advertised as spin strings? Well, according to tennis scientists, because the stringbed is woven, with natural peaks and valleys, all strings have sufficient friction with the ball at most impact angles to generate spin. So, theoretically, any additional friction provided by rough or pentagonal strings shouldn't make any difference.
But subjective reports consistently contradict this. At one online string playtest database, 17 of the top 20 strings rated by players for spin were shaped or textured copolys. Remember, scientists originally dismissed the existence of the poly-spin effect, despite how obvious it was to the players. So perhaps it is a mistake to discount their perceptions again.
So what's going on here? Science is always a work in progress, and this is one area where more research needs to be done.
But so far, there are two possible explanations. First, Crawford Lindsey says that increased friction between the textured strings and the ball may play a role during the snapback phase.
We know that the ball must grip the main strings in order to slide and stretch them sideways. But once the main strings reverse direction and start snapping back, they have to re-grip the ball in order to apply spin-enhancing torque. If the strings can re-grip the ball quicker they can apply spin-enhancing torque for a slightly longer period of time. So it might be during the snapback phase that textured and shaped strings have an advantage.
However, Lindsey's recent experiments showed that lubricating strings increased the spin potential, across the range of string materials. A lubricant will reduce friction between strings, but also between the ball and the strings. So whatever role string-ball friction may have in spin generation, it is almost certainly less important than having the intersections between strings as slippery as possible.
Still, there is one scenario where a player would want the highest possible string-on-ball friction. On almost all shots, theory and lab tests agree that slippery strings, and rough or textured strings, both have plenty of friction to spin the ball.
But on extremely steep swings with the racquet moving very fast – a topspin lob or the heaviest Nadal forehands being good examples - the ball can actually slip off the strings instead of biting them. In this case, a really rough string produces more spin than a really slippery one.
In any case, it's important to note that greater friction generally only makes a difference in the interaction between the ball and the main strings. This is because it is the main strings that are gripping the ball, sliding and snapping back. The role of cross strings in the snapback mechanism is to act as stiff and slippery rails for the mains to glide and slide on.
So one way to possibly have your cake and eat it too is to use a smooth and slippery cross string paired with a slippery but textured main string, something that string manufacturers have realized. Several manufacturers now offer hybrid packages containing two half-sets: a textured copoly for the mains and a smooth copoly for the crosses.
But regardless of the potential of copoly strings, the big question is still: Is this stuff for everyone? For players who hit flat, don't break strings, have tender elbows, or feel they need more pop, natural gut remains the gold standard.
And according to Cross and Lindsey's tests, gut is pretty good at generating spin too: offering about 15% more than nylon. Gut remains popular on the WTA tour, where power and spin may be more valuable than spin alone. The Williams' sisters, along with Justine Henin (up until her 2nd retirement), continue to use gut, the string favored by pros for over a hundred years.
Syngut and multifilament strings, both made of nylon, don't spin the ball as well as copoly or gut. They are softer and more arm-friendly than copoly, but less powerful than natural gut. Many of them are also pretty cheap, and perfectly adequate for most recreational players. The biggest problem with them is that they must be straightened constantly.
And if spin isn't a huge feature of your game, does poly have any use? Quite possibly. For a player with conservative grips and/or traditional mechanics, an experiment with copoly might be worth a try, as the strings will give you more spin with the same swing and effort.
Nate Ferguson says that Pete Sampras, with his relatively flat, classical strokes, switched to Babolat RPM Blast last year and is enjoying the greater "spin control" on the senior tour.
One final thing to note is that lab results will not always be consistent with our on-court perceptions. Because each different string setup will launch the ball at a slightly different angle, and with slightly more or less speed than others, its very difficult to subjectively evaluate how much spin we're getting out in the real world.
Applying lubricant to strings is an extreme example of this. We know from lab tests that lubricant will increase spin considerably. But it will also raise the launch angle quite a bit as well. Consequently, out on the court we may find the ball going long, even with all the extra topspin we're getting. To compensate, we could flatten our swing slightly to lower the launch angle, but this will reduce the spin. Alternatively, we could close the racquet face slightly at impact. This will also lower the launch angle, but increase the spin.
We can adjust to a new string setup in different ways, but unless we know exactly which adjustments we're making it's very difficult to distinguish what we're doing from what the strings are doing.
Lab research is invaluable because it reveals what is really happening. But it's also limited because the player isn't in the lab. On-court results will always be the most important dataset in tennis.
Scientific research into strings has really raised our understanding of why some strings generate more spin than others. But as always, more knowledge leads to more questions. Crawford Lindsey and Rod Cross soon plan to answer some of them by comparing the spin potential of many more strings and combinations in direct head-to-head tests.
But for the individual player, at this point there are no simple prescriptions. Level, playing style, injury—not to mention the patience and cost involved in conducting your own experiments to chose the right string or string combo—all need to be considered when choosing which strings are right for you.
