TinArc 4th Day (video added)

Review updated with all four days of feedback merged.

Many of us have seen Brian Pace's Video Review of this rubber, but how does it perform in the hands of a Noob/Intermediate who is used to a Hurricane 3 variant?

After damaging my H3NP38 I made a "Christmas Decision" and decided to try and find an Equal or Better Substitute. This is Classic EJ Rationalization from a guy who finally stuck with a forehand rubber for more than a year.

This is the first non hard/non tacky rubber on my FH in 2 years.

Style:
US1200 "tactical" player with Serve/Push/Pickhit tendencies who frequently uses serve push and passive BH stroke to setup over the table drive/smash attacks. Currently developing a more allround style with more active BH and FH topspins to create rallies that I can win by outlasting or outpositioning.

DHS Tin Arc 37 degrees 2.1mm after 3 hours of warmup, drill and a match:
Edit - might be the softer 35 degree 2.0mm - can't find a label.

The look and feel of the rubber:
-Big pores on a light orange sponge (lighter color than Hurricanes).
-Topsheet appears very high quality, uniform, nicely finished
-Topsheet is only very lightly tacky, a plastic protector will stick
-Noticeably lighter and softer than H3 neo provincial 38 and 39 degree blue sponge.
-The sponge looks and feels very "German" (very even/soft/elastic)

Compared with H3 Neo Provincial 38:
The Serve
-Even without a tacky top and hard sponge, it served very well and was easy to adjust.
-Engaging the sponge is the trick for varying spin amount, and toss height changes make a big difference to what your opponent receives
-Short serves are a little trickier, but doable.
-Knuckle serves are a little harder to perform.

The Push
-bouncier, but very good control like current ESN offerings.
-you can engage the sponge to create spin variation, rather than use the topsheet like you would with H3
-drop shots are a little tougher to manage than H3
-fast deep pushes at the elbow are easier

Serve Receive Opener and Third ball attack
-Openers with medium topspin and pace vs several different top/side variants were noticeably easier, rather than being stuck in the "push or kill" mindset that H3 encourages.
-On third balls, it was hard to tell, as sitting ducks are sitting ducks.
-i didn't notice any increase in unforced errors against third ball

The Block and Counterhit
-Blocking is faster and therefore a little harder to control. Unlike H3, which can effectively block even big drives and seems to ignore their spin, TA is more sensitive to a fast shot that engages the sponge. The dwell certainly helps here though.
-For allround countering and blocking warmup, the rubber feels noticeably faster on medium strokes than classic chinese tacky/hard sponged rubbers.

Smashing, Driving and Looping
-Flat hitting is better than ok. Pretty fast with medium strokes.
-Seems to lack that top end killing gear H3 has on 100% drives; it seems possible to bottom it out, but I may not have made the correct stroke adjustment.
-Looping is much easier. Creating safe topspins and attacking against topspin is where this rubber is much more forgiving than H3.
-Spins and drives had ample power. Like H3, when I "got it right" (meaning the loop timing) my opponent would block the ball to the ceiling. I think the window for getting it right is bigger than H3.

RECAP
QUALITY; QUALITY; QUALITY
-The topsheet has some "Euro" qualities for grip and elasticity
-Amazing sponge and I would be surprised if DHS made it in house.
-Faster than H3 on blocks, counters and medium strokes.
-Very forgiving for topspin like modern tensors but has some firmness that reminds you that it's Chinese.
-More firm and direct feel and lower throw than Acuda S3, although they play similarly.
-This is a great rubber for intermediate players looking for good speed and spin with a slightly Chinese feel but don't have a Chinese coach and 20+ hours a week to train.


Video added to Day 4 comments below:
http://youtu.be/SnOnlcKMkMc

Contrast video of H3 / Mark V on same blade:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0MipKodR-U&feature=youtu.be

to me it lacks the grip when looping hard against underspin. the trajectory ends up being a little too flat for me. 

He said in another thread he got them from ttnpp.com which in my experience have very good sheets of DHS rubber

AndySmith wrote: So this is regular Tin Arc, not Tin Arc 3?

A look at the ITTF product code would tell for sure. It sounds to me like the OP is describing TA3 (24-047), not TA (24-045).

technically it is, but people can use it for fh too. basically it's a softer rubber with a grippier rather than tackier top sheet. 

