what can i do or how can i get a good grind? i’ve seen andre in his tutorial videos to get his yoyo to SIT on his arm as it is spinning, and he has the hold the string so obviously the yoyo doesn’t fly off. is it because of the metal? when i try to do that my yoyo just stops in it’s place. ( oh and i use a protostar from yoyo factory ) and other than a strong throw, what are some helpful tips to improve my grinding if everyone or anyone reading this could tell me (:
To get the yoyo to stay in one place like that the yoyo would have to have a smooth finish… the plastic that the protostar is made of isn’t very good for grinding.
yea the protostar is awful for grinding. the DM has metal rims which makes it eaiser to grind.
Ohhh… noted! 
That’s one of those things you have to learn from people telling you what yoyos are or aren’t good for grinding, unless you get the experience yourself.
There’s a lot of other good yoyos good for grinding as well. Check the YYE product descriptions, the maker’s product description and users reviewing yoyos.
Bead blasted yoyos are usually good for grinding as are satined yoyos and some yoyos have grooves which even if you don’t have a good finish will deliver good finger grinds. The shape of the yoyo also affects grinds. If you read reviews of yoyos then you may get an idea of how well that yoyo grinds. Alot of people are saying the monkeyfinger evil-yo is the bee’s knees for grinding. Hope this helped
yeap, it’s all about the finish on your yoyo. Plastic yoyos are tough to grind with, some plastic yoyos have a textured surface that make it easy to grind. Slick surfaces tend to grip your skin, if you wanna grind with a protostar your gonna need gloves and a long sleeve shirt. I can pull off a second or two on a protostar but it’s tough.
He gets it to sit on one spot of his arm because of the downward angle his arm is positioned in, it’s basically climbing in place, if you lift your arm up more the yoyo will roll up your arm. Get control and you can make it go up and down your arm by changing the angle of your arm. You don’t have to hold the string at all either, sometimes not holding the string will cause the slack to roll up into the yoyo but you aren’t holding the yoyo back with the string at all just keeping the string out of the yoyo.
when your grinding from a side spin pop the yoyo to the top left so you catch the grind a bove your head and arm across body ( if your a righty) and during your grind drop your arm down and move it right as you grind. this should give your grinds an extra second or two. pics of this technique
Also when you get in to your grinds you want your landing to be SOFT meaning at the apex of the yoyos hop it should connect with your grinding surface. you dont want it to drop into the grind.
Humidity will also kill your grinds
Throw The yoyo hard
If you feel adventurous, you could also put a satin finish on your Protostar. Just make sure that you do your research first – reference and read thoroughly any one (or more) of the numerous guides and tutorials found on this forum before attempting it, and be very careful if/when you do. If the Protostar is your main throw, it may also be a good idea to practice it on another yoyo you don’t really care about. But if you do it correctly, satin finished Protostars grind great. Not as good as a beadblasted metal, but it’s definitely a cost effective way to enhance what you’ve already got.
If you’re going for a satin finish, best bet would be sending it to a modder. You might add some vibe to it if you do it yourself, but it wont be too bad. Protostar and Northstar is one fo the worst yoyo’s for grinding. Seriously they are. The only way to grind is the IRG having the ridge to be only 1mm wide.
Metal finishes are smoother, anodized, beadblasted, pyrammate etc. You need a yoyo with a lot of
momentum to get through the friction just as the DM2 or Raptor for a smooth finish.
Try to balance the best you can.
The only ways I could see that happening is if you either sand a good chunk out of the bearing seat (which should never happen – sandpaper should never touch your bearing seat in the satining process), or if you sand it so roughly and gratuitously as to actually alter the shape of the yoyo to the point where it’s warped and no longer perfectly circular, neither of which I’ve ever heard of and both of which can be avoided incredibly easily by following my original advice and reading carefully before attempting.
Funny, well maybe my Northstar was cursed…
yoyofoot is right