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Category: Racquetball Racquet Stringing

  • Why are My Strings Suddenly Breaking?

    Recently, a customer called and asked this question: “I had been playing with the same strings for five years and never had to change them. A month ago, I brought my racquet in to get new strings. I have only played with it 10 times and the strings are already broken. What did you guys do wrong?”

    So let’s be completely honest here. We love stringing racquets. That’s why we do it. But this is the part of being a professional racquet stringer that sucks.

    Customer breaks strings. We fix strings. Customer breaks strings again. Customer blames us.

    The truth is, we didn’t do anything wrong. We fixed the racquet. What happened after that has nothing to do with us.

    In this particular case, we know the customer. So we were able to drill down and find some clues that may point to an explanation.

    The first of the clues comes from the fact that the customer exaggerated a bit when he said he had been playing with the same racquet for five years. In actual fact, he bought the racquet five years ago. He used it several times the first year, a few times the second year, then it sat in his closet for two and a half years before he started using it regularly again.

    In this case, his perception is that the original strings last for years. In actual fact, however, his strings lasted several months. If you do the math and take out the time he was not playing, they lasted five to six months before breaking, which is about right.

    The second clue also comes from the customer who tells us that five years ago, when he bought the racquet, he was a new player who was not hitting the ball very hard. In addition to that, because he was a new player, his rallies were shorter. This means that he was hitting the ball both less often and with less power five years ago that he is today.

    The final clue has less to do with our customer than it does with the people he plays against. It turns out that the guy he is playing with now hits harder than anybody he has ever played before. So once again, as in Clue #2, we can see that the context in which the customer is using the strings has changed.

    So why blame us when his strings break? Because thinking things through is difficult and most people can’t be bothered. It is easier to blame somebody else than examine their own role in their difficulties.

    What every player needs to understand is that nothing is static. If they are playing frequently, they are getting stronger and hitting harder. If they are playing less often, they are getting weaker and hitting off center more often.

    Our opponents are changing, too. If they are hitting harder, we are probably hitting harder. If we are evenly matched and both improving, then our rallies are probably getting longer as well.

    And as our bodies and our abilities change, our string needs will change, too. Stronger players need stronger string. If you doubt that compare a 14 year old to a 20 year old. Or compare a forty year old to a guy in his fifties. One probably hits a lot harder than the other.

    So before you start assigning blame for broken strings, take a few minutes to think things through.

    We string two thousand racquets or more every year. What are the odds that we don’t know how to do it properly?

  • What You Get for Your Money

    Players often ask: “Why do basement stringers charge less than store stringers?”

    The simple answer is options.

    Basement stringing customers save money because basement racquet stringers offer fewer options. Basement stringers can stack up a bunch of discount stringing racquets for five or six days and then bang them all out at the same time without having to stop and reset custom machine tension and custom string options like custom racquet stringers do.

    Custom racquet stringers, by contrast, offer many options. They typically carry a large inventory of string and can offer many more precision tension options than basement stringers with budget machines.

    Every racquet they string takes more time. It is a more careful and deliberate process. Professional racquet technicians don’t just bang out custom string jobs. They are required to stop and check the custom spec sheet before starting every racquet.

    Then…

    They strip the racquet of all string and head tape. They clean the frame, remove all tape residue and inspect it. They check to see if any grommets are missing and formulate a repair plan. Often, at this point, they have to stop and call the customer to consult with them about how they want their grommets repaired.

    Once they have mapped out the road ahead, including repairs, they set up the string and the tension on the machine and start weaving. When they are done weaving and repairing, they have another stringer verify the weave and the repairs to ensure that everything is perfect. If any flaws are found in the weave or the repairs, they back up and correct everything before tying off.

    Once the racquet is done, they enter the notes in the customer file and notify the customer by email. All of this takes time and expertise, but it guarantees that they meet customer specifications exactly.

    Finally, convenience is a major factor in stringing costs. Basement stringers often have very limited hours. Customers have very narrow windows during which they can pick up or drop off their racquets while store stringers are open long hours. As a result, pick up and drop off are generally more convenient with store stringers than with basement stringers.

    In short, store stringing is a professional stringing service with a premium price while basement stringing offers fewer options at a lower price. Here in Calgary, Racquet Network offers both stringing options to their customers.

