Review by
rokphish2 (published with permisson) Got
this blade Friday night from Haggisv. I was quite excited when I saw the
package and quickly unwrapped it.
First impression when I held the blade was, "gosh this
blade felt big" later I thought that were due to the head and handle
size which are slightly not common. At least not common in my blades
collection.
Immediately after I weighed it and it showed up at
92.10 gr about a couple of gr lighter than Haggisv told me (94 gr).
Blade felt light and balance without rubbers.
Handle seemed longer than usual and also thin/flat
than usual. Here are the dimensions: handle length - 102 mm, thickness -
22.5 mm, width - 30 mm. Very nice design of the logo at the bottom of
the handle.
Two different printings for the front and back.
Also clear on the bottom showing the inside/core of
the handle, which looks to be cork. I didn't look carefully whether the
cork (or whatever) runs all the way into the handle or just a
small/short bit at the end. Anyway, I liked the bottom design of the
handle.
Head size are: 156.5 x 152 mm with 6 mm thickness. The
thickness of each layer almost about the same. I could see each layers
clearly. 9 plies all wood.
Now I figured I felt the blade BIG due to the
fatter-shorter head size and also the flat/thin handle size and the
length of it which are longer than the usual 100 mm length. I could see
it obviously sticking out the end of my palm when I was holding the
blade.
Looking at the blue color of the blade I couldn't help
myself and brought the blade closer and I sniffed it. Sure enough, I
could smell paint odor on the blade. Also looking at the grains and
rubbing it against my fingers the words "splinter" and "seal" jumped out
immediately. At first I was going to try the blade as is, but then I
thought why take the chance. So I sealed the blade right after the photo
session was over.
There's slight discoloration on the blade face (the
most obvious was on the left part of the front of the blade) running
from top to bottom. Greenish color. No biggie at all but should point it
out nevertheless.
All in all the blade appearance and finishing are very
good. Smooth all round, very nice design, no major defect visible. Can't
wait to try it out. Perhaps starting Friday night/Sunday afternoon.
I played with this blade briefly on Friday night,
sometime on Sunday, and about all night Monday night. So here are my
first impression of this blade...
The handle felt out of shape because of the irregular thin oval
shape. It felt wide but thin. When playing in the game I
didn't really feel it, but as soon as I loosen up I got to think about
it again... I'm thinking about adding some on the thin part to fatten it
up a bit. This would help with the feel and balance (more about this
later). But if this blade were to be used for quite sometime I'm sure it
wouldn't be much of a problem.
The head felt big/wide. Having H3P and LKT Rapid Sound (RS from
here on) on the blade made is a bit head heavy although not too much. My
RS on the top part stuck out about half a cm and finally I cut it off. I
usually do not cut rubber when trying blades, but I made an exception
for this blade.
This blade vibrates a bit when flat hitting and flat blocking.
But when done with slight angle the vibration's unnoticeable to me.
Hit/smashes are below average for me. They are so darn slow which takes
out the joy of smashing out of me. Yes, I could still point doing the
smashes, but it's just no fun... I found if I angle the blade a bit the
speed picked up though. I will also change the rubbers, say Sriver El &
Zeta and see of it goes. As far as hitting/smashing goes, it's
slower and felt worse than my HK.
Loops on the other hand... Above average...
The blade is a looping
machine. Slow loops, hard loops are all easy to do. The blade
softness, thinness, and flexibility really works well for looping
department. It performs loops better than my HK in terms of smoothness
for lack of better term. The HK is like a macho looper while the
Longquan more like feminine looper. HK is
YANG, Longquan is YING. If you are a
flexible looper with control oriented, calm & collected type...
Longquan might fit you.
I was thinking hard about which blade should I compare this
Longquan at first.
Longquan being 9 ply blade and I have no
other 9 ply blade. But now I figure out which blade in my collection
would compare very similarly to this blade. That blade is....
BTY Jonyer Hinoki.
Both blades have a soft feel, both flexible, both favor loops more
than hits/smashes, both have considerably thin head. My Jonyer is 5.1mm
and the Longquan despite being a 9 ply
blade is only 6mm thick.
I first thought that it being 9 ply would be hard/stiff but I was wrong.
