structured/shaped polys playtest

[diegoeste]

hi fgs, very useful review. Very good work!!!
After your test, I will buy the blackout but i would like to know if you tried the Stratagem. do u think that there would be many differences?

Last, the black venon rough is your nmbr 1 string? did you tried the regular one?

thanks!!!

 

[fgs]

diegoeste,

i have not tried the strategem. on the other hand it is hard to imagine that the price/performance of the blackout can be beaten.

i haven't tried the regular black venom. the black venom rough is indeed one of the strings i liked most.

 

[mikeler]

diegoeste,

i have not tried the strategem. on the other hand it is hard to imagine that the price/performance of the blackout can be beaten.

i haven't tried the regular black venom. the black venom rough is indeed one of the strings i liked most.

Do you think Blackout is Black 5 Edge?

 

[fgs]

mikeler,

no, not really. they play pretty much the same according to my notes in terms of spin, control, feel, tension maintenance but i had the definite feeling that the black5edge is somewhat lower powered than either the blackout or the black code. the latter two i could not tell apart if i would have done a blindtest. the black5edge seemed to be less responsive on offcentershots - and i hit offcenter as i have repeatedly stated, i hit higher on the hoop, 6th-7th cross topdown.

 

[mikeler]

mikeler,

no, not really. they play pretty much the same according to my notes in terms of spin, control, feel, tension maintenance but i had the definite feeling that the black5edge is somewhat lower powered than either the blackout or the black code. the latter two i could not tell apart if i would have done a blindtest. the black5edge seemed to be less responsive on offcentershots - and i hit offcenter as i have repeatedly stated, i hit higher on the hoop, 6th-7th cross topdown.

Good info, thanks.

 

[fgs]

luxilon savage black 1.27mm

there was a short break in my luxilon testing due to a blindtest i have done for the german tennis magazin, which included also two shaped strings. as soon as we are told what strings we played i will file my playing reports also in this thread.

power: the savage is a lower powered string, quite similar to the adrenalines but seems to have a slightly non-linear pattern. offcentershots had less acceleration than with the adrenaline rough for instance.
grade: 7/10

control: not bad but not impressive in any way. during the second session i ran a little bit into trouble with depth control due to the fact that the profile was worn down completely and the spinproduction was considerably less, getting balls to fly a little bit long. this also had an impact on shortangled crosses for instance, which got more difficult to play.
grade 8/10

feel: pretty "dead". hitting topspin groundstrokes was basically o.k., but i could not rerally connect on touch-shots like droppers, shortangled crosses etc.
grade: 7/10

spin: initially pretty good, but the profile wore down pretty quick and the string lost it's "grab".
grade 8/10

comfort: i had no issues whatsoever in terms of aches, but on slightly offcentershots i know quite a lot of other strings that feel more comfy.
grade: 8/10

tension maintenance: over the four hitting hours the string lasted there was just a minor dip in tension.
grade: 9/10
durability: the string lasted slightly more than four hitting hours on both sets i have played. this seems to be my new benchmark with 1.25mm strings.
grade: 4/10

overall: 51/70
the string is basically reasonable but taking into account that there are quite a lot of other strings with these performances which can be bought for less then half of the price asked for the savage, it makes no sense for me to consider the savage, which is an overpriced string with average playing characteristics.

 

[mikeler]

Can't say which German magazine?

 

[fgs]

it's called "tennis magazin" and the poly test report should appear in the second half of september.

 

[fgs]

luxilon big banger original rough 1.30mm

well, i seem to have survived the "originals". i played both the rough and the plain version. since it is an "old" string i did not really expect much and my expectations have been completely fulfilled.

power: at a very low level, but for me at least it is so low that it gets into my way in respect to controlling the ball. in spite of the rather high sw i'm sporting, i had to regularly "overhit" in order to create some pressure on my opponent, and that got my precision down.
grade: 6/10

control: as already adressed above, on a rather lowish level for a stiff AND thick string. it was pretty difficult to hit shortangled crosses for instance, a problem which was also enhanced by the rather surprising lack of spin. i have played the alu rough and adrenaline rough and was pleasantly surprised by the amount on rpm's i was able to put on the ball, the original rough is way below that, at a quite considerable distance.
grade: 8/10

feel: while not completely missing, definitely not a strong point of this string.
grade: 7/10

spin: at a rather low level compadred to the other luxilons i have recently played. while i managed somehow on the groundies, i was not able to hit a decent kicker with these strings.
grade: 8/10

comfort: after a two hours intensive practice session i did feel some slight stress in my arms and shoulders.
grade: 6/10

tension maintenance: within the rather short timespan it was more or less o.k. at the end of the second hitting session it felt rather "deadish" but since both sets broke before the session ended i could not make a reading with racquettune.
grade: 8/10

durability: i would say pretty poor. going through a 1.30mm string in basically the same time as i did with the 1.25 alu power rough and adrenaline rough is no feat.
grade: 4/10

overall: 47/70

from my point of view it is an obsolete string. i played it some longer time ago in my 106 nblades and thought that i give it another run in the 16mains sticks i'm playing now. i didn't like it then and i don't like it now either.

 

[fgs]

solinco revolution 1.20mm (17ga)

coming from the luxilon 4g, which i did not report about here as it is not a structured/shaped poly (but did file a report on stringforum), even a lower powered and basically stiff string like solinco's revolution seems to be a relief.

i have played the pre-packaged hybrid of solinco revolution 1.25 / tru-feel 1.30 and i could not supress the idea that there is more to the mains than in that combo. since it was (and is) a stiff string, i have chosen to purchase the slightly thinner version to see if my intuition was correct. i know that the nitpickers will argue that there is a difference between any 1.25 and 1.20 in playing characteristics, and i am more than willing to agree, as i have experienced that i loved the 1.20 version of a certain string while being completely unable to connect with the 1.25 version of the same string, so let's agree to this point, that my intuition told me that there is something to be found in the thinner version of that stiff string, that played obnoxiously dead and dumb in the aforementioned combo.