    Racquet Network’s Custom Stringing vs Discount Stringing Table

    CUSTOM DISCOUNT
    String options Choose from all strings None
    Colour options Choose from all colours None
    Tension options Choose from full range None
    Grommet repairs Minor repairs included free None
    Head tape removal Included free None
    Frame cleaning Included free None
    Service Options
    • online option
    • in store option
    Turnaround options
    • one hour
    • one day
    • one week
    • one week
    Notifications By email None
    Early pickup options Permitted Not permitted
    Warranty options Two weeks (labour only) None
    Sponsorship credits Automatic with online orders None

  • Questions to Ask Yourself About String

    Natural Gut Tennis String
    Natural Gut Tennis String

    There is no question that natural gut tennis string is the best overall tennis string for most tennis players.

    It holds tension remarkably well and over a very long period of time; this makes it a great value. It is a natural fiber taken from animals, therefore it more closely matches the materials in the human shoulder and elbow than nylons and polyesters mixed in a vat and extruded in a lab; this makes natural gut a safer and healthier choice for most athletes. And finally, because it has more elasticity than virtually all polyesters, it offers players who need it a lot more power and playability than artificial strings.

    The downside to natural gut, many players will tell you, is the price. While it may offer health benefits and environmental benefits (it is organic animal tissue), these benefits are not free. On average, natural gut costs two to three times more per racquet with than with multifilament. So for frequent string breakers, stringing with natural gut can get to be quite expensive.

    Our experience at Racquet Network is that most tennis players at the beginner and intermediate levels are satisfied with natural gut. The customers who are least satisfied with gut are men under 40 who like to pound the ball, especially on their serves. While these players probably should not be pounding serves (the harder they hit, the more they miss), they tend to do it anyway. More importantly, they like to do it. In fact, they consider pounding serves and ground strokes to be an important part of their game.

    Pounders, whether on the serve or from the baseline, go through string of all kinds a lot faster than placers (players who place the ball, rather than pound it). And the lower their skill level, the faster pounders go through string.

    This pattern of frequent string breakage is often a function of unnecessary power coupled with inconsistency. While more advanced players hit the ball in the center of the string bed on more than 80% of their shots, intermediate players hit the center of their racquet only about half of the time. When intermediate pounders hit off center, it means that the strings along the grommet line are being subjected to an extremely high amount of force and are more likely to break.

    This combination of wasted power and off-center ball strikes makes natural gut seem like an expensive choice for intermediate pounders. Players is this category tend to believe that they are better off with polyester strings than natural gut because they perceive breakage as their most important problem. The question is whether or not this is actually the case.

    Poly strings are durable. There is no question about that. A 16 gauge polyester string may last some players for years. Unfortunately, there is a downside to this durability that most players don’t realize. First, polyester strings lose power very quickly, even if the racquet is sitting in your bag doing nothing; this means that you need to restring every three or four weeks, even when you are not playing. Second, poly string is a lot stronger than most of the tissues in your shoulder and elbow; therefore if you subject both to equal amounts of stress, it is your body that will break, not the string. Finally, there are environmental costs to consider because polyester molecules take thousands of years to break down and be reabsorbed by nature.

    So while polyester strings may seem to offer a better value than organic strings, the trade offs have to be considered before that can actually be determined. Is it smart to use polyester string so that you can pound serves that end up going wide anyway? Is it smart to use a string that helps your serve but kills your volleys and ground strokes? Is it smart to choose a polyester string that will likely go dead before you have a chance to use it again?

    As any good coach will tell you, things are not always what they seem. Broken strings could be a sign that you need stronger strings or they could be a symptom of weakness in your strokes. Before you allow a broken string to knee jerk you into using strings created for professional players maybe you should consider all of the factors at play. You should also be aware of the fact that many of the pros who use poly only use it once before re-stringing their racquets and they almost never have to pay for it.

  • Most Common Stringing Mistakes

    As professional stringers, we spend several hours each week fixing problems created by amateurs. Most of the time, these errors are minor and can be fixed relatively quickly. Sometimes, however, the mistakes are fatal to life of the racquet and sometimes, sadly, the racquet breaks or cracks before we can fix it.

    With this in mind, we offer the following advice to customers who want to save a few bucks using an amateur stringer or who simply want to be loyal to their club stringer. At the very least, we encourage you to avoid stingers who do the following three things.

    1. NEVER STRING OVER MAX TENSION

    We see this all the time with badminton racquets. Players are told to string racquets at 30 lbs. even though the frame has a maximum tension of 28 lbs. written right on it. Badminton club stringers are especially bad for this. They tend to over-tension everything. The problem is that when you over-tension a new racquet, the racquet’s warranty is instantly voided. So one bad stroke and you are out $300.

    Club stingers know this. They know that one hard smash is all it takes to snap an over-tensioned frame. And they are also prepared to sell you a new one when it happens. As a matter of policy, our stringing experts won’t over-tension racquets, especially badminton racquets. That way, if something does go wrong, we can back the customer up and ensure that their racquet can be replaced under warranty.