I thought with the weight it would also help with the speed department,
but felt that it's about the same as my 70 gr Jonyer. I played with my
Jonyer not too long ago and I could feel the resemblance between these
two. Jonyer is now getting hard to get so this blade might be a very
good alternative.
These are my first impression. Now that I already found
a blade to compare it with I will try and compare them both head to
head. Sad to say the only doubles I have in terms of rubbers are H3P &
LKT Rapid Sound, so the head to head will be done with these rubbers. I
will still try the blade Longquan with
Sriver EL, Zeta just because they're not chinese and more well known
than say Osaka/Tokyo.
The blade says it's OFF+ but doesn't feel like it... On hits and smashes
it's slower than HK. Somewhere in league with Jonyer/Millerga. So
probably about All+ to Off- closer to All side me think.
Loops are much better and quite faster, could go to Off to Off- me
think.
I will update later after.
p.s.
When I was playing on Sunday, after only a few hits I notice something
was wrong with the handle. Sure enough, when I wiggle the lens part at
the bottom of the handle, it went off. I could insert it back and it
wouldn't fall off but I could pull it out with no effort as well.
So I superglued it back last night. Before I did that, I peeled off the
stickers with the prints on the small piece of cork. And I found out
that the small piece of corks is just a small piece and didn't go all
the way into the handle.
I should have waited on the super glue and should have taken picture of
it first to show you. But I already did, so you just have to take my
word for it.
I think despite the nice design of the bottom part with lens, corks and
prints... I think if the blade were to have solid handle all the way
down then it would help on the balance department. Although the slight
head heaviness might also part of the blade being so good for looping, I
think having a little bit more on the other end would make it feel
better.
I also thought about taking the lens out, took the cork out and replace
it with something heavier... or just add something inside to add the
weight...
Of course it was a bit too late as I already superglued it...
p.s.2.
thought about trimming the head to slimmer shape also... just
thinking...
Part2:
I played with this blade on Friday night and also
Monday night. On Monday night I was sparring at early evening before
playing games.
The head didn't feel head heavy as when I put on H3P + Rapid Sound
before. Didn't feel any intrusive vibration to me.
On serves, Zeta is better in creating the spin for me compared to
the EL. Short and long, no problem.
Hit/smashes are much better with Zeta. With Sriver EL, the speed is
below Zeta, but just nice for controlled returns with my backhand.
Easy to do a short ball less bouncy than the zeta. On all out smash
speed is more than enough and the opponent noticed the red mark on
his body but on most time the speed wasn't there for speedy
game/fast returns... With Zeta is another case... It's fast and
loud. I felt bad for my opponent last night who were hit twice with
my all out backhand smashes...
Blocks... EL needs extra push when the ball was't so strong from the
opponent otherwise it wouldn't cross over to the other side. Slow
but nice for doing that short ball placement. Zeta is much better
power-wise, less power needed and the ball returns with fervency
back to the other side.
Loops... The blade is still a looping machine. Slow loops, hard
loops are all easy to do. The blade softness, thinnes, and
flexibility really works well for looping department. I was sparring
with a defender last night and with him I used the EL as it gives me
more control and easier looping (chopped) underspin from him. It
wasn't all speedy but when I realized I gained the control I was
putting all out loops and the speed was there. And sometimes when I
hit it just right the acceleration of the ball after bounce were
there like what I've seen done my people much higher level than me.
I wasn't using Zeta on FH while sparring with him on that particular
bits. I'm so used to using slower FH for looping (chopped) underspin
so the EL works better for me. I did try Zeta for awhile and the
speed indeed is noticably faster and deadlier but I lost a bit of
control and confidence on doing so I just used EL for most of the
time. On counter looping and top spin loops I have no problem with
Zeta on the FH. Actually, zeta is a much better fit for the blade
(except for looping that chopped underspin but with a few more
sparring meets, i'm sure i'll be better at it) for more Offensive
oriented play. The combination of H3P + Zeta should do me well on
this blade...
Playing with defender or loober i usually put my faster rubber on
the BH. I then loop and loop just about every ball. Not aiming for
killing with the shots but more so with returning every ball and
with placement. When there's an opening I'll then kill it with the
BH smash which more time then not will ensure the point. Most of the
time playing games on both nights I used Zeta FH and EL BH.
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