power: it is low powered, end of story. but it is low powered in a positive way, in the sense that it gives you the exact feedback of what you are putting in, and it does not prompt me at any times to overhit in order to get a decent acceleration and put away the ball. it is also behaving pretty decent on offcentershots, i still get some juice on the ball when stretched. of course, bear in mind i have previously played the 4g.
grade: 7/10

control: really good. i could control depth and height very easily, was able to hit shortangled crosses and rarely did my slices float beyond the baseline. due to the shaped profile i got a better contact with the ball than with the 4g, but then there are also regular round polys out there that enable good contact, like the mantis power poly or the kirschbaum competition 1.20, i have so often written about. so, i think that this good control is a result of the lower powered nature of the string paired with the shaped profile.
grade: 9/10

feel: not a forte of this string but still better than the 4g. i already wrote about the shortangled crosses and i managed to hit quite some good droppers, so i would realistically say this makes a solid 8 in my evaluation.
grade: 8/10

spin: really good, not top notch but not really far away. the profile started to get worn towards the end of the second session but there was no tremenduous drop to be observed in the rpm-production department. i started to doubt my kickers coming from the luxilon originals (both regular and rough) and the 4g and i was more than happy to see that i can still get my second serve kicking up shoulder high.
grade: 9/10

comfort: it is stiff but not jarring. i had no issues with my shoulder, not even after hitting a basket of serves in one of the practice sessions. nevertheless, not really recommended for players with elbow or wrist issues.
grade: 8/10

tension maintenance: pretty impressive. while i have gone through my first set of mains within 4 days after stringing, due to some bad weather, the second set has been in the stick for 14 days. it has only seen 4hrs of action, but it played well until it's demise. there was a slight loss of tension to be observed, but not to the extent that required adapting strokes.
grade: 9/10

durability: for such a thin string really good. both sets lasted roughly 4 rather intensive hitting hour each. as i decided to just note the number of hours, the grade will be low, but has to be seen in perspective.
grade: 4/10

overall: 54/70

altogether a really good string, if there would not be the tour bite for instance. i played the 1.25 tb and will soon play the 1.20 tb, as well as the soft ones. from my notes and my memory, given the fact that there is just very little difference in pricing, i personally would rather take the tour bite. it is a little bit crisper, a little bit more controlled and spins the ball a little bit more. this obviously is a slightly softer version of the tour bite and i'm pretty sure it's not as soft as the new tour bite soft versions.

 

[fgs]

solinco barbwire 1.25

power: this is a lower powered string, just like it's siblings from the solinco line, the revolution (1.20) and the tourbite (1.25). nevertheless you pretty much get what you are willing and able to put in, and there is still enough juice on the ball even when on the stretch, so i would say it is a pretty linear response in this respect.
grade: 7/10

control: lower power usually comes along with rather good control and this string does not make any exception. control is really good, not quite top notch, but really very close to it. this seems to be helped by the rather rough profile of the twisted shape which grabs the ball really well and makes it rather easy to control depth and angles.
grade: 9/10

feel: not bad but i have to admit that i expected a little bit more since the string played slightly softer and touchier than the previously played revolution. nevertheless a reasonably good behaviour in this area too.
grade: 8/10

spin: very good and close to excellent, but just close. a string that produces pretty good forward action on the ball, not the sitter, in spite of the lower power level. very good on shortangled crosses, kickers also came very good and slices stayed pretty low.
grade: 9/10

comfort: while not a comfort string for people with arm problems i had no issue whatsoever with my shoulder and the good response on offcentershots just underlines this feat.
grade: 9/10

tension mainentance: for the shortlived nature of this string very good, but it would have been quite a surprise to see much tension loss over a three days span and 3.5 hitting hours.
grade: 9/10

durability: somewhat below average and also less than the thinner revolution played previously. both sets have gone in around some 3.5 hitting hours which is not really satisfactory in my opinion.
grade: 3/10

overall: 54/70

so, in conclusion, i would say a pretty good string, but the general playing characteristics are impaired by a below average durability for a 1.25mm diameter.

 

[fgs]

msv focus hex +25 1.25mm (black)

this is the newer and softer version of the focus hex, which comes basically in three different softness versions, the "soft", the "plus25" which i played and the "plus 38", which would mean that it is 25% resp. 38% more elastic than the regular focus hex.

in spite of being a 1.25mm string it came pretty thick compared to other strings in similar gauge.

power: for a poly it is quite powerful but sports a somewhat nonlinear response on offcentershots for instance, which don't really get much juice. the power it develops is also lowering the control, in spite of a pretty good grab of the ball due to the shape.
grade: 8/10

control: not really impressive in spite of the aforementioned good grab of the ball. some shots were simply flying and i had a tough time with slices with this string. topspinshots have been pretty o.k., even shorterangled crosses, but on slices and touch shots i had a really tough time due to the somewhat unpredictable stringbedresponse.
grade: 7/10

feel: not really my cup of tea. it is soft but in a kind of mushy, muted way. not the feedback i am looking for from a strinbed.
grade: 6/10

spin: spin is pretty good as long as the profile is not worn down. after about a hitting session the profile starts wearing down and the rpm's get less and less. the string lasted for about 4hrs and towards the end of the second session it just played like a regular but spinny poly.
grade: 9/10

comfort: it is a soft string with a rather high power level, so theoretically it would not really put much stress on the player. nevertheless, the way it responds to offcentershots doesn't really provide "comfort" on court, not in the sense of getting jarring at any time, but i was not really comfortable with it.
grade: 8/10

tension maintenance: in spite of lasting only 4 hours (which is usual with me in the mean time!) i could feel a surprisingly high level of tension drop. the first session it was still in the controllable area, i could still manage my shots, but in the second session, also paired with the wearing of the profile, things went down pretty constant and rather quick until it broke.
grade: 7/10

durability: 4 hours until breakage.
grade: 4/10

overall: 49/70

 

[fgs]

gamma moto (black) 1.24mm

having played the thicker version (1.29mm) this winter, i was left with the intention to try the thinner one too and this just happened coincidentally, as i got two test-sets for a blind test conducted by the german tennis-magazin during this summer. the results have been pretty interesting in the sense that i played with a string that i pretty much liked and, until i found out what i have played, i was quite sure it was another string surveyed some time ago, namely weiss-cannon's black5edge. it was not only the coincidence in diameter and colour, but a lot of the playing characteristics (mis)led me to this assumption.