But one fact is indisputable. The copoly effect is real. And the practical applications of the slippery string theory will continue to be refined and evolve as researchers, manufacturers—and players--experiment with more and more variations.
Want to Investigate More About Strings Yourself?
Crawford Lindsey, aka "The Professor", has published the most through, useful and up-to-date collection of scientific papers on strings and spin available. For those who want to learn more about the subject, or about other aspects of tennis equipment, there's no better resource.
C. Lindsey's Tennis Warehouse University
Lindsey's groundbreaking experiments on strings and spin:
"What Strings Generate the Most Spin?"
"Spin and String Pattern"
"String Friction Database"
"Spin and String Stiffness"
"String Lubrication & Movement in Spin"
I put another 2 hours on the courts hitting with Genesis Gut and SPPP and it's not a bad string. So far, 4 hours of use, and this natural gut and SPPP hits really nice. It is not as plush as say VS but at $25 dollars a set, it's also a lot cheaper. It's definitely not as stiff as Pacific Tough Gut and so far plays pretty well.
Will keep you guys updated to see how long this last.
What SPPP you use, Pure (white string) or the original orange string?
Have you tried Babolat Tonic gut in the mains?
............................Top pros tend not to string their gut/co-poly hybrids above 55 or 56/51 or 52, and go down to 48/44 or so. So for the rest of us, I can't imagine why we'd be going higher. Controlling lower tensions is what it's about, with both full poly setups and gut/poly hybrids. During some recent tests, I've been happy with 55/51 (VS/Silverstring). IMO, the poly cross shouldn't be strung more than 2 pounds higher than if it were in a full poly setup. The gut main's tension is then determined by adding 4, as one should not creat a differential greater than 4 lbs or so as higher differentials can damage racquets.
VS Team mains and SPPP crosses will be my setup as I have now logged substantial time with this setup.
I get about a good 10 hours of play before I have to cut out SPPP due to strings feel pingy and not as solid. But once I restring it, it is back to that solid and comfortable feel while provide good power and control. Ranked in order of preference.
1. VS with SPPP
2. VS with Silverstring
3. VS with Scorpion
4. VS with Black Magic
5. VS with Black 5 Edge
6. VS with Cofocus
............................
the only pro i know whos near the 48/44 is federer. but he uses 90sq head + string savers. djokovic is 60/58 and ivanovic is 56/54
Djokovic was at 55/52 at Wimbledon with VS/ALU Rough.
B.BRYAN Prince Natural Gut / Luxilon Big Banger TiMo 1.10 49/53 lbs.
M.BRYAN Prince Natural Gut / Luxilon Big Banger TiMo 1.10 53/50 lbs.
Mardy Fish, 55/55, gut/Timo
ZVEREV Pacific Classic Natural Gut / Signum Pro Hyperion 25/23 kg (55lbs/51lbs)
DENT Babolat VS Touch / Luxilon ALU Power 1.25 43 lbs.
CHIUDINELLI Wilson Natural Gut / Luxilon ALU Power 1.25 25/24 kg.(55lbs/53lbs)
IVANOVIC Wilson Natural Gut / Luxilon ALU Power 1.25 57/55 lbs.
omg how often do i have to post real pics of djokovic racquets in 2011 to shut people up with djokovic strings 55/52
he does not -.- he strings 60/58 go ask priority one if you dont believe it. its been proven 1000times on this forum that he uses
60,5/58,5
all you did here was copying some specs out of some thread years ago (as dent doesnt even play anymore ..). congrats.
i dont want to be quoted anymore so here the real threads: http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=389215&highlight=djokovic+specs sticker which says 27 which means 27kg
or here http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=380351&highlight=djokovic+gut
As you may recall, Dent played again this past year and those are the tensions.
The Bryan brothers switched to gut mains just this past year, and the tensions above are for the new setup.
I checked the links you provided and one involved you correcting someone else about Djokovic tensions, and the other had nothing about tensions.
I could have missed that info, and if I did, my apologies. But even if Djokovic uses tensions that you suggest he does, the point was that many pros, not just Federer, use lower tensions, even with gut. And while it's true Fed uses a 90 sq in headsize, he also has one of the heaviest raquests out there, which still supports the notion that cpntrolling the power and touch of a soft, low tension stringbed is the direction we are headed.
I see no reason to use gut, most multi's hit almost the same for 1/4 the cost.
I see no reason to use gut, most multi's hit almost the same for 1/4 the cost.
I see no reason to use gut, most multi's hit almost the same for 1/4 the cost.
all im saying is djoko strings 60/58. i never said nobody strings low. and in the second thread you can clearly see one pic with djokos broken racquet with his tensions. if you didnt see it you should look at it again