Thank you for your welcome and giving me the opportunity to comment. I apologise for not being as prolific or eloquent as my brother!
The Unicorn Group owned by Edward and myself of whom GM is a member company has its foundation in technical sports engineering and research so our / my comments are substantiated with technical research.
I learnt at an early age that you don’t put your head over the parapet unless you are qualified and certain of your facts. Those that know me and GM well would substantiate that we are qualified on both.
If I may address the questions or points raised of me by person, I hope I don’t miss anyone or any question out .
d7bow. Super Light Willow.
I don’t believe there is a consistent “strain” of lower density willow freely available and or grown in significant volume. I could be wrong but that would also mean that several world leading experts in timber research and technology are also unaware to.
If your question relates to varying density of willow then of course I agree across grades. Not often across trees . Occasionally a light cleft can be found. These “lighter clefts” very rare I might add and raise questions. In our experience they do not necessarily produce a good performance bat. Sometimes they do but because they are the exception it is hard to be precise.
To put a bit more flesh on that. About 60,000 English Willow clefts pass through GM’s Nottingham facility each year. Source varies from own felled and merchant sourced. Each cleft is graded, weighed and tested for moisture content. Having passed through our seasoning process each cleft arrives at the production point with the exact same moisture content. At this point the weights are so consistent across the grades and over the years, that we can conclude a super light willow does not exist.
d7bow. How do you explain this?
http://custombats.co.uk/cbforum/index.php?topic=14120.0Really that is covered in my original post.
To put a bit more flesh on the blunt reply. A cleft depending on grade weighs 5 to 6 lbs at point of manufacture. I know this may be different for some but in general for GM that is where we are after opening a round up, extracting the cleft and after the seasoning process.
To end up with a bat at 2lbs 8oz you remove a mass of willow. Where you remove the willow from and what you decide to leave is up to the designer. The depth of edge can be increased by having a flat face and shaping elsewhere. In the case of your illustration the flat face is evident and the shape looks to have a lot of wood removed elsewhere to create the low weight.
All this assumes the bat is made to a men’s length and width, at what point it is weighed and with what handle as that weight can vary to.
I can’t be precise as I am looking at an illustration.
In the case of the E41 and other bats I am more confident as by our DXM computer modelling and with actual product we have calculated the exact mass which led me to my post by pointing out that though the edges are big actually a standard GM Flare with much smaller edges has more wood in it.
Science shows as I pointed out in my original post that the best overall blade performance and durability cannot be achieved by removing willow mass in the pursuit of a large edge and a low weight.
Buzz Thank you! Actually a very frequent visitor and thread follow, but a very poor poster sorry.
Ayrtek. d7bow question
Now answered.
Ayrtek, peplow. Contradiction
Far from it. Same points made a different way.
Always aware of competitors and developments, we never stop learning, but forgive me, always on our own message.
Peplow . Talking down
I would respectfully ask you to read my post as I don’t understand how you or indeed anyone can conclude I am “talking down the E41”. Far from it. That is neither my position nor my style. I merely point out a series of facts and offer them for consideration and discussion.
roco Your bat.
A big edge won’t make you play better or hit the ball further or more consistently. At point of purchase you may feel it will. But I don’t need to tell anyone on this informed forum about where to hit a ball on the blade to extract the best performance, but it’s not on the edge.
To put flesh on this. Looking back through our archive of bats, we have several hundred going back to the early 1800’s. Many of these are bats of test and leading players of their generation with records of achievements. Most of the designs would be considered “tiny and unsaleable” today but they scored hundreds of thousands of runs and performed.
The science tells us that this is about timing and striking the ball in the correct area of blade very consistently.
It of course does not preclude new developments and designs but it is worth thinking about.
Hads45
I appreciate your post was before mine but I hope you would indulge me if I added a comment. I agree with you in general terms. Some of these extreme edge / extreme swell / light weight shapes have an unbalanced feel and pick up to some players, not all but to some. Many of our experimental designs have had that to. I recall similar pick up issues a few years back with the extreme bow shapes.
At GM we focus on pick up, performance off the blade and durability. A GM bat across our whole range should have those consistencies. Picking up our bats should always have the GM feel in the same way that whatever BMW you get in has the BMW DNA across their whole programme.
My post and opinions offered here are just that, technically sound and with supporting data. I am not closed to anyone’s view of course but would consider those based on the facts I know.
Richard
Author
Topic: Stuart Kranzbuhler talks about Gray Nicolls e41 (Read 14215 times)