power: i wouldn't call it low-powered as you get pretty much of what you put in, but it definitely is somewhat lower powered than some of the polys in the market. offcentershots are not so smooth but still get some juice and it basically is never jarring. there is a pretty good ratio of power and control, you can step it up and still direct the ball pretty good to where you are aiming to.
grade: 7/10

control: at a reasonably high level and just working fine with either shortangled topspin crosses as well as with slices. depth control is also quite good, you never get the feeling that the ball is sailing, unless of course you do not make proper contact. interestingly this feat keeps up even after the profile is pretty worn down, which happens rather fast (around the 3hrs mark).
grade: 8/10

feel: this is not a forte of this string. it is a reasonable level for a poly, but nothing really outstanding, just middle of the road.
grade: 7/10

spin: good and constant, even after the profile has worn down. there is no decrease in spin nor control to be observed once the profile is flattened and even when pretty heavily notched and about to break. from this perspective there are quite few strings that have such a performance, which makes you think a little bit about all these string-to-string-friction theories and the importance of strings in regard to spin production.
grade: 8/10

comfort: never jarring but i have played smoother polys than this.
grade: 8/10

tension maintenance: really good also in respect to the good durability for a string of this gauge. while the thicker (1.29mm) sister i played in lime was pretty bad in this respect, the thinner black one performed quite impressively. could be that this also affected the aforementioned spin production positively.
grade: 9/10

durability: well, i'd say above average for a 1.24mm string, as i got clean 5 hitting hours out of it.
grade: 5/10

overall: 52/70

apparently the 1.24mm black version comes in below the 1.29 lime as overall points, but if you take out the durability, the 1.29mm lasted for 9hrs, then the clear winner (in terms of playability characteristics) is the 1.24mm version. in my opinion a really solid string in the mid-priced sector, even better than some of the higher priced offerings in the market today.

 

[mikeler]

Good stuff, keep testing!

 

[fgs]

thank you mikeler, i'll do so - after all i do have another 100+ sets hanging around waiting to be strung

next up will be the tour bite soft 1.20 and the regular tour bite 1.20.

this year i have played some more matches (open, +35 and +45 leagues) and entered also some tournaments. i finished with a positive count in singles, 19:13 w/l-ratio AND the weird thing is that most of these matches, with very few exceptions, have been played with different strings in the sticks. is it possible to say that strings that played well and to my liking have helped me win? NO, DEFINITELY NO!! i have lost tight matches with strings i did really very much like performance wise and i have won matches with strings i will definitely not play anymore, not even if i would get them for free. most of my opponents have been in the itn 4.5-5.2 bracket, so pretty good players. if i look at some conversion chart, then every player with an itn between 4.00-4.99 would be a ntrp 5, while the 5.00-5.99 bracket would correspond to a ntrp 4.5. i don't know how precise these conversions are, but that is the best i could get my hands on.

so, in conclusion, strings do make a difference, but as i always thought, the biggest part is in our minds. i won matches with strings i don't want to play anymore, most probably because feeling uncomfortable to a certain extent i have just played "percentage-tennis", knowing that i can't go for fancy touch shots. with other set-ups i felt really good with, i was most probably trying too often to land some high-risk shots and maybe having a "not so good day in the office" i loused up not only the shots but also the match. one of the weirdest matches was against a former touring pro, a match i have gone through three sticks with different strings - i started with a stick i really felt very comfy and had my behind handed to me 6-1 in the first set. at 0-1 in the second the strings broke and i took out a stick which i knew would play pretty different, but still managed to win the set 6-2. at 3-4 in the third, that one broke too and i had to take out the mono gut zx/mcs combo i was talking about being strung too low. i liked that string but felt really uncomfy with the "rocketlauncher", nevertheless reeled off the next three games making only two mistakes and "magically" landing all the shots i was going for.

 

[fgs]

solinco tour bite soft 1.20mm

having played and enjoyed the regular 1.25mm tour bite some while ago, i decided to give the "soft" ones a go too. since this is not only a "soft" iteration but also a thinner gauge, i slightly upped the tension by 0.5kg (1lb) from my usual reference tension of 21kg (46lbs) for the mains. i played the "soft" in an a/b with the regular tour bite 1.20 (which is on the verge of breaking, so the reviw will be up in a couple of days too).

power: this was the first surprise, it is lower powered than the regular and i truly doubt that 0.5kg (1lb) would and could produce this effect. i had difficulties in accelerating the ball on putaways.
grade: 7/10

control: control is somewhat below the regular one and this has to do with the stringbedresponse which is rather muted. the string is spraying more than the regular, in spite of having strung it slightly higher. still on groundstrokes and serves i could direct the ball pretty much where i liked, i could play nice short angles, so not much to be complaining about in this department.
grade: 9/10

feel: this was the second surprise - it is rather muted and i would call it unresponsive compared to the regular tour bite 1.20. on touch shots like droppers or short angled slices the "soft" performs a sensible step below the regular. it is still good, but just a regular run of the mill.
grade: 8/10

spin: really good but slightly below top notch. the string grabs the ball alright providing good control on both groundies and kickers for instance.
grade: 9/10

comfort: i can say that it is slightly more comfortable than the regular, but this goes rather into a somewhat diffuse stringbedresponse. neither string is jarring or feels "hard" on offcentershots, but the "soft" one is at the verge of "mushy" in my opinion.
grade: 9/10

tension maintenance: for the rather short lifespan (3 hitting hours) good, but this starts to be a high mark on almost every string i test in the mean time, as such a short lifespan would not allow for any big tension drop.
grade: 9/10

durability: rather low but not really surprising for this thin gauge. i got roughly 3 hitting hours of each of the two halfsets i played with.
grade: 3/10

overall: 53/70

maybe having strung it 2lbs higher than the regular would have provided a better response, a more crisp and direct feedback, but then the durability would have gone even lower.
the regular one is about to break too, but from the experience with the first half set i would rather take the regular one, which is supporting my game better and gives me a better feeling stringbed.

 

[Stasko]

Will you be testing yonex poly tour spin? Sorry if you've already been asked.

 

[fgs]

hello stasko,

yes i will but it will not be very soon - it is quite likely that it will be no sooner than next summer.

