So the MYY V3 and the Butterfly AL are done about the same. The V3 still plays absolutely unresponsive with a dry half bearing in. But since I had extra (red) Flow Groove pads and they were thicker than standard by a hair, I replaced 1 of the V3 pads with one of these and voila!!! With a dry half bearing and Kitty XXl, or similar thickness string, the response is phenomenal. Why would I care about this on a MYY V3? I actually have a ton of fun doing string tricks with this setup responsive. It’s pretty stable and gives pretty good spin times.
The Butterfly AL is semi responsive at best with nothing more than a dry half bearing swap. I noticed that the stock pads are recessed a bit so I replaced them with some yellow pads and they actually stuck out ever so slightly. But once I did this…I fell in love with the Butterfly AL. It is a bit on the heavy side but as I’ve grown accustomed to it, it has become a tie between it and my Deep State for favorite. Though I will say that the Butterfly lands tricks much better but the Deep State is an accuracy tool like no other.
Now for the Confusion. The Confusion always felt sluggish to me. Even when I cleaned the bearing and put it back in dry. There was no difference in how it played…sluggish. You won’t believe what fixed it. Super thick string. Thick enough so that when wound, it reaches the top of the sidewall.
Now I never would have figured this one but hear me out. I got a Zeekio Jumbo string and tried it on there. This is like a type 12 or maybe type 13 string. It’s fat!! But when I played with the yo-yo I noticed it was moving faster and playing more well behaved. What I believe causes this is very similar to the difference in starting off on a 10 speed bike in the low gear as opposed to the high. When the string takes up that much gap it applies a greater starting force to the yo-yo due to the leverage of the “lower gear”. The low gear on the back wheel is the larger one and the thicker string creates a lower gear around the shaft if you will.
I had to go back and forth with the string several times to make sure I wasn’t imagining it, but I did the same thing to my wife’s Confusion and she noticed immediately that something was really different. This alone is worth a try if you have a Confusion laying around. I actually got this idea from doing the same thing to a Bi-Metal Bumblebee (next up). But before moving on I didn’t stop here. I got some of these…
This is as narrow of an “A” bearing as I found. I put one of these in the Confusion and removed one of the thick pads and replaced it with an unresponsive small A pad. I was hoping the narrow bearing would offset the need for the thick string, and it did but only slightly. I was able to get improved performance from a slightly less thick string but regular string plays identical to the stock setup. There was no other modification needed aside from replacing the bearing and pad. You could keep both stock pads if like it very close to auto-returning. Also these ceramics give a super satisfying hiss when spinning. I like it anyways.
Underwhelmed is the most apt description ever of the Bi-Metal Bumblebee. I’ve not fully completed experimenting on it. I am so determined to actually enjoy playing with it. So determined. As I mentioned earlier the Bumblebee is the one I discovered the difference that super thick string made on it. Before that though I had at first enjoyed the absolute unresponsive behavior of this yo-yo that advertised “going back to the old days and playing catch with yourself” responsive yo-yo. We know that’s not what we got…it’s what we wanted but it’s not what we got. Here is where I would add that the Bumblebee could be the ultimate unresponsive accuracy training tool. Imagine if you could really sling that thing unresponsive. But I digress, of course I put the stickers on and I got it to play ok. The stickers just felt jank to me. Didn’t matter how it played, that feeling kept yanking at my psyche. I had to discard the stickers, there had to be a better way. So I found the narrow ceramic bearings and thought surely this will work…but to make sure I figured why not go with some thicker pads as well. So it made no difference. It played about as ok as previously with the stickers. Not fun though. Just so very meh…then came the thick string and that actually made it play faster and have a more solid response. Before it was just sluggish. It was like the worlds most lazy yo-yo. The thicker string paired with the thicker pads and the narrow dry bearing actually made the yo-yo consistent and playable. Still not quite satisfying though. But you can play catch!!.
So what my plans are , and I mentioned earlier I just haven’t taken it on yet, is to flow pads in. If you look at the area that the stickers were to fit you’ll notice it’s slightly recessed. That means that if you were careful you could flow some pretty wide pads in there.
So you tell me that wouldn’t make a very responsive pad. My imagining is that, having the narrow bearing teamed with that wide flowed pads and the thick string is going to be about all that can be done to make this thing fun. I actually think it’ll transform it. I hope anyways. I just haven’t jumped in yet. When I get to flowing the pads I’ll document that too. Unless of course someone wishes to hijack the thread and do their own Bumblebee first….
