Price of celluloid balls

lineup32 wrote: mts388 wrote: what clubs in Northern Calif that sponsor weekly RR events have switched to plastic?

The Modesto and Sonora clubs have already switched to plastic and the Folsom club will switch on the 9th.
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Mastermind has a "funny" way of communicating, and clearly has his own agenda. I wrote about what's going to happen in England, i.e. virtually all clubs/local leagues will switch to plastic next year, and mastermind had an "interesting" response to that. Indeed it is perhaps not mandatory for local leagues, but all other competitions will switch, and that includes not only tournaments, but also county matches and British league. So of course local leagues will follow suit and switch.

I am not really bothered about the switch to plastic, I've played with the ones from DF, and they play ok. A bit different indeed, but not dramatically so. And coming back to the OP, the price of celluloid is, at least in the UK, likely to go down nearer the date of the switch, ie July 2015.

Edited by kuifje - 10/29/2014 at 4:05pm

Money saving idea:

mts388 wrote: I tried to get the non tournament players at the club to use up the celluloid balls before using the poly balls.  They won't use them.

NextLevel wrote: ...when the come back he predicts for celluloid takes place.

If you mean me, I do not predict, I see the facts and the trend.

From the present perspective I estimate the possibility that celluloid balls will be banned by the ITTF as fairly unlikely, given the feedback. But still technically possible.

If celluloid balls are not banned, we will have essentially the present situation at worst, in the countries with the well developed league system anyway, where the plastic ball is neglected by the vast majority.

Then, in a year or so I believe the number of international tournaments using plastic will be reduced gradually, or at least the organizers will have the right to choose the ball (as they by the have on paper now).

As far as I know our club (as of 2 weeks ago) is still using the old ball.  No pressure so far to make the change...that will change when tournaments begin to use the new ball I suspect.  So the change will probably come as some point.  I have hit with a few different balls, and I admit I'm not eager to make the change at this point in time.  I'm also not preparing for any competition at this time , so I don't feel any pressure to change (yet).  Once I decide to jump back into competitive mode, it will depend on which ball is being used I suppose.

Mastermind wrote: racquetsforsale wrote: playing with the celluloid ball or even playing with the old 38mm ball, Those are 2 different things, since the 38mm ball is banned and the celluloid ball is not banned.

I don't compete in ITTF sanctioned tournaments. The ITTF shouldn't have the power to limit equipment choices available to recreational players. I believe amateur tournaments should not have to abide by ITTF equipment regulations at all.

My point is, I and others like me can resist all we want, but when the manufacturers stop making the celluloid ball, like I'm assuming they have stopped making the 38 mm ball, and we can no longer buy celluloid balls on the market, then we would have no choice but to switch.

My question is do manufacturers have enough financial incentives to maintain production of the celluloid ball?

cheondo wrote: We must OBEY our ITTF masters and use plastic balls. So what if they play like crap and are really expensive. And so what if 90% or more of us on this forum will never play international events.

 

A few correction or additions.  Seamed Chinese plastic balls so far have had durability problems, unless they have fixed that in the last couple of months (which I personally doubt).  Seamless Chinese do not have that problem, at least if you get an ITTF approved one in March ore more recently.   The various types of balls have quite different bounce heights that give you something like four distinctly different playing experiences:  celluloid; seamed Chinese; seamless Chinese; Nittaku Premium Japan.  These differences are greater than we ever had with celluloid.  Someone could like one of the plastic balls and absolutely hate another type.  (Well, me for example).  Everybody likes celluloid because you know what you are going to get and how to play with them.  All plastic balls are slower and have less spin than celluloid.  That is not very hard to get used to.  But the differences in their bounce are quite extreme.  If you are not going to play a lot of competitions that use plastic, there is no obvious reason to buy them.