 

[fgs]

solinco tour bite 1.20mm

today i finished off the last set of regular tour bite mains in 1.20mm (17ga) i have played parallel to the soft version.

power: it might sound a little bit weird, but i find the power level of the regular tour bite somewhat higher than that of the soft version. it might just be the fact that the stringbed simply seems to be more responsive to what you are putting into it, a more direct feeling and hence also the perception that when you accelerate you really get a fast ball. i was better able to put away balls with this setup than with the soft one. it is by no means a "powerful" string, but it pretty well responds to what your input is.
grade: 8/10

control: due to the aforementioned "direct" feel it sports, control is on a high level. it is pretty easy to direct shots pretty much everywhere you want them. due to the good spin behaviour short angled crosses are easy to place, but also when on the defensive, it is easy to spin the ball high and long and "buy some time". slices also are pretty touchy with this combo. i am reluctant to give the highest grade, but this one is very close to making it.
grade: 9/10

feel: in spite of being pretty stiff, the stringbed still is "lively", but not in the sense of springy. you can still feel offcentershots very well and direct them where you want, i was able to play dropshots and touchy slices without any problems. for a poly this is top notch.
grade: 9/10

spin: really good, almost top notch. topspin shots kick pretty nasty and slices stay nice and low, kickers go shoulder high. this string grabs the ball really well and the profile also keeps up pretty long.
grade: 9/10

comfort: i had no issues in this department, it is surely somewhat stiffer than the "soft" one but personally i would not give it a lower grade. for me it does just fine but be aware of the fact that this is still a stiff string, so the ones having elbow issues should better stay away from it.
grade: 9/10

tension maintenance: really good for the 4 hours it lasted. i wouldn't give it the highest mark but the loss of playability is minor and only the very picky ones would complain.
grade: 9/10

durability: it lasted 4 pretty intensive hitting hours which basically is very good for such a thin gauge. and it lasted about one hour longer than the "soft" one in the same gauge.
grade: 4/10

overall: 57/70

this is a string i thoroughly enjoyed playing and it will turn into one of my favourites. i'll buy some more of it as i want to have it in my "final shoot-out" (whenever that is going to be - presumably 2016).

 

[fgs]

solinco tour bite soft 1.30mm

i'm done for now with the shaped solincos, and i am determined to "revisit" the regular 1.25 and of course the "recently discovered" regular 1.20. over the next days i'm going to play the 1.25mm outlast and then i get back into the "shaped/textured"-business with the dyreex black edge.

power: as one would expect from a thicker string, the power of the tour bite soft 1.30 is somewhat lower than that of it's stiffer colleague, the regular 1.20 tested before. nevertheless there still is enough juice to be putting balls away and most interestingly the stringbed does have a linear behaviour in the sense that offcentershots don't just fade away but still make it pretty nice over the net and deep into the opponents court.
grade: 7/10

control: as opposed to the thinner gauge of the soft i recently played, the 1.30 does have really good control, almost in top notch category. it is easy to direct the ball both lateral and depthwise, and i attribute this to the fact that (surprisingly) the thicker gauge of the soft simply has better "grab" than the thinner one.
grade: 9/10

feel: it has a more direct feedback than the thinner gauge soft one, very much like the 1.20 regular. this allows for better touch shots in my case. nevertheless i still prefer the regular 1.20 in this respect.
grade: 8/10

spin: spin is almost top-notch and absolutely on the same level as the thinner regular i played and considerably more than the thinner soft. short angled crosses have been easier to play and place and i got my kick back on my kickers , which i started doubting with the 1.20 soft. slices are also really nice to direct and they keep staying low.
grade: 9/10

comfort: on a high level for me and i can imagine that players which do not have an overly sensitive arm might give this a try (allow me to remind you that i play hybrids, crossing with the very soft mantis comfort synthetic at rather lowish tensions - 46lbs.)
grade: 9/10

tension maintenance: very good for the 5 hitting hours it took me to break the strings. the strings have been in the sticks for about a week before i started to play them, but all the solinco polys i have played so far have had really good behaviour in regard to keeping tension. there obviously is some tension loss but it does not seem to interfere with the levels of control these strings provide.
grade: 9/10

durability: each of the two halfsets i played lasted for about some 5 hitting hours, which for a 1.30mm string is quite reasonable.
grade: 5/10

overall: 56/70

the tour bite soft 1.30 is a really playable string indeed. since i like my stringbeds a little bit more on the crispy side and as i got around 4 really decent hitting hours of the regular tour bite 1.20, personally i would rather go for that one, but the performance of the 1.30 soft is very close.

 

[pennc94]

Have you tried/evaluated L-TEC 4S yet?

 

[fgs]

pennc94,

no, haven't tried any of the l-tec strings yet and due to the price i doubt i'll do so in the near future. my main problem is that i break poly mains in 4-5hrs of playing, therefore the l-tec strings are not really an option. i might end up buying some just for the fun of testing, but right now they are not on top of my priority list.

 

[fgs]

dyreex black edge 1.25

there has been much fuss regarding these strings lately and i had the chance to playtest the black edge in dia. 1,25mm.

power: this is a softer poly and it is rather powerful. the power nevertheless comes a little bit erratic and it seems to have vastly differring launch angles even on slight offcentershots.
grade: 8/10

control: as already mentioned above, i sometimes ran into troubles in this department. i could most of the time control the ball pretty well due to the respectable spin this string generates, but it also frequently happened that i overshot by quite a wide margin, both in depth and/or lateral.
grade: 7/10

feel: this string is definitely not my cup of tea. while it is pleasant to hit with due to it's softness, but it is and feels extremely muted. i could not develop a consistent feel for droppers or slices for instance, some came perfect and others, in spite of feeling the impact itself "the same" took on a completely different trajectory.
grade: 7/10

spin: respectable but not impressive. i feel i got at least the same amount of rpm's out of the previously played solinco outlast 1.25 and the kirschbaum competition 1.20 i'm playing right now is easily above in this chapter. spin production nevertheless was pretty consistent for the first hitting session, then got lower as the profile had been worn out completely during the first session. spin is still good, not to understand me wrongly, but just on an average level for polys.
grade: 8/10

comfort: really nice, not much to comment about it, but it is a comfort that is misleading as it gives you basically no real feedback and makes it rather difficult to find out what went wrong on mishits. you have a good feeling on contact and find yourself that the ball has sailed long by 3meters.
grade: 9/10

tension maintenance: over the four hours i got out of the string i have not experienced any problems related to a drop in tension. the control issues i was talking about earlier have been right from the initial hit.
grade: 9/10

durability: 4hrs which is reasonable for a 1.25mm string.

overall: 52/70

i must confess that i expected more. maybe this string has to be strung higher in order to give me what i'm looking for, but from my recent experience with the tour bite soft i doubt this string would turn from dull to lively and responsive by matters of increasing the tension by 1-2 kg.

 

[Torres]

Apologies but a minor grumble...with the overall score, wouldn't it be better not to include the score for power?

