Got bored one evening and came across a guy selling Butterfly willow bats made in India for £80 inc postage on eBay. Returning to playing after a few years out I was surprised by the cost of high grade bats now and the more I read the more I wonder if you can actually get a decent stick for next to nothing and how it would stack up against a top grade bat, so I decided to buy one as a bit of an experiment....
After the guy sent me some pics of a few clefts I picked one out which looked fairly clean, specified a low middle with duckbill shape and weight at 2lbs 9oz /2lbs 10oz, then paid through PayPal on Saturday.
The bat arrived today and I'm pretty surprised at what's turned up for the money tbf. It's a nice shape, with 45mm edges and around a 61mm spine. The grains are pretty straight through the toe, it weighs just over 2lbs 10oz and picks up quite nice too. It feels to be pressed well and pings nice, if a little firm where there's some graping abv the middle. I've tapped a few bats up from various brands this year and it seems to ping as nice as bats I've tapped up costing 4 or 5 times more. Really surprised tbh as wasn't expecting that much and it even came with a full length SS cover.
Obviously I have no idea how it will go longer term but feels decent and the finishing wasn't bad at all. There is a little bit of filler in the splice area, but only a tiny bit and due to the size v's weight I'm guessing its maybe dried a bit more than is necessary. Suppose time will tell but worth the experiment. The handle is round and a little thin too but that can be sorted with another grip. Apart from that it seems decent.
Just to add that my match bat was UK made and bought from a sponsor and it is top notch, so I do think it's important to support the UK bat trade, this was just out of curiosity more than anything but could be interesting.
I'll try to upload pics but not quite sure how to do this
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Topic: Indian made Butterfly eBay experiment (Read 2353 times)