Maybe it is a movement to protect the goose or duck? I am supportive of this idea: 1. It will protect the animals from which the feathers come from - giving a guilt-free image of the sport; 2. It will cost less for the organisation organising the tournaments - if it cost less for one shuttle it is already a saving and if the shuttle is twice as durable it will reduce cost even more; 3. Feathers will be required even less. If the pros are using plastic, the amateurs will follow suit as well. And the cost worldwide will be lowered; and 4. It'll be interesting to see what kind of stuffs the top pros will be doing with plastic shuttles.
As you mentioned more cost effective, you should check the price of 6 feather imitated Victor plastic bird's price. Over $ 20 in my neighbourhood . I can get 12 feather birdie for that , and they are not flying sideways. Not to mention, try the plastic first! They are horrible in comparison.
Yeah that's Victor's hybrid bird right? I'm not too much a fan of the structure of that birdie. You look at it and it seems more fragile than a normal feather birdie. Anyway I have used Yonex Mavis 600 and it is quite nice. No where near an Aerosena 50 but it is nice in it's own way compared to other plastic shuttles. I know they have Mavis 2000 which I am yet to try. It should be even better feeling than 600. I'm pretty sure Yonex will come up with something good if the regulation itself is pushing for plastic.
Was wondering the other day whether anyone could come up with a way to treat, say, cotton fibres to simulate feathers. Anyway, has anyone tried the Bird 3 yet? https://goode-sport.co.uk/news/a/bird3/
Hmmm interesting, hadn't seen that Bird 3 had been released. Bird 2 was definitely better than the usual Mavis stuff, but price was definitely an issue. I would certainly be very interested to try them, though I still feel pricing could be a stumbling block. Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk
Unless there is a global ban on using duck and goose feathers I have a hard time seeing it happens. Personally I think it's just a marketing thing. BWF did the AirShuttle with Victor, they now plan with Yonex that "tournament ready" (I see the slogans pouring already) plastic shuttle that is "allowed for professional tournaments" but never actually used in any and you got a potential new product on the market. Are pros really going to use plastic? If it flies the same way as feather shuttles yes. For now it doesn't. Let's wait and see those new shuttles. May be I'm just being negative but I mainly fail to see how is it more sustainable. If they would have come up with a biodegradable material why not, but plastic again?
It is better the describe the new shuttles as artificial feather rather than simply plastic. The "skirt" is not necessarily a single piece, it can be many separate pieces that resemble feathers and could well behave similarly to feathers. https://patents.google.com/patent/KR20100007212U https://patents.google.com/patent/KR20110065237A There are some interesting patents around for various types of artificial feather shuttlecock. Victor artificial feather: https://patents.google.com/patent/EP3228368A1 Hybrid of traditional plastic skirt and feather like flaps/channels https://patents.google.com/patent/US5853340
Some patents are from the 90's or have expired but it is very interesting indeed. If it really is a recycled or biodegradable shuttle I think it's game changer. Regardless if pros play with it or not, a lot of social clubs would use it. I'm still doubtful we'll actually see a sustainable shuttle that performs the same way as a feather one that is trully sustainable and not astonishingly expensive. Again I might be a little bit negative minded regarding this theme.
Ahh, Yonex patent. They seem to be concerned with getting the flex and weight distribution just right to be as consistent and same as a feather. https://patents.google.com/patent/JP2017202001A/en Maybe better/more ethical material choices will come later.
Why is the Yonex approach better and how does it keep the costs lower compared to other patents? I just want to know why you stated so, especially if someone has more insights in the industry or professional knowledge about hybrid shuttles development and manufacturing.
Thanks for your comments about Bird2. We did launch Bird3 through Ashaway a week or so before the Covid19 shutdown, so there won’t be many out there. Bird3 is another step closer to the performance of feathers. We found that many feather users liked the performance and consistency of Bird2 but they are constrained by the specification of feathers for league matches, and people who have only used nylons found Bird2 ‘heavy’ and a bit odd. This is because it traps more air in the skirt like a feather shuttle. Standard nylon shuttles need larger holes in the skirt to enable manufacture and these bleed more air giving less resistance. We have a very specific market for Bird2 – clubs that use nylons but have a good number of players who are used to feathers, and we get lots of lots of thanks and encouragement from these clubs and coaches who use them. So it will be difficult to merge the two markets and our plan is to bring them together incrementally. Standard nylons tend to be heavier than feathers (5.2-5.5g whereas feathers are mostly sold as 77-79 grains = c. 4.85 – 5.05g) as the extra porosity of the skirt slows the shuttle and they are made heavier to compensate. This is contrary to general belief, and they are still too slow through the air (but faster off the racket). We have redesigned the apertures on the stem section of Bird3 to change the internal vortex and exactly emulate the speed of a feather shuttle through the air and off the racket. So Bird3 shuttles are sold in grains and precisely align with feathers. This gives a perfect flight parabola and, most importantly, more control around the net. The rigidity of the stem section has also been increased with new compounds which gives a little more feel. There is also a further enhancement ready to be manufactured which uses a carbon fibre compound and increases rigidity still further. So Bird3 will be continuously improved until it can replace feathers where necessary. Bird2 will focus on getting price down and durability up with the development of more resilient compounds aimed at the nylon market, which is very cost of use sensitive. Re your comment on price of Bird2, they are now £18.95/doz from Ashaway, which is only £1.70 more than the Yonex 600, which is just a one-piece moulded design virtually identical to Bill Carlton’s first plastic shuttle designed in the 1950s. Bird2 has a composite skirt which involves six more processes than a standard plastic shuttle during manufacture, so it represents good value. Gordon
I wanna get Bird3 as soon as lockdown is over in my country. Where can I get it? I am from Mauritius.
Contact me direct at http://www.birdsports.net/contact.html For now I can arrange a delivery from Bird Design. Gordon
Now , there is the restarti upon us, but during the lockdown I had the opportunity to try out Victors Airshuttle. This one is 8 gramms, so not even close to an indoor birdie, But these kind of innovation, bring out another issue. We need to have outdoor strings to use it. My original string was Yonex BG 66 Ultimax.1'st used, and broke. Mind you it was strung to 25-26 lbs. Next I restrung it to 22-23lbs with BG 65. The string lasted until I started smashing (30 minutes). So now I strung the racket for 20-21 lbs with BG 65, yet to try it,'cause has been raining for a couple days, but my impression, that with this feather imitation shuttlecocks, the whole badminton industry will have to be revampt, including rackets, and strings etc. So my suggestion is that this alteration to this sport should be called GOODMINTON, and leave badminton alone as is for us to continue to enjoy. This idiotic alteration is not revolution,by any means, it is creation of a new sport, from an existing one, like surfing - to skateboarding to snowboarding.
Plastic could be recycled. Even if not able to turn it back into a new shuttle the plastic could be used in other products. Fairly easy for clubs to have a recycling bin for old shuttles which could be sent to recycling when full. Probably better environmentally than feather shuttles which need to be replaced so often, (resulting in more manufacturing, packaging, and shipping), and get thrown in the garbage, in a plastic garbage bag, which ends up in a landfill where it probably won't degrade for a very long time. A good, durable, synthetic shuttle is long overdue.