A high overall score presumably means a good string, but that doesn't necessarily mean high power. By adding the power score into the overall score, doesn't it inaccurately skew the overall score?

 

[fgs]

torres,

you sure have a point here and i have been thinking about this myself, moreso regarding the score for durability for instance since this has gone down for me in terms of hitting hours quite considerably over the past two years. i play maybe 70% of my courttime with my son, who is now 14 and a half years old, plays competitional tennis and has gained pretty much in consistency and strength, so for instance two years ago i was getting anywhere from 10-12 hitting hours out of a mains, now i'm down to 4-5 max, some of the strings, specially in summer when it is clay courts only, even break in 3. this means that i have some strings like the tecnifibre ruff code which at the time of the test lasted me 11 hours and scoring a 10 in durability, which gives it a unrealistic high mark as overall score. i still like that string quite a lot but the score is too high. same goes for the mantis power poly, my go-to string for instance, which now lasts me 4-5 hrs but when i started my survey and made it my benchmark i was also getting around 11hrs out of it.

regarding power i was thinking quite a lot about modifying the score to a power/control combo with only one mark. i think we can agree on the fact that uncontrolled power is basically a negative, so a string having a really high power level but a very low control level and getting two grades as of now, would in the end get the same amount of points as a lower powered but quite well controlled one and this does not reflect the reality on court.

with my current system of evaluation i get some weird results like for instance the dyreex black edge having the same overall score as the gamma moto 1.24. while i'd play the gamma anytime i would not do so with the dyreex for instance, so there is something definitely wrong about the mix in regard to scoring. by the description i make i try to express these things but if someone would look only at the scores (and i think quite a lot do) they surely might be mislead by the plain figures.

another thing that got me thinking is a grade for tension maintenance. as said earlier, i get max. 5hrs hitting time of the mains currently, so within this short time span very few strings will louse up. the vast majority of the polys i played lately in this restricted timewindow have behaved really well earning consequently "high! marks. but this is not what the average player will be experiencing, playing maybe anywhere from 10-20 hours with these strings when he hopefully cuts them out if he/she does not break them. these scores are definitely misleading. i did some syngut tests lately and those have loused up in these 4-5 hrs, but the multis i played (very few lately with the exception of my regular mcs) only last for like a single session in the crosses and don't exhibit any dramatic tension drop in this ultrashort time span. therefore my marks i would give for this feature are surely misleading.

i'm open to any ideas and willing to talk about them in order to fix these issues as i myself am not happy about them in the mean time.

 

[fgs]

the past weeks i spent, besides playing some tennis and testing strings, rethinking my grading system as i found out that some results definitely did not reflect the on-court reality, as already stated above in the response to torres "grumble".

i played around with the grades and went on to read the vast majority of my notes i take after each practice session or match and i concluded that, since i rarely gave marks below 5, a system starting from 1=very bad and ending with 5=very good would be sufficient.

next up i reconsidered the separate grades for "power" and "control" and decided to make a joint category "power/control". the main reason for this being the fact that in my old rating system a high powered string with low control would add up the same amount of points as a lower powered string but with good or very good control. consider the luxilon 4g 1.25 (16L) i played (not reported here as it was the plain version), which i found to be low powered but basically offering good control - the on-court reality was, obviously for me!!!, that i tended to overhitting quite a lot in my attempt to accelerate and put pressure on my opponent, so hitting precision started to suffer and along with it control. the longer the session lasted the more tired i got and obviously the errors count kept hiking, so i had no practical benefit from this "low powered control string". in the response to torres i also described the situation with the dyreex black edge 1.25 and the gamma moto 1.24 which basically had the same score when the two grades were added up, but which would not reflect my on-court experience.

another issue was tension maintenance and durability. in the mean time for the reasons mentioned earlier in the thread, my playing time with 1.25mm strings has gone down to 3-5 hitting hours. in this short time span very few strings louse up in respect to tension maintenance, so from this perspective i would have given high grades basically to every string, which obviously is not reasonable. therefore i joined these categories as well - if a string lasts 5 hours and tension loss keeps decent levels as not affecting control for instance, the string gets a 5. the less it lasts, the less it gets and if in the time window provided there is some tension loss occuring that affects the other parameters, than it will get a lower grade.

i will not re-write all the reports and the new ones will be graded with this new system, but for reference i will modify in post #1 the gradings for the top 15 strings in my evaluation (some of them not being shaped/structured). for the rest of the shaped/structured polys i have tested that do not make it into my current top15 i will adjust the figures to the new rating system which has just 5 categories:
- power / control
- feel
- spin
- comfort
- tension maintenance / durability

 

[fgs]

tourna big hitter silver rough 1.25

there has been some confusion about tourna gauging lately - this has been sold to me in europe as 1.25 but the pack stated gauge 17 (only) and by comparing with other strings i have at hand i would dare say it is somewhere between 1.22-1.23, as it is definitely thicker than the kirschbaum competition 1.20 but less thick than the 1.25 head hawk i recently purchased.

power/control: the silver rough is a low powered string which basically gives you quite good control, but doesn't really make it into the top level. it has a somewhat nonlinear behaviour, meaning that even slight offcentershots do tend to go short. it is not a string tempting me to overpower due to the lower power level but control is going down on aforementioned offcentershots. as a player heavily relying on topspin, i obviously do not hit the sweetspot every time, so this string sometimes exposed some erratic behaviour when compared to other strings.
grade: 4/5

feel: it is stiff but not in the "pleasant" way for me as for instance the tour bite. it is somehow "pancaking" the ball which makes touch shots pretty difficult, even when hit very precisely.
grade: 3/5

spin: pretty good but not top notch and also exposing that weird behaviour when not hitting properly. it happened that when on the run and trying to buy some time with a high arching topspin i found it went out by two meters.
grade: 4/5

comfort: as mentioned earlier it is stiff but not harsh in my opinion. i had no arm/shoulder issues whatsoever but i have definitely played more comfy strings than this.
grade: 4/5

tension maintenance/durability: i got slightly above 4 hitting hours out of this string, which basically is good as the string is "on the thinner" side of 1.25, but the last 30-45 minutes there was a seizable drop in tension. not really bothering but nevertheless noticable.
grade: 4/5

overall: 19/25

i would say a solid string for power players, but for the ones that tend to also rely on some touchy shots in order to get their opponents off-balance this would not fit the bill. i also had some courttime with the bhbr which so far i have enjoyed more and there is a very small difference in price.

