Like Kwun said, beside durability, if everything else was the same, high-end shuttlecocks like AS-50, Victor Master would have gone the same route and the breakthrough of synthetic material would be published everywhere. Personally, I will not buy another batch with synthetic cork since I can get the natural one with just 10% price more.
Wow, that is a good deal! Which shuttlecocks are you buying that has such a good price? Does it comparable to the EG1130 in other aspects? As far as I know, the AS-50 and Victor Masters are about 40% to 60% more than the Aeroplane EG1130. Personally, I don't see those prices are justifiable.
Agreed and that is indeed a good question I have been ask myself and my friends. We have played EG1130 for years and just bought bulk last month or so, to be honest, we did not see much difference and we still got a good 1.5 to 2 games out of them. Indeed, after we are done playing them, the cork does NOT look as good as when they are new. Personally, I am not ready to pay an extra 50% more for the good-look of a used birdie. lol For the price and performance we got for the Aeroplane black label, it seems it is still a very good value to us.
I always been using EG1130 for my social plays for this past year. Even though I know the recent drop of performance by them, they are bang for buck to play for social play as we all know badminton isn't a cheap sport to play. For those who are die hard for flight and consistency but not worried about money and lasting long, My friends usually grab out their Ying Yang and RSL.
Yeah, I got my order more recently (April 2012) and it looks like I've got the newer "low quality" ones so far. Just based on the last time I played, I ended up using four shuttlecocks. Three had the normal wear, but one came out with the same warping in the leather around the cork base. It's been a bit more humid in Bintang the past two weeks, so it's harder to do an apples-to-apples comparison on the durability.
aside from the crispness. i am also suspecting that the quality of the feather is worse than before. the older high quality ones usually just fray over time and slows down by a lot. while the rib of the feather remain intact. that's kinda the signature of the Aeroplane Black. however, a quick visual comparison i noticed that newer ones the feather tends to break apart completely, or break apart halfway. which is rather uncharacteristics of Aeroplane Black. since i have both types in the same speed, i will attempt to use them in games next week to see if i can see a pattern. there will also be close inspection of the feather although that is usually hard to do. so far not looking very bright for the new batch.
Is there any way we can recycle the old birdie's cork to the factory to solve this shortage problem. We just throw away the shuttlecock after 1 or 2 games.
Oh my, this could explain why my Aeroplane blacks suck recently! The only reason why I was willing to buy them was because I thought they would last long! I go through a few birds every game now. I havent used any other brand other than Aeroplane black for many years, but recently bought a tube of zelm as its way cheaper and lasts about as long as the new aero blacks. Why pay premium price when it's going to deform just as fast!
I have recently bought aeroplane black shuttles in Australia. I have noticed that the feathers break out easily and sometimes it's hard to use them for one game. I compared them with a batch of Aeroplane green shuttles i had and found actually those were better and durable than the black one i received. I was playing with Aeroplane green shuttles for a while and moved to black ones co'z i've seen many ppl saying they are durable than the green ones. Heavily dissapointed. I've cut and check the cork and it is natural so no problem with that.
Can you do us a favour? Can you cut open a used Zelm shuttle and post a pic here for comparison? And where did you buy them from? I'm still looking for the ideal shuttle at a cheap price. Thanks.
i collected more new/bad Aeroplane Blacks from the gym and they all have severely broken feathers. either snapped in the middle or a feather snapped as whole. the old durable Aeroplane Blacks are gone. i am afraid.
Just for fun i cut one of the LN A300+ from last practise.. seems to be a two piece construction? but it seems to be pure cork anyway .. And they dont deform. /T
Hi I just bought some fresh-manufactured aeroplanes black that, according the the importer, just arrived freshly made from the Aeorplane factory, and I cut them in half after playin' a bit with them. Let me try to upload the pic: this looks like semi-synthetic. Let me ask the importer for comments Zynex
Sure I'll cut them open this sat. They're actually Hang Yu No.1 Aqua, I couldn't edit the brand in my post earlier I'll see if I can get my hands on some Zelm in the coming weeks. I bought it off Tedski on the forums who orders it directly from the Rep. I'll be honest, although Aeroplane blacks die easily now, I still like the feel over many brands. But at $8-10 difference PER tube it's getting hard to justify using them just for the feel when the durability sucks. I really hope Aeroplane decides to go back to the old formula, as currently Yonex AS50's are only a little more for the full cork. I was talking to others about this thread and some were very disappointed and couldn't believe that a company that was known for quality has decided that the bottom line was more important. I think we could all agree that we would have been less let down had these actually been fakes or if there was at least an announcement so we can consider our options. Finding the fact after user led investigations makes us all feel a little cheated. Being the only company with the 3rd cork SURFACE layer almost seems like a scam because definately hides the changes. At least the other companies with 2 layer synthetic you can clearly see it! We've played badminton for 15 years and not once have any of us thought about cutting the shuttles in half to analyze. I'm glad to have this community around because although I felt something was wrong with my new batch, I probably wouldn't have figured it out
i think my school club got ~100 tubes of aeroplane blacks from shuttlecock101...kinda doubt its the good batch. but we're almost done with em
The issue is not that they are fake, but rather that lately, the legitimate Aeroplane shuttles are of lower quality.