    2. NEVER OVER-TENSION PLAYABLE STRING

    This is another common mistake we see from amateur stringers. They take very expensive and very playable string and tension all of the playability out of it. Since the whole point of spending money on a playable string is to experience its superior playability, it makes no sense to crank the tension up to maximum and end up with a string bed that’s stiff as a board.

    In a lot of cases, amateur stringers don’t really have a choice. They bought a cheap stringer on e-Bay so they could make a few bucks on the side. Do they know how to use it? Not really. Is the machine capable of precise tensioning? Not really. So they crank every racquet out at the same tension regardless. Whether or not the tension is right for the string is irrelevant. They are getting paid for stringing racquets and that’s all that really matters.

    3. NEVER STRING RACQUETS YOUR MACHINE WAS NOT DESIGNED TO STRING

    Racquets have changed a lot in the past 10 years. Stringing machines have changed a lot, too. In fact, there are many racquets today that simply cannot be strung on cheap stringing machines. Every time you string an advanced racquet on an outdated machine, you run some risks. The best case scenario is that you risk doing the job poorly. The worst case scenario: micro-cracks that translate into broken frames at some point down the road.

    At Racquet Network, racquet stringing is not a sideline. It’s not something we are doing on the side. We are professionals with professional tools. We are up-to-date on the latest technology in both racquets and string. We have manufacturer specifications for all of the latest racquets. And as members of the Yonex stringing team, we take pride in our work.

    While we cannot in good conscience recommend that you take your racquet to be strung by an amateur, we hope that the points above have at least made you aware of some of things to watch out for.

  • 3 Ways Discount Stringers Cut Corners

    STRING-INSTALLATIONYou see them everywhere, little signs cable-tied to tennis court fences or pinned to bulletin boards offering dirt cheap stringing. You see them on Craig’s List, Kijiji and a thousand other websites.

    But can you trust them? Can somebody stringing racquets in their basement really do as good a job as a professional stringer? And do you get your money’s worth?

    The answer is: possibly. If the stringer is properly trained, credibly certified and has a suitable stringing machine, he may be able to do a professional job. However, the truth is that people who string out of their basements are rarely trained or certified and rarely have suitable stringing machines.

    In fact, most people stringing out of their basements are discount stringers willing to cut every corner in order to maximize their income while charging customers the lowest possible price. As a result, quality is not their highest priority.

    LOW BUDGET STRINGING MACHINES

    While it is possible to buy a tool marketed as a “stringing machine” for a little as $300, it is not possible to get a professional stringing machine for much less than a thousand dollars. In actual fact, the starting price for a professional stringing machine with all of the attachments and accessories required to do a range of racquets and strings is about $3000. Anything less and you will be buying a tool that can do some racquets, but not all racquets, some strings, but not all strings.

    This is where most discount stringers cut their first corner. They buy a cheap machine or an old machine that is not capable of safely or effectively stringing modern racquets and then use it anyway. It doesn’t matter to them that stringing new racquets on outdated machines is often like trying to fit square pegs into round holes. It doesn’t matter to them that they may damage their customer’s frame. Maintaining a low price is their only concern and an outdated machine helps them do exactly that.

    CHEATING TO SAVE TIME

    As anyone who has ever used a cheap stringing machine can tell you, they are often painful to use. Compared to the computerized precision and speed of professional stringing machines, table-top and drop-weight tension machines are extremely slow and embarrassingly imprecise. In fact, they are so hard to use that it will often take an hour or two just to do a bad string job. So in order to save time, stringers who use them will often cut corners by tensioning only one side of the racquet. This turns a bad string job into a terrible string job.

    Professional machines, by contrast, are extremely precise and efficient. They allow tensioning down to one-tenth of a pound and they have rotating turntables which make it easy for the stringer to properly tension every string without damaging it. This allows professional stringers to focus on quality rather than corner-cutting.

    NO PARTS IN STOCK

    Another area where discount stringers cut corners is in the parts department. In general, they have none. Most carry only string and tend to offer very little in the way of selection. While a professional stringer will replace a split grommet or advise you to replace a damaged bumper guard, discount stringers will tell you (falsely) that these part don’t matter. The truth is, these parts do matter. They are installed in racquets for a reason. When they are damaged, they should be replaced. And if they can’t be replaced, the racquet should be replaced.

    So keep all of this in mind the next time you see one of these discount stringer signs cable-tied to the gate of your local tennis court. Racquet stringing is like everything else in life; you get what you pay for. If somebody offers to sell you a diamond ring for ten cents, chances are you will get a ring that isn’t worth a dime.

