Gambler Outlaw Lavender Sponge

anyone can tell me more about Gambler outlaw durability ?

liang1983 wrote: anyone can tell me more about Gambler outlaw durability ? last more than 6 months ?

I play 3 hours a day and get 2 months out of a sheet of Outlaw if I do not rip it. You have to put on edge tape to slow down the brittleness of the edges. Even so, it will start to chip within a month. Big deal, all you can realy expect for top performance of T05 is a month playing everyday tops, even if the topsheet lasts way longer. Sometimes, you have other issues with Outlaw, but that is streaky. All in all, Original Outlaw is good if you do not get a bad sheet or be unfortunate and rip it on a corner.

I think some here are referring to 1st or 2nd generation Outlaw, not the new 3rd generation Outlaw Golden Cake Sponge. I have been playing with two sheets of black Outlaw GCS and thus far they still look like new, and I was previously splitting the topsheets on 1st and 2nd gen Outlaws within hours.

While not much like the first two Outlaws, I think Outlaw GCS is an excellent looping and blocking rubber in its own right, and doesn't deserve the ridicule heaped on it by disappointed 1st and 2nd gen Outlaw users whose expectations were not met. Zeropong.com no longer lists Outlaw GCS, and I hope they haven't decided to drop it altogether. Colestt.com does have it at this time.

By the way, black felt a bit more well rounded (recommend: FH) and red was stiffer for hit/block (BH). Maybe not a big difference but that's what I thought.

callisto wrote: Did anyone know if i can buy outlaw lavender somewhere else than at zeropong ?Thanks

I think ColesTT.com sells it now.

As of just now, ZeroPong has both versions still, and has been for a while. GCS version went off-site for a little bit back then and came back within a few weeks --- must have been a production thing?

My understanding is that if and when the white sponge version goes back into production, it will only be made in 2.15

Hm, never heard of it. Is it Gambler Outlow pretuned? 

Finally I got Outlaw GCS and played with it - twice. Here is my 2c

1. Weight - 57 g (so lighter than old Outlaw). Cut sheet weighs then approximately 40 g.

2. Appearance - topsheet seems a bit more supple, softer than the old one. Perhaps they fixed the topsheet as well, not just the sponge.

3. Hardness - Certainly feels a little softer than old Outlaw (Cream version, white sponge). Numerically it is about 37 for both topsheet and sponge which is 3 degrees softer than old Outlaw. Does that mean that they have changed the topsheet significantly as well? perhaps... or maybe the durometer is affected by the softer sponge underneath (after all, that durometer is not set up to measure hardness of such thin layers of sponges/rubber).

4. Speed - as jcdi noticed just above me, it is just a tiny bit less than before. Noticeable but really negligible difference, imho.

5. Control - doesn't seem to have changed that much, really. It is certainly improved in the short game, I am guessing the reason is that sponge is softer so it is not as hard in gentle control and pushes as before. Blocks are still good. I do understand what jcdi meant by loss of crispness but I do not consider that a problem - most likely because I was playing it on a very fast Galaxy T-8... so no need for crispness there, I rather needed a bit more dwell-time which old Outlaw on such a blade would lack almost to the point of zero DT. I haven't tested it on BH yet so not a lot of blocking was done but on FH I didn't feel any disappointment in that department.

6. Spin - since I installed it on my FH as a temporary replacement of PME 47.5, the comparison will be made mostly with that rubber. In two words - noticeably less... less spin that is. My guess is that the topsheet is still rather hard so you only get decent amount of spin if you force a relatively deep penetration of the ball into the rubber... and sometimes there is not enough time for that.

7. Flat game and sensitivity to the (incoming) spin - are still really good. Perhaps S2S is a bit less than with the old Outlaw which is to be expected but it is still better than PME, Blitz and similar rubbers.

8. Durability - only played it twice, for about one and two hours, so I cannot offer any data there. I will update this item later after a few weeks, months, etc.

Generally I like this one (for my purposes) a little better than the old one which sometimes really sucked in gentler combination-style game. For all-out attacker with good technique old Outlaw could be a more promising rubber, but for the most of us this one is an improvement, I think.

By the way, tom tells me that they should have the white sponge back shortly.  Will only be in 2.15

Can anyone compare the Gambler Outlaw Lavender's (Golden Cake Sponge) spin compared to let's say, Mark V?