See those 2 bearings? According to CLYW, IYoyo, and Yoyoexpert, they are the same bearing…I think 2 eyes can tell you better. More importantly, the bearing on the left is an utterly worthless peice of ****, while the one on the right is one of the smoothest bearings ive ever played. The one on the lefts cage for the balls is machined terribly, it can be felt rattling and grinding against the balls if the yoyo does anything more than sleep perfectly on axis. Obviously, they are 2 different bearings, most likely machined by different companies, and all sold as “CLYW X IYoyo Pixel Bearings” because they left the machining marks instead of smoothing them out like a konkave…what ingenuity. Its not an issue of break in or cleaning or lubrication either, the machining is too LOOSE, so its impossible to break in, and I have cleaned and lubed it several times. All I can say is if youre lucky and you get a Pixel bearing from whatever machine shop did the good ones, its a good bearing, but I wouldnt risk getting ripped off $13 on the most trash bearing youll ever play (Yeah worse than the ones that used to come in Auldeys xD) Theres no fixing it either, no break in will solve it and while it is playable, and probably wont cause snags, its the sloppiest bearing you could hope to find…and at a premium price to boot…
UPDATE! If the community is genuinely interested, I would love to see some pictures and hear your experience with your own Pixel bearing and see if we can corroborate the thick wall/wide cage bearing as being superior.
Haha, I guess that did come off pretty negative, I am definitely dissapointed I spent so much on an upgrade bearing for a yoyo thats stock bearing waaay outplays it, but for the most part I just posted this as a warning to all thinking about buying. Also, if you go read every forum post or reddit thread about Pixel bearings it makes SO much sense, one guys is terrible and rattly and never breaks in while another guy claims its the smoothest, most quiet bearing hes ever played after a couple throws.
(I love your videos by the way, seriously quality review/documentary content)
IMO the only “upgrade” you can get in a bearing is from a flat to a string-centering bearing, so I don’t really order a bunch of “upgrade” bearings.
Personally, I’m yet to get a bearing that came garbage, but on the flip-side, I’m also yet to get a bearing that made me go “wow this is gonna change the game”
Except for gold-plated bearings. They’ve always come to me crunchy and low-spinning.
And ty, glad you enjoy my content <3
EDIT: When I say a bearing that came in garbage, I mean, specifically single-piece bearing orders. I’ve had plenty of yoyos come in with dead bearings.
I would say most of the time a products price doubles or triples, and a community with members who have experienced the gamut of said product backup the claims that there is a difference in quality of material and precision of machining, thus leading to an increase in smoothness, being quiet, lasting much longer and being more consistent would be considered an upgrade. I do however understand what youre saying in the sense that just as I can grab my no-jive and play around its wooden sleeve axle design to do some insane modern yoyoing, I can grab a cheap bearing and ignore the grinding feel up the string from the bearing and lack of solidarity with string hits to still hit all my combos…Play around it,thats all yoyoing is. Do you ever just wonder what its like to be able to forget the physical side of throwing and explore the conceptual ideas? I think getting past the technical aspects and not actually having to “feel” the yoyo helps get me in that headspace. I like my yoyos uber smooth, ill pay for the bearing that gets me there. shrug
Pixel bearing, some people talk about them like they are made in futuristic labs by scientists with lasers.
Like many mass-produced things, there is a min and max for quality tolerances. They are quality tested maybe every 1000 made. You’ll most likely get a good one most of the time and a bad one occasionally.
This is a case of it actually being a DIFFERENT bearing, im saying its literally an entirely different bearing design with different thickness inner and outer walls and size balls and cage and grade of material entirely being sold as the same thing.
Pretty sure I heard they were having problems which is why they were put of stock for a long time. I think they said they worked out production problems