  • 3 Ways to Extend String Life

    BROKEN HAMMEREven hammers break. Strong as the they are, they will all break eventually. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that racquet strings break too.

    Like hammers, they can break when they are old and worn out after lots and lots of pounding or they can break when they are new, fresh out of the package. They probably shouldn’t. But if you hit a hammer hard enough the first time you use it, a hammer might break too.

    So what can you do to prolong the life of your strings and get the most out of your investment?

    Step One is to learn to play rather than pound the ball. Contrary to the way some players think, hitting every shot as hard as you can is not the right way to play any racquet sport. Hard shots have their place but rarely will they make up more than 10% of your total shots in a game or match.

    Even serves should not generally be pounded. In tennis, a first serve might be hit hard, but the second serve should not be. The second serve should be a spin serve which is rarely hit with 100% of your full force. Even the first serve, which is often flatter and harder than the second serve, rarely sees top players hitting the ball as hard at they can.

    BROKEN GROMMETSStep Two in preserving the life of your strings is to take care of your frame. Split or broken grommets are string eaters. When they are whole, they work to prevent the string from touching the sharp edges of the graphite. When they split or break, the graphite cuts through the string like a hot knife through butter.

    Step Three in preserving the life of your strings is to string at lower tension. While it is true that constant friction at the crosses may cause the strings to saw through each other, modern materials and engineering minimize this. Strings today are designed to glide easily over each other. As a result, they are much more likely to break when exposed to extreme force under high tension.

    Players today have more choices than at any point in history. They can play with natural guts, synthetic guts, polyamides, polyesters, co-polys and more. In our store alone we carry more than 150 types of string. But all of these myriad choices have one thing in common; like hammers, if you hit them hard enough, they will break.

    So as carpenters take care of their tools, players must take care of their strings. No self-respecting carpenter swings as hard as he can at every nail. And no self-respecting tennis player should swing as hard as he can at every serve. The key is to apply force skillfully in order to maximize the effectiveness of the tool.

    TEST PREPARATION

    The following questions may appear on tests related to this article. Use them to test your reading comprehension and prepare for the CERTIFIED EXPERTS TEST – RACQUET SERVICE.

  • What Can Broken Strings Teach You?

    tennis-string-shear-breakImagine a brand new tennis racquet equipped with perfectly installed and completely flawless new string. Nobody has ever used this racquet before. Now imagine a recreational tennis player (or a total pro — it doesn’t really matter which) tossing a regular ball into the air and hitting it for the very first time with this brand new racquet.

    Now imagine that the string breaks — because it CAN happen. Even under perfect conditions with a perfect racquet with perfect strings that are perfectly installed, it is entirely possible for the strings to break the very first time they ever strike a ball.

    How can this happen? Typically, it is the result of what we call a “shear break”. Shear breaks occur most often on serves or overhead smashes when a ball is hit with a high degree of force off center near the frame. It doesn’t have to be a smash or a serve though, shear breaks can happen on ground strokes, too. Anytime you hit a ball off centre out near the frame of the racquet a shear break can occur.

    When a ball is hit with the centre of the string bed, the load is shared evenly by a bunch of strings. Together they are strong. But when a ball is hit off center, the load is carried by fewer strings. And if this load it too much, one or more strings may break under the strain — even if they are new strings in a new frame installed by the world’s best stringer.

    The image top right in this article shows a typical shear break on polyester string. It has broken along the grommet line, probably as a result of an off center serve or smash. Whether the strings are new or old (used or unused) in these events actually matters very little. The break is caused by the overwhelming force of contact with the ball, a force that is too large for the material to withstand.

    So what can players do to minimize these kinds of string breaks? For many, it’s as simple as taking some lessons and learning how to serve using the center of the string bed. For others, it’s a matter of taking some pace off of their serve and learning to place it rather than pound it.

    In general, switching to a stiff polyester string just because you are consistently breaking strings on your serve is not a good idea. Doing this may result in a racquet that is durable enough to withstand your serve but too stiff for rallying or volleying. In other words, it may help you on your serve, but it may kill you on your ground strokes.

    A much better idea is to listen to what your strings are telling you. They may be saying “Ouch!”. “Too hard.” “Time for a serve lesson.” Persistent shear breaks are more often a sign of bad technique than a sign of poor quality strings. So if the strings you are breaking are good quality strings to begin with, then you may want to listen to what they have to say.

    TEST PREPARATION


    The following questions may appear on tests related to this article. Use them to test your reading comprehension and prepare for the CERTIFIED EXPERTS TEST – RACQUET SERVICE.