I’m essentially at the same point on a Pop Art for different reasons that I’ll explain after sleep.
My apologies on this. I do need to add that it was necessary to file the bearing post a tad on each half to accommodate the 3mm bearing. I simply used a nice sharp file and very carefully filed the posts down. You can scratch the inside of your yo-yo and if you do you’ll need to make sure to smooth out any burrs with sandpaper or they will destroy your string until you do. A sharp file take material off of this rather quickly so don’t go crazy. Doesn’t matter if it’s level just make sure there’s something left to hold the bearing in place.
I actually just fitted a pair of Flow Grooves on there and it ain’t too bad. On flowing with silicone I figured if you removed the pads you’d have the deep recess for those and a slight overfill of those gaps could be smoothed out and filled in with a credit card or similar straight edge into the excess area. Too bad on those other pads you tried.
I don’t know who started that saying but it was old timers that said it to me when I was young and they probably had old timers say it to them when they were young. It can be fascinating to wonder about the origins of sayings like that. When you look it up though…make sure you’re holding your mouth right or it won’t make sense.
So here’s my last one. The Pop Art. I’ll start off by saying. I am a big fan of that Tiger Shark-like shape. It’s so comfy in my hand. I love my Butterfly AL and its shape has a ton to do with it. I had such high hopes for the actual Tiger Shark from Spintastics as a beater…I won’t even go into that adventure. Anyways, love the shape and had to have a Pop Art. This thing is designed for a sport I can’t play. It’s designed to stall, and do all those amazing 5a tricks that demand something different from a yo-yo of this weight and plastic to get it to play that way. So when I play with it in my caveman like way this is what happens to me. And maybe some have experienced this. I have to sling it hard to get it to play nice and then I end up quite often giving it slack to play with. Once that happens it grabs as much string as it can and balls it up inside. Over and over this happened and so I tried the 3mm bearing in it. Well, have you ever taken a look at the pads on a Pop Art? They are massive and thick. Removing that 1mm in the bearing (bearing post modification necessary) makes the Pop Art a Brain. Auto return. So I used an x-acto knife and sliced the pads as level as I could. They now look like an overhead view of waves on an ocean. But it plays much nicer now. For me and the way I play anyway. But it’s now slightly unpredictable. It can play amazing for a while then become very unpredictable. So I figured flowing a nice level pad in there would make it just right. Again we are back to the flowing of the pads that stops me. Funny I know. I’ll hack the crap out of some stuff but pour some silicone….
I’ve actually thought that if I could have my Deep State play like it does and yet have a Tiger Shark shape. Or Daytripper shape but at that 53-56 gram weight. That would be my dream yo-yo. I’ve heard of some that removed the caps on their Butterfly AL and I’ve heard mixed opinions about the results. It would put it in the right weight range but would it play wonky? My caps won’t come off without destruction and I’m not willing to do that so I may never know. Perhaps one day I’ll buy a green one if they stay around. I won’t feel so compelled to keep those green caps intact.
nono i wasn’t trying to say yall are ruining your yoyo or offend at all but i know myself i take things to an extreme and have unsteady hands ill decide to scratch up the response well to make flowing catch easier and make a gash in the wall of the yoyo or something. waiting for my yoyo day bumblebee to arrive. then ill get to decide if its as terrible as everyone including folks on discord and youtube have said…
Please. Please feel free to share your opinion here. Misery loves company. If you look you’ll see scratches on mine. That x-acto knife slice so easily into the plastic of the Pop Art. Took me forever to get that where it would stop snagging the string. I stated close to the beginning that the work is destructive and it can be. My search for my vision has resulted in the deaths of many things over the years. Most especially when you get that file near the post, you can easily hit the inner wall and the file is mean to aluminum. One may consider taping the surface just to keep damage to a minimum if something does happen.
surely this will work…but to make sure I figured why not go with some thicker pads as well. So it made no difference. It played about as ok as previously with the stickers. Not fun though. Just so very meh…then came the thick string and that actually made it play faster and have a more solid response. Before it was just sluggish. It was like the worlds most lazy yo-yo. The thicker string paired with the thicker pads and the narrow dry bearing actually made the yo-yo consistent and playable. Still not quite satisfying though. But you can play catch!!
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