How do the thickness and weight of the blade affect the racket?

Compared with highly industrialized rubber products, the blade has more metaphysics.

Many enthusiasts have tried many blades and come up with a summary of “weight”, “thickness”, “wood grain”, “air holes “, “fiber,” and a series of criteria for judging.

This article will talk about weight and thickness from a professional point of view to give a reference answer.

Impact on performance

As you better understand table tennis equipment, you will find that the blade’s weight and thickness impact performance.

Under the same conditions, the heavier and thicker blade generally has more power to hit the ball; the lighter and thinner blade has a faster “conversion speed”.

So some players have the ultimate pursuit of performance and have strict requirements for weight and thickness when selecting a blade, even requiring a weight error of 1 gram and a thickness error of 0.05 mm.

There is no denying that different weights and thicknesses can slightly impact weight, but there is no need to be so severe.

Scope of selection of professional players

In the opinion of many players, the blades of the national team players are unbelievably accurate.

It is also believed that they all use very heavy blades to have such high quality.

This is not entirely true.

We found some bladed weight standards mentioned in interviews with Chinese national team players:

Wang Liqin: I like the heavier blend, weighing about 95 grams.

Hao Shuai: I usually choose a blade around 90-93 grams, giving the stroke more power.

Fan Zhendong: I usually choose about 90g of the blade.

Yan An: My blade is around 88g, and I usually choose a blend of about 87-88g, which makes me faster.

Xu Xin: I am a straight player, and my blade is usually about to 86g, a relatively heavy blade in a CS racket.

Chen Meng: I like a lighter blade, usually around 86 grams.

As you can see, there are also blades for national players under 90g.

And the fluctuation of blade weight for national players can also reach 3g.

I think the weight difference of about 5g is in the acceptable range.

In other words, the human hand will feel a floating range, in a weight range is not to feel the weight difference.

Compared to amateur players who are not as sensitive, this range can be relaxed a little more.

Normal fluctuation of blade

ITTF regulations say a table tennis blade must have at least 85% natural wood.

Since most of them are natural ingredients, the weight of the same blade will fluctuate even if it is made by a major brand manufacturer, like DHS, Butterfly, Stiga and Joola.

This is all very normal.

To take a step back, even the same blade can fluctuate in weight at different times and places.

For example, the same piece of blade, in the drier north will be lighter, in the south will generally be a little heavier.

However, the fluctuation is relatively small, and the impact on the performance is almost negligible. After all, the national players are also playing with rackets worldwide.

Moreover, the difference in quality control of the rubber causes the weight of each piece of rubber to fluctuate.

The amount of glue will also make the weight of the whole board fluctuate.

Therefore, being too concerned about a few grams of error is not necessary.

The center of gravity that deceives your feel

The actual weight is not the only thing affecting the blade’s feel. The center of gravity also has a significant impact.

The center of gravity of a butterfly sole is generally closer to the handle, while the center of gravity of DHS and STIGA is relatively close to the head.

The most intuitive effect is that Butterfly’s blade is lighter to play under the same weight, while DHS and STIGA’s blade is heavier and more tired.

The same is valid for thickness. The slight difference in the thickness of each blade has almost no effect on the blade.

Recommendation

The quality control capabilities of the world’s top manufacturers are generally trustworthy.

For the world’s largest manufacturers, these first- and second-tier brands, a year of research and development costs a lot of investment. Their manufacturing plants for thickness and weight control are within a reasonable range.

At least, as far as I have observed, the basics are within a reasonable range of normal.

But some second-tier manufacturers can not guarantee the product. On the one hand, the standard is not so strict. On the other hand, technology can not keep up.

Even if some small manufacturers do not have the production capacity and are looking for ODM, they are difficult to control the selection of wood (weight, thickness).

So players buy equipment to choose the formal channels and reassuring brands. This will be the greatest extent to avoid buying products that are not satisfactory.