 

[fgs]

the past four weeks basically i have played with the tourna big hitter strings, the silver and blue ones in plain and rough versions, all 17 gauge. about the silver rough i have already reported, the blue rough will be coming soon too, but what i have a little problem understanding is what i basically experienced on court. the one i liked least was the plain big hitter blue. looking at twu-data, i found it to be the stiffest of the bunch (222.3 lb/in.) with the shortest dwell time (34.4ms) and the smallest deflection (31.0mm). it plays stiff and is not touchy at all, and surprisingly seems to be losing some tension after the first session (2hrs), a finding/feeling which is not reflected in the data.

as you could see in my report, i was not really fond of the silver rough either but pretty much enjoyed the plain round silver. looking at the data, the round one is softer than the rough one (185.7 vs 197.2), sports a longer dwell time and a slightly higher deflection. well, so far everything i felt on court also matches the "science".

but now comes the blue rough, which is less stiff than the plain blue (unlike the silvers) but still stiffer than the silver rough (209.7 vs 197.2) while dwell time and deflection are about the same when compared to the silver rough. the blue rough plays a lot smoother than the softer silver rough, has more power and better control, feels better, spins better, simply is better - for me and my stroking mechanics obviously. something obviously happens which is not reflected by the numbers, and it is not the first time that i found this "picture" from the lab not to be confirmed by the "picture" on court.

 

[fgs]

tourna big hitter blue rough 17 - 1.25mm

let me start by saying and stating that i do really like this string. could be because it was the most pleasurable hit from the four tourna strings i played, but i do think that this one does qualify for a top 10 string in my book.

power/control: in spite of being on the stiffer side of things, at least according to the twu measurements, this one played really nice and smooth providing a really good level of power and even bailing me out on offcenershots on the run. control is also pretty good, not really topnotch but very close. since the shape keeps going for quite a while, and i tend to control my shots with spin, this was a really good hit.
grade: 4/5

feel: i could pretty well relate to the touch of this string and felt pretty comfortable playing slices and droppers or angled topspin-shots. blocked returns could also be pretty well directed, so altogether a really good performance in my opinion.
grade: 4/5

spin: this is one category where i find it to be top notch, producing pretty heavy topspinshots, quite highbouncing kickers or low skidding slices. the profile kept up pretty well too for the roughly 4 hours until breakage, so there was no diminishing spin to be observed.
grade: 5/5

comfort: while i did not have any aches or pains with this string i have seen more comfy ones, so this will not be the highest grade even if i had no issues with it.
grade: 4/5

tension maintenance/durability: lasted roughly 4 hitting hours and i had no issues with tension loss and shots started to sail. a solid performance.
grade: 4/5

overall: 21/25

after finishing the plain silver and blue i have played parallel to the rough versions i will turn to the black 7 in both 16 and 17 gauge. regarding the plain versions, i could pretty well relate to the silver but did not like the blue at all.

 

[mikeler]

Any chance for a Discho Iontec review? I think it is a smooth string so I'm not sure if you'll violate your thread title. Great reviews, keep 'em coming...

 

[fgs]

thank you for your appreciation mikeler. i regularly play also round polys but i do not report here about them as i thought to make this a strucutred/shaped polys thread only.

i must confess that i'm rather reluctant to beef up my current inventory which is about to last me for the coming three years - i still have some 60 sets, which means 120 mains of shaped/strucutred strings around and about the same amount of plain polys. every now and then, when i purchase some other items like balls, shoes etc. i also order a couple of strings, so if i spot something with the t-man i need then i will give those strings also a try.

i'm also interested in the multi they offer. i'm currently really happy with the mcs, the only trouble is that i go through a cross basically each session and usually restring the crosses once. if i'd manage to find one to last me longer and give me the same touch as the mcs, i might switch. i've tried some synguts lately but the results so far have not been satisfactory.

 

[Don't Let It Bounce]

Any chance for a Discho Iontec review? I think it is a smooth string so I'm not sure if you'll violate your thread title. Great reviews, keep 'em coming...

Get ready to be happy. There is now Iontec Hexa in both black and salmon.

The round version was so nice that I am looking forward to trying out the Hexa when weather permits.

 

[lynnbart]

I like the review of bhbr. I strung up a ethnic last night and it played fantastic today. Enough that I might have to use it awhile.

We played the iontec black for awhile last year and it's a nice playing string, and good value.

 

[mawashi]

Hi fgs,

Great thread! Unlike you I only consider myself a 3.5-3.75 however, on the one time I somehow managed to get my string setup just right I was able get a set from a D3 college level player.

I used to play with kevlar/multi cross which is a string setup that I can consistently get that great pancake feeling however, the kevlar will saw through the multis in less then a set and make the string bed unplayable.

Tour bite 1.25 too plays great but for a couple of sets but as soon as the textured surface gets worn out, the spin and control goes as well.

Genesis Black magic 1.23 (round smooth) is the only poly that I could get that pancake feeling and which I won that set. At it's peak, it produces a rather unique shot. High arc trajectory and net clearance however upon ground contact the ball skids low rather then bouncing up.

It's the one string that I measure others against as it just feels so good however, the lack of durability & tension maintenance means I'm still on the lookout for a replacement.

The key for finding the right string is the feel, especially that unique ball pocketing feel that I can almost feel exactly where I want the ball to go.

It's an weird déjà vu feeling and I'll try to explain it. When I get that feeling, I can get the ball to go anywhere on the court I want. During a 2hbh swing, I did initially intend to go cross court however, there was a spin and weight to the ball which made it difficult to go cross court and in that split second it felt that I could go down the line instead and adjusted my swing to do that.

It might be a pipe dream but I'm still on the lookout for a stiff, controlled long lasting poly lol!

Btw, I rely more on stringforum.net reviews more then those of tw

 

[fgs]

mawashi,

i can very well relate to what you are telling and moreso "feeling" on the court. the string that gives me that feeling constantly is the mantis power poly. it's a round string which still gives me plenty of spin and i can literally put the ball wherever i like on court. it is also a string i have played with quite a lot. a quite similar experience as with the mpp i get from the kirschbaum competition 1.20 which is currently strung on my three "competitional" sticks (i still have some reels hanging around i want to clear and have decided that this year i will play matches with three identical sticks in my bag).

i also quite like the tour bite 1.20 a lot and it is for me a string that does not wear down on it's profile too much before breakage, quite similar to the recently played tourna big hitter blue rough. the genesis twisted razor also deserves a honorable mention along with the polyfibre black venom rough, the latter one being a very soft string nevertheless and needs to be strung higher as it sports a quite big stabilisation loss.

