I recently bought a carlton airblade as ti. Having looked at it I am a little suspicious that it might not be genuine. The first thing I noticed was that the paintjob was very poor by comparison with my other carlton racquets. As well as this it came with a cover which is totally different from those of friends with this racquet. The last and main concern was that in the inside section of the head which shows the titanium mesh, the mesh was incomplete, some parts were not there at all, despite there having been no chips on the paintwork there. Can anyone give me any advice on what to look for to see if it is genuine or not? Thanks for your help.
Never heard of Carltons being counterfeited but there is always a first one. Will need more details (pics will greatly help) as to where and how much you paid for it. Are the lettering clear on the racquet. Is the handle well constructed? As for the "incomplete" mesh, it could be that the inside part of the frame was painted over. I've never seen the AS so can't tell you whether that is the case or not.
Regarding the paint job, Carlton's first year production OF AS-Ti's had a glossy finish, the year after they gave the rackets a dull finish. As for the titanium mesh not complete I don't know what to make of that?
Re: Re: Fake/genuine airblade Has anyone seen a fake Winex/Hi Qua/etc? I'm sure there's a market somewhere for a knock-off of a knock-off... its probably low risk because no one will suspect it, and even if buyers see imperfections, they probably blame it on clonex's manufacturing... Btw, I hear in some asian cities, you can buy warez CDs that are knock-offs of other "more prestigious" warez CD makers
Thanks for all the help guys. Turns out it is ok, I managed to compare with a friend who has just bought one from a big London shop. It was good that so much advice was offered here so quickly. After i've had a chance to play a few games with it I will try to get a review up, as there don't seem to be any on the site yet. Thanks again
yeah. we have never heard of fake Carltons. they just don't have as much market potential as yonex for people to counterfeit them. even for counterfeit yonex rackets, only the hot and high end models like the MP100, MP99 and cab20 gets any attention.
