Custom Bats Cricket Forum
Equipment => Bats => Topic started by: fasteddie on March 16, 2013, 11:41:20 AM
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Ok, so you're a small bat maker and you get your consignment of clefts from Wrights.
First up is the top grades, then the 1's, all the way down to the ugly ducklings.
You only sell 'pingers, not mingers' (I'm here all week) and don't want the door stops and kindling finding their way into someones kit bag.
What do you do with the clefts which don't 'ping like a nun sings'?
And, how many of your yearly consignment end-up in the log pile?
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if you are buying the wood as crafts and you are pressing it yourself the you only have 1 person to blame if it doesn't at least ping reasonably
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grade 1 or 2 or 3 if its pressed right it will go
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I have no idea, but I think that the pressing is the most important part. I think that generally, all clefts will eventually perform around the same standard, but you do get some that perform exceptionally, and others which don't quite make it. I know that some which have big defects around the edge are trimmed down to make middling bats at times, but it would be interesting to see what batmakers do with clefts which just turn out to be duds, no matter how well they have been pressed! :)
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You should see the Kook that Paul showed me at his store. Taps up horribly with the mallet! Rebound was awful compared to a Wasp he was knocking in for Roco. Pressing is obviously key, and depends whether you want the bat to ping right away or last longer and open up
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Interesting thoughts.
What is the wastage ratio?
If they are as appealing as a sauna with JClarkson, then is it to the kindling box?
You can't polish poo.
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Is it just me or are English made bats generally pressed a lot softer?
I knocked in a CA bat for a customer this week. It was a supposedly their top end bat, but I've heard Kashmir willow bats tap up better off the mallet. And yes, as Jamie alluded to, these Indian made Kooks are concrete this year too.
In my experience, Salix, M&H, Hammer, Affinity and Newbery produce the best pressed bats on the market. And they are all English made bats. Can't be a coincidence, surely?!
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I think Indian bats pressed by kg and Ss are the equal to many.
Paul I hate to comment but you only ever seem to praise the items you stock...
Look at your list many of them are from the same place.
There plenty of other great people pressing like b3,kippax,chase...
Looking at newbery bats currently I have not seen many special ones maybe there taking a back seat with the keeleys.
Also tried a few sf there good as well and as for bas well there quality sticks as well.
I quess it about experience with bats but to put the Asian and uk thing to bed the best Asian are as good as the best uk made bats and pressed just as well..
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That's not true, Dave, I'm judging from bats that I've knocked in and /or used before, which includes brands like CA, Chase, SG, Duck & Run, H4L, Black Cat, SS, Malik, Puma, Adidas and various others that we don't stock.
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Well I guess I have had quite a few between my hand over the years Sareen are softer pressed than most I have knocked in.
I guess there never going to win people over as looking at old thread people where complaining there where to softly pressed the Asian brands.
Look which tend to last longer that a good indication to hard pressing
When did you last knock in a chase bat Paul
Most Ss I have used go for ball 1 and do not have the greatest durability
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Last Chase was a few months ago. Belonged to a forum member actually.
To be fair, of all the Indian made bats, SS tend to sound the nicest off the mallet, and I certainly think they are pressed better than the likes of CA, Kookaburra etc.
Again this is just based on my experience, and a lot of it is not more than my bashing a bat with a mallet for four hours. I still think there's a trend there, and I'm not afraid to say that I prefer the pressing on the English-mades...
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Nothing wrong at all bud just find it very interesting.
How people interpretations are...
Agree about sg/kook always found them hard and same as rns..
Interesting what a batmaker told me about a few Ss and a kg I showed him but it isolated bats.
I prefer anything no matter where the made I think no matter what cleft as dean put it if the maker has skill he will bring the best out of it.