It's a good review.  

Nothing wrong with a little faster rubber so long as it's got some linear control about it. Especially if you can use it on the backhand, but the hardest and one of the fastest tensors on the market, not so good for learning how to be aggressive on the forehand

I guess that is where we are different in that I don't see that Thor's is so fast, myself.  It seems very linear in it's play.  Icon and I are in similar stages of development and I have never felt that Thor's is uncontrollable.  I would add the qualification that I am playing it on an All+ blade and I am not familiar with how fast your blade is Icon.  

Icon, Shark in 2.0mm is a fantastic rubber, I'm not sure what the lower limit of it rating wise would be but it seems usable on the backhand of a kid thats had a little coaching ~us1600 and Shark is a very fast rubber but it's control is much better than the majority of high performance Tensors, I'd say all tensors except I haven't tried Acuda S3 so I'll say the majority just incase. So you basically have a rubber that you can use all the way from 1600 to Pro level with some confidence and that doesn't happen very often.

Second Session with TinArc on Forehand (league night at the club)

It was pretty good.

Split matches with my buddy the 1400 pips out hitter, took a US1700 player to 5 games, got stomped by the lobber and won 4 matches straight against equal and lower rated players.

I was impressed with how consistent the rubber performs on a variety of topspin strokes ranging from brush loops to drive loops to flat smashes. Really very few surprises. It's very forgiving to the "caught out of position loop from wrist with elbow at side" stroke as well as the "reaching straight arm hail mary pull the wrist to cover the ball" shot.

Loops against a variety of incoming spins were pretty easy, including medium underspin and knuckle balls. I especially enjoyed counterattacking flat drives with a faster loop. The topsheet is not that sensitive to incoming spin and the sponge turns most incoming shots into outgoing topspin.

I haven't played with a rubber this fast on my FH since Joola Green Energy in 2006. But unlike that one trick pony (it loops, and that's it) TinArc seems much more well rounded.

TinArc definitely plays softer than any Hurricane variant, including #19. But unlike the soft and deadish #19 sponge, TinArc's soft sponge is very elastic. Not to the point of being wild, but to the point where it feels very European.

What's interesting about Tin Arc is that it basically changes my forehead game from one that relied on wildly changing spin and speed (Hurricane 3 -which was often enough to end the point with an opening loop and a drive or open/smash) to a more consistent topspin rally based game. In that regard I think Tin Arc may be more suitable to my current and future development.

I miss H3's topsheet for over the table pushes and dropshots though. I also miss how easy it is to vary knuckleball placement and depth on service with H3. The tradeoff is that TinArc allows the fast push at the elbow more easily and performs much faster deep serves to throw off people's timing.

I'm still excited to try TG2 because it's an unknown rubber. I really enjoyed TG3Neo, and a softer, more spinny design might just suit me. I just hope that the Neo Sponge has some of the speed of Tin Arc and some of the elasticity. I am not super hopeful.

Remember how I said I could play with the H3 Blue Sponge if TinArc didn't suit me?
I'm having doubts now.


Edits:
speech to text is absolutely better than auto correct. It let me write the bulk of this review while driving. Too bad the edits took an extra 15 minutes to turn it into English :)


I have no clue why DHS has not made a 38-40 degree version of this sponge and thrown a Hurricane variant topsheet on it...

dabookerman, I was just talking about what level of player I think can use Shark II comfortably, I play in the low US2000's myself but have seen lots of people use Shark II. I got my 2.0mm sheets from TTNPP. It's the only place I've seen carry them in 2.0 but is the most popular thickness it seems. Icon wouldn't tinarc be a good backhand and run TG3 or TG2 on the FH?

Edited by bluebucket - 12/07/2011 at 12:32am

Icontek, do you have black sheet? how is the topsheet compared to H3neo? My tinarc3 has harder (I mean stiff) topsheet then H3neo. Not huge difference, but noticable. Without tackiness it misses something :/

how is TinArc compared to hard tensors like Vega Pro or Acuda S1? is it lighter? is it easier to push?

icontek wrote: TinArc plays soft, bouncy, grippy and lightly tacky.

As to DHS rubbers, this description reminds me Dipper I the most.

I wonder what the main difference is between the TinArc and the TinArc3