I’d be interested to see where people stand on 5A versus 1A preferences. I see tons of people, including the furry guy who’s apparently a great 5A player, say that they don’t see any difference and just use whatever they feel comfortable with for 1A.
I heavily disagree with this. My 1A preferences are completely different from what I like in 5A. My 5A yo-yo optimal specs are more narrow, a little heavier, and much more rim weighted than what i like for 1A. Not to mention shaped differently. I lean towards more h shaped throws with slight more prominent rims and less of a huge catch zone.
You’re manipulating the yo-yo in totally different ways, i don’t see how most people’s preferences for both styles would align perfectly.
So I missed out on a BST sale of a blue Kuntosh 5000QV, and I’m thinking of drowning my sorrows in a purchase of a C3 Astrea in gold. Thoughts? Opinions?
Lol I’m familiar with this mentality. Just make sure it’s something you really want and not just a rebound purchase
It’s weird how you can think about money. I was selling something to but a specific yo-yo, now I’m like well I was gonna buy that yo-yo anyway, who not use that money towards a different yo-yo?
The Red Blue and Green polished Wide Angles are like the regular power rangers, and the black, silver and aqua/orange fade are like the special power rangers that join partway through the season.
So a lot of my yoyoing is very freestyle in nature, and I’m fairly often not doing specific tricks or working towards anything specific. When I find something I really like I’ll try and build from it and this is where any of my new tricks come from.
I felt like this was kind of a backwards approach but it’s what I enjoy. I saw a post on @Markmont ‘s Instagram today that advocated for this kind of play and what he was doing looked pretty similar to my yoyoing and it gave me a big confidence boost.
I also want to say if you’re reading this Markmont i used to watch your videos way back when I was first getting into yoyoing and one of them got me into Binary Star, so thanks for that as well.
Thinking of getting some expensive strings that last longer. I like Kitty Strings but they get fuzzy pretty quickly so it’s easy to burn through them quickly. Amazing to see that the markmont strings can last like a year, with washing. But do they have any bounce to them at all at that point? Are they hard on the fingers? ANyways… it’d be nice to have a more ecological solution, I’m just concerned about the string keeping a nice feel despite their age. Used to use some GStrings and they lasted a while but they were a bit hard feeling. Seems like there is a tradeoff between bounce + softness versus string life.
One Drop 54 is a yoyo I’ve tried to love for a while now. Maybe we’ve reached a good agreement now. Used to have one in a Winston (half blue/half orange) colorway that (if I remember correctly) I used to rock with ultralights and a flat bearing. Always liked the feel in play but there was something I couldn’t quite get into about it so I got rid of it eventually. Perhaps the gap is a little big to use with flat bearings, for my taste. Recently I got a red 54 but it came with brass domes and flat bearing so when spin would start decreasing, the yoyo would die quick. Didn’t like that. I like a tight, confident bind even at low RPM so I swapped the flat for a centering bearing and it was much better. The 54 returned at low RPM much better, but I still didn’t love it. Too much center weight with the brass dome. Ok, so I was able to locate some light side effects (aluminum domes) in Europe (hard to find side effects here in the EU, actually - if you’re listening one drop, maybe it’s good for you to know that). So now my 54 has aluminum domes and centering bearing and it feels light years better than the flat + brass domes that it came with (in a trade). I liked the side effects concept but in practice I always want the same thing - ultralights in everything. Anyways, I’m keeping the 54 for now. Nice feeling organic that I would recommend rocking with light side effects and centering bearing.
Have you tried any nylon strings yet? I’ve been using Airetics for a couple months, still the same string. Plays a bit different from poly, and you have to kinda break them in for a bit, so they take a little getting used to. Really like them so far though.
I just got an order from Zipline not too long ago, and their new business class string is an absolutely wonderful nylon/poly blend. I would have gone through 3 or 4 kitty strings by now and it still plays and looks new. I’d imagine at this point I’m looking at weeks/months of life rather than days, and it feels much better than other nylons I’ve played (I really dont like super slick and whippy string either). I’m really interested in trying the Markmont blends as well. Haven’t tried Airetic so I can’t comment on those.
I’ve heard the slim blends don’t play as fast/whippy as the standard blend, but I’ve only tried the standard so far.
Shoot me a PM and I’ll send you a few different strings in the mail if you want
This is how I used to feel until I just kinda forced myself to get used to them. I loved how much softer they are on my hands compared to poly - now I pretty much exclusively use nylon.
I’ve been gravitating towards that same conclusion myself. The thing is, I’m a big fan of matching the color of the side effects with the color of the yoyo, and that isn’t easy given the paucity of colored side effects (apart from Energy Domes which I don’t care for). Luckily, I’ve been fortunate enough to match up ultralites by color on the majority of my SE-equipped One Drops. If only I could find two sets of blue ultralites…
Ok this is simple. ‘Yes’ they maintain their play characteristics throughout the lifeline of the throw whilst you wash them. As the string breaks in over time, you’ll notice different characteristics of the string coming out more. If you dig hard enough in the forums, I’m sure you can find folks talking about having thrown DRAGON or Draken for 1 - 3 years+
Honestly it’s one of those situations where you really just need to try it to see for yourself. There is literally no other string on the market like it so theres no way for you to conceptualize it properly in mind. And you won’t be able to till you try for yourself.
Quick and to the point - Markmont. Formulas have the ‘most’ bounce on the market. I can guarantee this. Our blends are 100% poly, but the fabrication of how we twist our materials is entirely different - yielding a much different experience then standard poly strings.
Here’s 2 recommendations I will make. If you want straight up ‘bouncy’ then go with Copernicus (Copi). This string is also very suitable against humid sticky weather. Plays soft but cool to the touch. Blue Eyed White Dragon also has a certain bounce to it, but it’s more stiff then Copi.
Here’s a guide page I’ve been putting together for folks to get categorical groupings. I’m still fixing some things on that page but it’s in a ‘fine’ enough state for you to use now. Also to note - half the formulas last 1+ year and the other half last 1 - 3 months.
As far as ultralights - those too are my favorite. But there’s definitely diff times where I prefer diff side effects - as is the case with the community. Lot of folks have a variety of diff styles and play setup/weight distribution preferences. There would be folks requesting styles if they only made (1) style of side effect as well - me being one of em *insert chuckles