Only ever had 2 real stinker bats one a navarone and another sg bat
You take all the stickers off and leave them all generic shaped not many could tell the difference between Indian and uk pressed not many at all
Stickers and glue
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My friend had an SG bat, which was rock hard in sound and just sounded horrible. I didn't really tell him straight up my thoughts, as it was a present from his girlfriend when they were both in India. I just said, "It is really nice, a little hard pressed and will take a little time to play in, but nice!" If I had bought that bat, I would have sent it back, it sounded rock solid. Much harder pressed than the Kookaburra I bought off Asad, and more than double the price! The bat actually broke on its second use too, he hit a ball near the toe, and there was a split from edge to edge just under the splice. This has put me off SG, as that bat was a complete plank. To think it cost that much! It made my Laver sound soft!
I have tapped up an SS, and they are lovely. There are some CAs which are pressed rock hard, but others which are softer pressed. My friends TRD was really soft sounding. MSR say they press their bats soft, but I actually found that the bat made a really hard sound at start, but dented really easily. Just not pressed quite enough I guess!
I also saw a well used Flare today, and the sound off that was incredible. I wonder if it was a one off, or if a bat just sounds that good after a long period of use. Pressing is a really important, yet strange thing...
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Get a ball place it on a hard floor and wallop a ball down on it see the indentations very good,indicator
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I am surpirsed no one mentioned H4L pressing. They some of the best pressed bats out there, No offence to Salix but I like the H4L pressing better.
Also if someone took the stickers off L&W & SG/SS and swapped them would anyone complain? L&W are pressed horribly yet we all love them.
P.s. Dave (Procricketer) just got Uzair's SS in Kohli shape. I have never seen a bat like that or a rebound like that...wow!!
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Sareen sports when right are hard to best by any bat on value or quality...
I just sold mine handle set too far forward for me :o
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Agree with you on H4L pressing tusher, the one I have is truly unbelievable, and the clefts that were pressed by Matt and sold by Peplow, unreal too. Genuinely one of the best I've used
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I would Love to know what a soft pressed bat is?
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In my experience, Salix, M&H, Hammer, Affinity and Newbery produce the best pressed bats on the market. And they are all English made bats. Can't be a coincidence, surely?!
Hammer do not make cricket bats. They simply put stickers on other peoples work! Their spokesmen also has appalling grammar!
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I'm still interested in the original point.
Pressing is great, if you've got a decent cleft to press. But what about those are beyond even alchemy?
What is the wastage ratio?
Also, Dean stated that 'it's all in the pressing'. I'm going to question that point.
In direct relation to the original question, the duff cleft will always be duff. You can't make it good by pressing.
I think what Dean alludes to is making a decent cleft better.
What is the % of cuckoos in the nest?
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Think this post is more of a rhetorical question by OP.
Dud bats are still sold by companies. They don't give a flying.....
To Be fair with some bats it'd be hard to predict with certainity whether they are going to be the terrible ones.
The bat maker or manufacturing unit will be "hopeful" that with knocking it will come to life.
In the past seen some such duds end up in bargain bins with some shops. Sometimes sold to club kits as specials. Or school kits. That would certainly explain most of the school bats I had to use.
You know the worst bats are the ones that refuse to play better or break! Dead albatross around your neck!
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If it all just the pressing it is possible to press a bat by hand over pressed is ackiller under pressed you can do the rest yourself
Rob not softly pressed I would say lightly pressed
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Hammer do not make cricket bats. They simply put stickers on other peoples work! Their spokesmen also has appalling grammar!
True he doesn't make bats, just had an idea, sourced a bat maker on both sides of the world, worked on a design idea, spent money out of his own pocket to start a brand, arranged for stickers and bat sleeves, designed and arranged for softs to be made, found a stockist to sell them, and maybe worst of all forgot to by a dictionary.
Like you say not a lot of work really, and defiantly the only person in the market that has every done that.