 

[mawashi]

Oh no... mantis power poly... getting certain brands of strings here is going to be a pain here.

Btw, how's the tension stability and durability of mantis power poly?

The reason why I latched onto your reviews is because you mentioned the pancaking effect and how you like a stiff yet comfortable string. Things I can relate strongly to.

The 2 strings I found very difficult to adjust to were cyber blue and Pacific Poly soft for some reason, they feel too soft and mushy. I agree that they pocket the ball very well but unlike black magic or MSV hex the pocketing seems to go on and on like I'm playing with a bed of rubber bands lol.

Looks like I go to get my hands on TB 1.2, kirschbaum competition 1.20 and mantis power poly lol!

I'm rather gear sensitive so the moment the loses that twang or fast rebound and feel I lose confidence in my swing. I tend to swing big and the moment I loose feel on the ball I know the balls will start flying.

I do hope you can review black magic and compare against the other strings you have mentioned.

Best wishes to your matches!

 

[fgs]

for quite a while my main hitting partner has been my son. i still play quite a lot with him and as he grows older (soon to be 15) he builds up in consistency and pace. three years ago i was getting 10-12 hitting hours out of the mantis power poly, or most other polys as a matter of fact, due to the slower pace our practice sessions had. in the mean time i'm somewhere down between 4-5 hours. the mantis is slightly thicker than the 1.20 tour bite or kirschbaum competition and lasts a little bit longer, but the main issue here is that for that longer time span they held up tension really well.

my son is playing the mantis power poly in the mains and he is usually breaking them around 12-14 hours as he has a flatter shot than me - tension is still o.k. when they break, i keep checking from time to time having a few hits with his sticks. i used to also check with racquettune some time ago and that only confirmed what we were experiencing on court. nevertheless i have to mention that we usually keep our sticks at least 24hrs after stringing before we take them out for a hit, so once the stabilisation loss occured, and that is around 10-12% of the initial stringbedstiffness measured off the stringer, the strings keep pretty even, that is only a rather slight tension loss until breakage, usually somewhere around 5-6%. this does not affect control with these strings in our experience and it is easy to adjust to a "fresh" stick.

thank you for the wishes for the matches, next week i'll be "in action" again, hopefully playing a little bit smarter than on my last two matches.

 

[mawashi]

Thanks for the info! Looks like I need to get that string!

My coach and his son are really hard hitters. His son happens to be an atp pro so guess what, unless my string setup and fitness is max, there is zero chance of keeping even a decent rally going.

Older but not wiser, another thing I can relate to lol!

 

[fgs]

i can feel what you are saying - we have a former pro in the club too, just turned 35, and from time to time i get to hit with him. even if he doesn't play at full pace i'm pretty much done after some 20 minutes of hitting. never happened with my +45 buddies so far.

 

[mawashi]

LOL exactly! When I'm playing regularly, I can easily go 2 hrs for singles and 3-4 hrs for doubles. With my coach I'm buggered in 30 mins and with his son I want to die after 20 mins! A busted left knee and a right knee on it's last legs doesn't help either!

Back on the topic of strings, how much difference in playability vs durability do you get/compromise when you go from 1.25 to 1.2? I'm mostly around 1.25 to 1.23 cus of the fear of losing playability too fast.

Btw, you mentioned that the mantis power poly was thicker then the tour bite 1.2 cus it is. Some research lead me to find that it's actually 1.25 mm. I'm able to get kirschbaum easier here so I'll have a go at kirschbaum competition first.

 

[fgs]

to all tourna black 7 users

i just strung up the next two sticks for my playtesting and had a truly weird experience - i have a pack of 16 and a pack of 17 gauge black 7 strings which i intended to test in parallel. i started out with the 17gauge and while it felt and looked a little bit thicker than one would expect i did not mind very much as we all have come to know about the diameter variances according to this way of gauging (i even had some european strings denominated at 1.20 and they looked much thicker, but then from the same manufacturer the 1.25 also was thicker when compared to others).

what struck me nevertheless was the fact that the 17gauge black 7 comes definitely thicker than the 17gauge of the other four tournas i have previously gone through. the next thing was that the 16gauge definitely had the same thickness than the string from the 17ga. pack. so, it rather seems to me that i have ended up with two sets of 16ga black 7.

did anyone of you have similar experiences?

 

[mawashi]

Might be a case of a bad batch or general poor qc. I've personally not experienced it before as most of the strings I've tried were quite up to spec.

 

[swfh]

i just strung up the next two sticks for my playtesting and had a truly weird experience - i have a pack of 16 and a pack of 17 gauge black 7 strings which i intended to test in parallel. i started out with the 17gauge and while it felt and looked a little bit thicker than one would expect i did not mind very much as we all have come to know about the diameter variances according to this way of gauging (i even had some european strings denominated at 1.20 and they looked much thicker, but then from the same manufacturer the 1.25 also was thicker when compared to others).

what struck me nevertheless was the fact that the 17gauge black 7 comes definitely thicker than the 17gauge of the other four tournas i have previously gone through. the next thing was that the 16gauge definitely had the same thickness than the string from the 17ga. pack. so, it rather seems to me that i have ended up with two sets of 16ga black 7.

did anyone of you have similar experiences?

I just got a reel of the 16g and I compared it to a set of 17 that I had lying around. I thought that the 16 was visibly thicker, but the biggest difference was during stringing. The 16 barely stretched on my klippermate, while the 17 was stretchy.

IMO, 16 plays better than the 17 in my 4d 300 tour. way more feel.

 

[fgs]

i have ordered from another supplier another set in 17ga - which now is denominated 1.20mm. i do hope it is of similar thickness than the previously played 17ga tournas, which basically, also according to tw-university, are about 1.23mm. this i could also see pretty clearly when holding them up against the kirschbaum competition 1.20.

this gauging stuff from tourna is a little bit unsettling, but i still like the performance of both the blue rough and the plain silver.

 

[mawashi]

Another thing worth noting is perception sometimes isn't reality. I was sure... sure that the msv I had was 19 till I used my vernier caliper and realized it wasn't...