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Do you mean that the switch to the 40mm ball and in turn the death of the 38mm ball was driven purely by consumer demand? Do you mean that had the 40mm ball been first introduced by manufacturers as a novel alternative, most non-professional players would have eventually come to prefer it over the 38mm ball anyways?

Which was the cause and which the effect: people decided to switch to the 40mm ball, demand for the 38mm ball decreased, manufacturers stopped making them; or manufactures stopped making the 38mm ball and people was forced to switch?

If it's the former, why did people who are non-professional players feel the need to switch?[/QUOTE]

I have no idea why the non-professional players switched to the 40mm ball.  But they quit buying the 38's so production stopped on the 38's.  If manufacturer's felt there would have been a continued demand for the 38's production would have continued.

I suspect that in any sport, if the pros switch to a different type of equipment, the masses will follow.  I still have my Jack Kramer wooden tennis racket, but I doubt the pros will switch back to wooden rackets.

Mastermind wrote: racquetsforsale wrote: If it's the former, why did people who are non-professional players feel the need to switch? It was not quite so that people who were non-professional players felt the need to switch. The rules were changed, therefore unlike in the present situation both tournaments and the leagues switched to the 40mm ball. It was like changing a law in a country. They had to switch . Or they could "emigrate", but unfortunately there was no other international TT Federation and all the national association were members of the one and only ITTF. Now the TT rules regarding balls are the same as 10 years ago, both celluloid and "similar plastic" are legal. They only chose plastic for some international and national events (in violation of the existing rules, in my opinion).  This is the difference.

I do not ever recall seeing any rule or law requiring clubs or leagues switch from the 38 to 40mm ball.  I could have missed the rule/law change, if so, will you please show it to me.

mts388 wrote: I do not ever recall seeing any rule or law requiring clubs or leagues switch from the 38 to 40mm ball.  I could have missed the rule/law change, if so, will you please show it to me.

Usually at tournaments and league competitions the ITTF rules of the game (racket, ball, table, service, counting etc) are mandatory as universal rules, it is not so that every league has its own ones. There are special cases, but they are rare exceptions. If the ITTF change the rules, they are followed.

This can change, however, if they ban celluloid balls. It is well possible that it will be perceived as too much, and I have such a feeling that they know that.

ITTF have not banned celluloid balls. They have only banned the use of celluloid balls in ITTF sanctioned events.

So, there are no reasons to stop using celluloid balls in non-ITTF sanctioned events.

The best plastic ball, according to what I have read here, is Nittau 3*** 40+ Premium.

Edited by skip3119 - 11/02/2014 at 12:25pm

I still don't think the prices of the reputable brands' celluloid balls will drop any time soon, not until 2016 or close to it, by which time plastic balls should become more widely used and one would expect the precursor to that is better ball quality (e.g. Other brands' 3 star plastic balls becoming like the Nittaku Premium 40+ in quality).

If anything, before 2016, I think the price of good reputable brands' celluloid balls might rise due to the inventory risks that stores now face in having to stock both the celluloid and plastic balls.

Facts to think about, the recommended prices of celluloid balls in the newly released Japanese TSP catalogue for 2014-2015 remain unchanged.

Further to this, in May / June, I received confirmation from a large manufacturer that they have no plans to stop producing celluloid balls.

Note too, you will know when the market will start to phase out celluloid balls when you see manufacturers start phasing out established rubber and blade models with the 40+ models. Right now, they are introducing the 40+ models (think DHS, Nittaku, Stiga), with Nittaku being the front runner as if you haven't yet noticed, they have labelled how compatible their rubbers and blades are with the 40+ balls.

Personally, I still don't see the need to abandon the celluloid balls because the plastic balls are still in the piloting phase. But if I were shopping for a new blade, I would go for a blade designed for the 40+ balls.

Summary:
1) Prices of reputable brands' celluloid balls should not drop any time soon
2) Plastic balls are still in the piloting stage
3) 40+ designed blades are better for the long term
4) Celluloid balls will still be common for at least another year