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My friend had an SG bat, which was rock hard in sound and just sounded horrible. I didn't really tell him straight up my thoughts, as it was a present from his girlfriend when they were both in India. I just said, "It is really nice, a little hard pressed and will take a little time to play in, but nice!" If I had bought that bat, I would have sent it back, it sounded rock solid. Much harder pressed than the Kookaburra I bought off Asad, and more than double the price! The bat actually broke on its second use too, he hit a ball near the toe, and there was a split from edge to edge just under the splice. This has put me off SG, as that bat was a complete plank. To think it cost that much! It made my Laver sound soft!
I have tapped up an SS, and they are lovely. There are some CAs which are pressed rock hard, but others which are softer pressed. My friends TRD was really soft sounding. MSR say they press their bats soft, but I actually found that the bat made a really hard sound at start, but dented really easily. Just not pressed quite enough I guess!
I also saw a well used Flare today, and the sound off that was incredible. I wonder if it was a one off, or if a bat just sounds that good after a long period of use. Pressing is a really important, yet strange thing...
Personally I think it has more to do with the drying of the cleft that is making these bats hard. To get these massive profile / edge bats they are drying the clefts to an inch of their life to reduce the weight which in turn make the blade harder but brittle. Pressing removes moisture so as the clefts are dryer they soft press them but you still get a hard sounding bat.
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True he doesn't make bats, just had an idea, sourced a bat maker on both sides of the world, worked on a design idea, spent money out of his own pocket to start a brand, arranged for stickers and bat sleeves, designed and arranged for softs to be made, found a stockist to sell them, and maybe worst of all forgot to by a dictionary.
Like you say not a lot of work really, and defiantly the only person in the market that has every done that.
The marketing isn't rocket science and if done well is not expensive.
I'd say <£10k and you're up and running.
A lot of what you've stated is making phone calls and sourcing which is virtually free.
The expensive and 'value adding' part is the manufacturing process. Everything else is just transparent froth.
And, if any person in charge of public communication forgot basic grammar they would be re-assigned. How many (serious) companies hire someone without grammatical skills to manage their written output.
A lot of people seem to allow Hammer so much leniency. Not sure why.
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Hammer do not make cricket bats. They simply put stickers on other peoples work! Their spokesmen also has appalling grammar!
You could argue that Newbery and M&H don't make bats too....
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Who gives a flying if his grammar is good, bad or indifferent... Good grammar isn't a prerequisite to becoming a successful businessman.
Plenty of successful uneducated brilliant people out there in the big wide world.
Not saying Jason/Hammer is uneducated either.
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I'm still of the opinion that 95% of people, including shop owners and people on here (including myself!) couldn't differentiate between 'ping' and 'ripeness' (i.e. whether it's knocked/played in or not) of a bat.
And I don't think the in shop tap up does little more than reassure the ego ;)
And that's not before you consider sheer wood weight - how many would say a M&H Distinction 'pings' more than an M&H Original mid or Harlequin ;) Certainly (genuinely) the 2 best rebounders I've owned were a Distinction and an ex pro Mongoose...Obscene power (standing and reflective) from the pair of them but never could tell if it was ping of the silly amounts of wood behind it!
Doesn't change a thing of course. And sometimes it's almost a nice surprise to find a plank amongst the forest, just to remind you that sometimes the mallets doesn't always fly back through your wrist ;)
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Who gives a flying if his grammar is good, bad or indifferent... Good grammar isn't a prerequisite to becoming a successful businessman.
Plenty of successful uneducated brilliant people out there in the big wide world.
Not saying Jason/Hammer is uneducated either.
I agree. Education and academic ability are not pre-requisites in business.
But how many successful companies have such bad grammar in their public communications? Go onto the twitter feeds and blogs of any of the FTSE 250 companies and show me the same.
I think some people here have a bad case of 'Emperors new clothes' with Hammer. He seems to be forgiven for doing even the basics wrong!
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Sorry didn't realise Hammer Cricket was on the FTSE let alone the top 250
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All this Hammer bashing is getting a bit tedious. This thread was in relation to bat pings but has been taken off topic. Can we try to get back on topic?
