Hi, I am a beginner, and just bought a yoyojam kickside. Lots of people said that it is very responsive just out of the box. But when I tugged it, sometimes it didn’t come back. And it’s not easy to do the gravity pull, most of the time it just sleeped.
Is it just the problem of my skills or the yoyo itself? Do I need to replace the cotton string for better performance? Thank a lot!
welcome welcome! anywho, this is called unresponsive play. you must perform a bind to make it return to your hand. this is a good thing in the world of 1A yoyoing! in my opinion, just learn how to bind. cotton strings break VERY eaisily, and you shoud upgrade to 100%poly or a 50/50 slick 6 string. both work fine. if you must be responsive, put a couple drops of lube in the bearing and your good to go. i wouldnt though, because youll habe to play unresponsive in the long run if youre doing string tricks. if you lube now, youll have to clean later. that needs some chemicals (acetone, mineral spirits, lighter fluid, or if you wanna be safe and green, clean strip safer paint thinner. have fun! again, if anything your kickside being unresponsive is a good thing, work on your throw and learn how to bind! 
To supbreh1234,
Thank you so much for your reply. So looks like my kickside is on its way to be unresponsive. I thought yoyo is either responsive or unresponsive. So there is something in between.
no problemo, and its called semi-resonsive (i think lol)
Did you buy extra string? Cotton string just doesn’t work well with a hybrid response. The bearing won’t need lubing yet, YYJ bearings are very heavily lubed stock.
It might be that it’s becoming unresponsive our you just might not be throwing it hard enough and getting enough spin.
The Kickside and Speed Maker, and even the Lyn Fury are as shipped, considered intermediate yoyos. With a slightly larger gap than a responsive wing shaped yoyo, these will come back with a tug, but work better on a bind. Tehy will often require a stronger tug to come back. As the bearing breaks in and the lube breaks down, the bearing spins longer and the yoyo becomes less responsive. Cleaning the bearing makes them very much unresponsive.
A drop or two of YYJ thick luibe will make these responsive again if that’s what you desire. What’s nice is with these three yoyos, they can grow a bit with you. Clean the bearing and yank the rubber o-ring and fill the recess with flowable silicone and you’ve got a sweet unresponsive yoyo! You’ll be there sooner than you think!