It seems like my looping has gotten worse rather then better. I can’t seem to get more then 5 or 6 loops before things go side ways. Obviously practice is everything especially with 2a but I’m wondering if my setup is holding me back.
Currently I removed one of the spacers but can’t get to the other bc of the axle. Could that tiny difference in weight be effecting the balance? I noticed the yoyos are much more responsive with that tweak. I’m running kitty normal. Do I need to tweak my setup or just keep grinding?
Yeah string length is huge factor. Our your loops sagging? Don’t be afraid to go short, Shu runs his around 75cm, Loop Lite strings start at 85cm. New Kitty Normal starts out around 125cm. Your strings look kind of long in your pic.
I can share my setup for optimal looping experience.
My hornets internal setting was removing one shim from the other half of my yoyo and leave one on the other side (see 2nd image below) and some few drops of thick and thin lube after I cleaned the bearings.
Axle + Shim + spacer + bearing + spacer + nut
For strings, you need to cut it about 72-75cm and stretch out to minimize tension and you’re good to go.
I tried to pop my caps out of my Hornets this weekend and realized after the fact that I was pushing against the shim
I finally got them removed but upon reassembling, one throw has an overly tight gap. I’ve swapped around and flipped all the shims and axles a bit but I basically always end with one that plus great and the other with too small a gap. Am I missing something reassembling? Stock setup is shim, axle, spacer, bearing, spacer, shim, right?
I think that’s the most likely thing because after swapping parts a ton it seems like it’s the half, not the guts. I can’t visibly see any damage but it is transparent and around a bunch of protrusions so it’s kind of hard to tell.
It’s definitely the half. Only one of the four sits flush on the ground with the starburst side down. The rest have some rock (presumably from the starburst protruding).
I finally replaced the bent Hornet and have a working pair.
I decided to remove 1 shim as @p44company recommends above and I like it. The response is pretty good, though my left hand throw can’t always sleep reliably if the torsion gets too high.
I have never had a more mechanically finicky yo-yo than the Hornet. IMHO the whole guts with shim plus spacer and you can’t remove the shim without removing the axle is all way too complicated. I’ve spent far more time trying to tune these throws than throwing them. And all the stock half swaps are ugly.
That all said, I feel the Hornet plays pretty nicely. It’s got a little more weight than the Loop 720. It gives a ton of feedback through the string; I feel like I could almost play blindfolded. I have a harder time turning them over on each inner loop, so I tend to wind up looping at an inward angle instead of an outward angle, which is a problem for me in general but is definitely worse on the Hornet so far.
I also have a duncan hornet that I have been tweaking for a very long time but to no avail.
This is what I’ve tried:
I removed both shims, added YYF looping oil, even used fat kitty strings, the result was only a few decent responsive loops then it becomes less and less responsive. I even double binded the string in the end, but no luck.
This is what I’ve learned:
Looks like the intruding surface where the shims are resting on is a redundant design because the shims seem to be flushed with the surface where the spacers are resting on. I’ve also verified that with a pair of callipers, the gap width remained unchanged after removing both shims. If you’ve actually noticed difference in gap after removing the shims you might be unconsciously overtightening your yoyo, either that or I have a defective yoyo.
Final verdict:
I suspect the pro players either overtightened their hornets or they used thinner spacers and bearing or they used different type of strings or they somehow managed to narrow the starburst gap without narrowing the yoyo gap (that’s Loop 720’s critical design breakthrough that makes it responsive and easy to loop with or without lube). I also don’t think it’s a good yoyo by design at all because you need to keep reapplying lube to achieve only a few decent responsive loops. The reason that’s bad is that the string will be soaked in lube and the starbursts will also inevitably be covered in lube, hence that significantly reduces the responsiveness.
I found the Hornets to be consistently responsive out of the box. Most of my original maintenance journey with them was because I bent one trying to remove the cap
Believe it or not after I discovered that some pro loopers used a stock hornet for demo and contest, hajime sakauchi setup was just a well lubed hornet but replaced with SG black spacers with no shims removed while jeniffer baybrook was using straight out of the box hornets for her demos. This is how skilled they are with a stock setup.