I am glad that Farnham Quins has seen my new Salix bat and says it is a good one in relation to "ping"
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All this Hammer bashing is getting a bit tedious. This thread was in relation to bat pings but has been taken off topic. Can we try to get back on topic?
I am glad that Farnham Quins has seen my new Salix bat and says it is a good one in relation to "ping"
Agreed. I was merely replying to Paul's incorrect and misleading post.
A new Salix.....cat and cream spring to mind!
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I'm very sorry about my "incorrect and misleading post" which has steered this thread of course. In actual fact, I made a mistake and used the wrong wording. I said that these five companies, including Hammer, "produce their own bats". Of course, I know how and where Hammer bats are made. I guess I should have said something like "Hammer, M&H, Newbery, Salix and Affinity bats are, in my opinion, the best pressed". The use of the word "produced" has clearly been my downfall here. Feels like I'm back in English class - never have I felt that my grammar and choice of words has been so closely scrutinized! :( I guess I'm not the only one on here who feels this way now...
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agree with you Paul on this, I don't think it's the crime fasteddie is building it up to be. Since it's obvious who makes Hammer bats and they are made by some of the best, I don't think picking up on the odd word is really worth it.
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I'm very sorry about my "incorrect and misleading post" which has steered this thread of course. In actual fact, I made a mistake and used the wrong wording. I said that these five companies, including Hammer, "produce their own bats". Of course, I know how and where Hammer bats are made. I guess I should have said something like "Hammer, M&H, Newbery, Salix and Affinity bats are, in my opinion, the best pressed". The use of the word "produced" has clearly been my downfall here. Feels like I'm back in English class - never have I felt that my grammar and choice of words has been so closely scrutinized! :( I guess I'm not the only one on here who feels this way now...
Since when has been so hard for a company to use the correct grammar when communicating.
I can't believe you feel put upon! If you post as IJC you're liable for your words. It's the basics no?
People lose their jobs for making such mistakes. Why not get into the habit of correctness.
It's about image. Nothing more, but totally critical.
Not having a pop.
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I agree. Education and academic ability are not pre-requisites in business.
But how many successful companies have such bad grammar in their public communications? Go onto the twitter feeds and blogs of any of the FTSE 250 companies and show me the same.
I think some people here have a bad case of 'Emperors new clothes' with Hammer. He seems to be forgiven for doing even the basics wrong!
Terrible point. Go to the Twitter of Richard Branson or Alan Sugar.
Eddie to me it seems you have a negative attitude towards Hammer and even Paul. It has to stop, it puts a sour note on the forum for no reason.
I actually think most people on here are ridiculously anti Hammer. You can say whatever you want about him, at the end of the day he probably sells more bats than you ever will. You might not like his style but I guarentee you cannot argue with his results. If your going to spend ages criticizing him or his actions see how easy it is to do what he does.
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Terrible point. Go to the Twitter of Richard Branson or Alan Sugar.
Eddie to me it seems you have a negative attitude towards Hammer and even Paul. It has to stop, it puts a sour note on the forum for no reason.
I actually think most people on here are ridiculously anti Hammer. You can say whatever you want about him, at the end of the day he probably sells more bats than you ever will. You might not like his style but I guarentee you cannot argue with his results. If your going to spend ages criticizing him or his actions see how easy it is to do what he does.
I've sent you a PM.
...and you can put that finger away.
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I have met Paul from ijc and his grasp of the english language is second to none,so much so, if I am not mistaken he is surely privately educated
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FFS, it's not grammer (a their/there/they're insistence), it's ensuring certain standards of accuracy about a bats provenanzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
I admire your persistence FE, though it must be a hard and thankless task being the sole bearer of the grammar flame. I think Pauls' (shoot, is that 's, s' or just s?) grammar is second to none and I think It's Just Cricket will be It's Still Just Cricket next year, typo or not ;)
Back to the subject (if people can still remember the OP...) one of the things that sub consciously puts me off bats from the subcontinent, is the sheer travel these things go through, and the various storages they must go through. I remember getting my first super-bat reading a bit too much on here and thinking I was going to need to install a thermidor (sp?) in my small 1 bed in Notting Hill to keep it, such was the precious care I should take of it...Needless to say I'm a bit more relaxed now but I do still wonder the sorts of micro climates a subcontinent a standard J.S.Wright number goes through from here to there to here? Would that affect the 'ping'?
