I have been researching the Rev-G yoyo made by the Revolution kite company. I managed to find the patents but not much else other than posts saying it did not play well. I’m fascinated by the engineering and design of it and looking for more information from that side of things. I did try emailing Revolution a while back but didn’t hear anything back. Thought maybe this forum might have more pictures or info on it.
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What would you like to know?
Instead of unwinding as you threw it often it just slipped the length of the string and you had a yo-yo at the end of the string not spinning.
That lack of basic understanding of how a yo-yo functioned crippled any ‘good’ of the concept.
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Rev-G yo-yo is pretty.
It is also Worthless.
I guess you could it is pretty Worthless.
I remember the first time I saw one. Big Bill put one in the glass display case at Goldenapple Comics. That was a long time ago.
At first glance it looked Amazing. Carbon fiber and anodized aluminum body had great visual impact.
I didn’t really pay much attention to the large diameter or the very small gap or just the general shape/weight/weight distribution. Or of the small bearing or wimpy tiny axle/horrible ready to strip threads on body.
I was just enamored with the candy like look of it.
It may only be a rumor, but at the time I was a yo-yo modding machine. I was constantly doing something to yo-yos ‘just to see what I could do to make them better than they were in stock form?
I thought they might be ‘on to something’. I was completely wrong. They should have just stuck to flying kites.
To this day, it remains one of a few yo-yos that I feel I could not/can not do anything in the way of yo-yo modding, to improve.
I was already machining weight rings for yo-yos well over 20 years ago. In my dreams, if I could’ve only talk to those people when they were in the design stages of that yo-yo. I would’ve had no problem, telling them to stay with the carbon fiber theme. And then I would’ve told him to consider this. Decrees the diameter of the yo-yo. Increase the width of the yo-yo. Forget the small rubber O-rings on the rims. Insert some rim weight rings under the rims of the flared out halves. Step up the bearing size to open the gap. Put some kind of actual response system, which the Rev-G has none into the yo-yo to improve its functionality.
Increase the width of the actual rim surface to create a better footprint to allow a more comfortable catch. On a stock Rev-G, a hard come back is very Unfun to catch and has one of the weirdest feelings of any yo-yo I’ve ever thrown. It’s not painful necessarily, it just feels like crap when I smack you in the hand. The diameter is so big that it rolls off the hand funny. And you have to throw it down in a forward pitch angle because it has a tendency to kick back and want to go between your ankles, lol. Honestly, it’s kind of a challenge in itself to just get it down to the end of the string. And once you successfully get it down the end the string, you don’t have much time to do anything.
To this day, I still like the look of it. But if I was asked to grade it, like it was a high school project in a science class, I would give it a A for effort and an F for results.
The guys that designed it may have been engineers for all I know. But when they built the Rev- G., they basically build a bridge to nowhere.
A few years before a big bill passed away, he was going through the case and golden apple, and I was standing on the other side of the counter, talking to him. He reached down and pulled out a Rev-G. He handed it over the counter to me. He said Mo, I want to give you this yo-yo. I’d be embarrassed to sell it to you. You were one of the only people I know that may possibly be able to figure out how to turn this nightmare into something functional. But then again, I feel this may be beyond your modding abilities. Please take the challenge because this yo-yo is basically stinking up the place. It looks pretty on display, but I have this constant fear that eventually somebody will want to buy it and I’ll feel guilty if I actually sold it to them. I feel better just giving it away for free, and then he laughed and said good luck. Tell me if you can hot rod it successfully. But you’re not obligated to tell me if you fail miserably.
I still have that yo-yo. Once a while, I take it out and stare at it and smile and think I wonder if there is something I could do to the sucker? Then I laugh and put it away.
Thee end😎
PS… well, almost the end>. Summation as follows:
- Diameter too large… 2. Width to narrow. 3. Extremely poor weight distribution. 4. Tiny gap/tiny bearing/no response system. 5. Uncomfortable shape. 6. Very unusual feel on the throwdown and on the catch. 7. Soft aluminum female threads in halves combined with tiny find threaded axle was a perfect storm for the easiest yo-yo to strip that I’ve ever touched.
One Drop Cascade used for contrast.
Ok, I’m done
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Thanks for the write up. I really enjoyed reading about your experience and stories surrounding the REV G.
This was one of the yoyo’s I drooled over when I was a kid. I remember seeing photos and ads for these around 1999ish. It looked so cool, right up there with the metallic missile!
I eventually got a chance to try one a year or two later. I remember being surprised at how big and uncomfortable it was. The gap was so thin it looked/felt wrong. Like, someone had taken out the bearing spacers. I maybe threw it 5 times and thought it was broken. 
I hadn’t thought about this yoyo since.
20 something years later and It’s still fascinating to read about this creation!
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Wow. I really appreciate this great response. The photos of it taken apart also answered some questions I had on gap width. It looks so good for such a flawed product. Was the finger protector worth any darn on it? Here is the patent on the Rev and the finger protector: Patent
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I only recently got back into yoyo after giving up on it as a kid 25 years ago. I love researching technical histories and in doing so found out about this Rev-G. It looked so over-engineered I was just compelled to find out more.
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If you want a functional carbon fiber yoyo
The vektor by s.kon was really cool
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S.kon made some incredible work. My favorite is his paper yoyo that was made of laminated sheets that he machined
were those sheets glued…? That sounds very interesting
https://www.instagram.com/p/BhJSHvwhw8y/?igshid=MTc4MmM1YmI2Ng==
Found the process and pictures here
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Such a deceiving yoyo beautiful yet…
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I’ve thrown the top one a bit and it seems to work ok, just the basics like hop the fence and rock the cradle. The gap is adjusted pretty tight so it doesn’t slip on the string like @yoyodoc mentioned.
I got them more for historical reasons, I fly Rev kites and even spoke with Joe a couple of times over the years.
They sit in the shelf next to my Duncan Sportsline series and it makes me smile to know I own what has become known as one of the worst yoyos ever made.
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Shinobu FTW! Great write-up, Mo. 