One reason I don't use gauge only mm...

 

[fgs]

the two black7's i have strung are definitely the same thickness in spite of coming in different packs stating different gauges and have been bought from different suppliers. i understood from the infos from another thread, that tourna did some changes in respect to "translating" gauges to mm, which to a certain extent i can follow, but this still does not explain why a 17ga comes thicker than a 16L from other manufacturers or 1.25mm - this must be a qc problem definitely.

upon getting the newly ordered 17ga (which now is denominated 1.20mm in europe) i will test my theory, because the 16ga should basically be 1.28-1.30mm and this corresponds to what i had in my hands and have now on my sticks.

the 17ga should basically be 1.23mm which with the other tournas i have played so far lately (the regular silver and blue and the rough silver and blue) is quite spot on, as they have been somewhat thicker than the kirschbaum 1.20 i use currently in my "competition" sticks but slightly thinner than another 1.25 i recently played.

there always is and will be some production tolerance, but on a synthetic it is difficult to accept a 1.23 nominal coming in 1.28 actual thickness.

 

[mawashi]

The issue is the use of gauge as a measurement... 16g can vary anywhere from 1.33 mm to 1.28 mm that's 0.5 mm variance between the manufacturers.

Also some will say 1.25 but it will be anywhere from 1.28-1.22... poor qc or generous acceptable ranges.

Wilson had said that +- 15g for their racquets is "acceptable"... excluding balance point, horizontal balance etc, etc.

 

[fgs]

tourna black 7 17

to make a long story short, i have gotten three sets of this string, one 16ga (sold to me as a 1.25mm), then i got a 17ga which basically was the same thickness as the previously purchased 16ga and last week i got from another reputable supplier a set marketed as 1.20mm which again was of the same thickness. obviously they have put some stickers on the packs in mm-gauges, but when i removed it, 17ga was printed on that label.
according to tw-university the 17ga runs at 1.23mm which i can confirm. i was even tempted to buy a digital caliper but then i decided that i would have much more fun playing an hour of tennis with my son buying court time with that money than clearing up the diameter mess of a string i did not like.

power/control: mediocre at best. a soft but low powered string with a very spongy response, providing a very very muted feedback. when i first set out to play this string i was in the middle of a session and had just broken the regular tourna blue (also 17ga). after the hit my partner asked me if i had gotten tired as my shots got flatter (!) and slower.
grade: 3/5

feel: due to the fact that it is soft and muted and provides in my opinion almost no feedback at all, the feel is just average. it somehow reminded me, not in a pleasant way, of the msv hex +25. i had to play in this period with head atp balls and wilson tours, two sorts of balls which are quite different in my opinion - this string made almost no difference of them.
grade: 3/5

spin: now this is a true disappointment for me - the no.1 spin string producing no spin, or to be more accurate, not more than a regular round middle of the road poly. i have the feeling (see also the comment of my hitting partner) that i get more action on the ball with the 1.20 kirschbaum competition i currently use for matchplay, and from the recently played blue rough i got twice as much action. with the mentioned strings, the kbc or bhbr, i can literally feel the ball connecting to the strings while with the b7 this does not occur.
grade: 4/5

comfort: it is soft and comfy but not outstanding at this either.
grade: 4/5

tension maintenance/durability: tension maintenance is o.k. but on the other hand it didn't have much time to be dropping it. durability is very low ranging from less than 2hrs when crossed with syngut to around 3hrs when crossed with a multi. as i had altogether 3 sets = 6 mains, i felt i could experiment a little bit, but found no combination in which to like this string.
grade: 3/5

overall: 17/25

after the positive experiences with the regular silver and the blue rough i was expecting more, correction: much more, from the black 7. could also be that i can't really get along with these "softer" polys - see my experiences with the msv hex +25 and the tour bite softs, and it has been a while since i played other soft ones like the black venom rough or twisted razor. as my son grows up i get to play a higher pace and obviously have some control issues with these softer polys, or at least some of them. therefore i think that i will soon "revisit" the aforementioned strings of which i have fond memories and high ratings.

 

[mawashi]

I share your sentiments about soft polys... they just don't play well for me too.

Polys don't have much feel to begin with and making them soft is like trying to get mushy noodles to provide some feedback.

If I can't feel the ball on the string bed I don't know how much to swing.

fgs if you have the chance to try black magic please let me know what you think.

Cheers

 

[fgs]

kirschbaum helix 1.20

for a reason i don't know and most probably will never find out i have a reel of this string in my "collection" for almost 5 years but have never strung it up to try it out. i fell in love and still have a very good opinion of the kirschbaum competition 1.20, i learned to love the mantis power poly and still consider it as being one of the best strings i have played with, but now they are not in good company, they are in better company!

power/control: equalled only by the recently played signum pro gut mains 1.30/adrenaline 1.25 crosses! in spite of being, according to twu data, stiffer than both the mantis and the competition, this string has more power and plays smoother than both. each time i switched to this combo i felt that it was very easy to do whatever i like with the ball. and this test was conducted differently than all my previous ones, as i had four sticks i was rotating over the course of three weeks, the fourth string being a blindteststring from stringforum.
grade: 5/5

feel: this is the only poly that, along with the competition and the mantis power poly gets the highest grade, and i would even give it a 5.1. it is really fun doing all those nasty things and succeeding at it, be it weird droppers or skidding slices or shortangled topspinshots.
grade: 5/5

spin: the string is helically twisted but is basically almost round. nevertheless it produces incredible amounts of spin equalled only by the 1.20 tour bite. the profile basically wears down after some two hitting hours but there is no decrease in action on the ball. after playing with the natty/poly combo i developed a theory about this, based less on the so often cited snap-back but on the fact that given the higher power of the strings one tends to control them by adding rhs and thus invariably produce more spin. this definitely holds true for heavy topspin hitters as i happen to be, for flatter hitters results might be different.
grade: 5/5

comfort: absolutely no issues here, plays smooth and nice even on offcenter shots.
grade: 5/5

tension maintenance/durability: the string lasted close to 4 hours but since i played it over the span of three weeks i can also tell that it kept it's playing properties very well over the entire timespan.
grade: 4/5

overall grade: 24/25

after having played last year tournament matches with 7 different string-combos in my bag, i decided to take a different approach this year and keep three "competitional" sticks strung with the same combo and the other four for testing purposes. so, starting this coming week i'll swing the helix in my competitionals.