(Granted, I get they're probably stored/dried in pretty shoddy shipping containers over here too, though the weather is rarely too extreme, just dull and whinge-enducing)
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I think there is only one Paul, so it is Paul's grammar rather than two Pauls' grammar. ;)
It would get confusing if there were two Marcus' bats
I hate criticising peoples grammar on here as I invariably make a mistake when I do it and look a double wotsit.
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What all this got to do with bats
Love hammer or hate them there not going to be bad sticks...
My grammar is (No Swearing Please) but I know a good bat when I use one.....
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Maybe we need another section - The "Hamma Gramma Slamma" where we can stick Jason/Spelling/Eddie "Communications Management" advice?!
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Pro - I believe that fasteddie was trying to make a point that hammer do not PRODUCE (or make) their own bats.
Which is fine to make that point, but it's a point that should have been made in a single line! There is no need to then rip into hammer, ijc and anyone else, as that just seems like overkill/nasty/argumentative...and then other forumites do not appreciate an almost bullying attitude!
I agree that this should be about bats and not labouring on a point that could have been made in 1 line!
So, let's get back to the subject fellas :D
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Interesting thing happened last night, I brought about 7 bats I wanted to sell to cricket nets last night, and a guy picked out a bat that he liked the look and pick up of, and bounced a ball on it and said "This bat has no ping". Now of course, I was slightly offended as I like to think that I wouldn't be trying to sell duds to anyone, and funny thing is, I have one of his son's bats in for repair (plays for Scotland) which was fully knocked in, and the bat he had picked up responded pretty similarly with a ball. Considering the bat hadn't been knocked in at all, I can only assume that it will get much better with some time with a mallet. However, I think that picking a bat on ping alone is not a good way to go about it, as each plays in differently and each one is pressed in a different way depending on what the maker wants to achieve. Also, the fact that his son had been using a Newbery GT Players which responded pretty similarly shows that the ping of a bat and how it plays are two completely different things. Should also mention that his son also came to look at bats, and he based everything on pick-up a feel, and didn't choose by bouncing a ball on them, simply because they didn't pick up the way he liked his bats.
I picked up every GM bat in my sports store the other day, and they all sounded exactly the same, as in they all had a planky sound. Then come the next day, my friend brought a GM Flare he had found, very well used, but the sound off the mallet, ball response and pick up were all incredible. I think initial ping is a very misleading thing to judge a bat on, and all bats need to be given time to be played in. If we are so worried about ping in this forum, why do we buy Lavers? Because we like to give them time to play in. If you are like me, and like to use/buy lots of bats, I would say initial ping is somewhat important, but if you stick to 1-2 bats a season, then always, always pick a bat on pick-up and feel.
IMO, it's very hard to tell a bat is a complete dud, which is why some companies, even the boutique ones, end up selling duds. It's just wood in the end, and I reckon that if the batmaker knows it is a complete dud, he will cut it down to a smaller size and sell it as a junior bat or something like that.
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Good point Chad.
I saw the pic of your Supreme, it looks fantastic.
Mine is playing really well. Actually another team mate has bought one and a couple more are considering the same!
Enjoy the Vintage/Supreme.
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agree with you Paul on this, I don't think it's the crime fasteddie is building it up to be. Since it's obvious who makes Hammer bats and they are made by some of the best, I don't think picking up on the odd word is really worth it.
Totally agree Nick and well said.
At te end of the day Fasteddie I would suggest you use the brand equipment and then write I review that people would be interested in reading and any opinion you then had would have some credibility. At the moment you appear to have none when it comes to the Hammer brand.
Not having a go!