All the advancements in techonolgy you mention in your listings has been introduced more recently than the first plastic shuttlecock was introduced. little progress has been made the last 20 years in plastic shuttle-cocks.. So you just prove the point that racket tech moves ahead, and shuttle technology hasn't moved ahead since the 50's.. Maybe some maker will be able to reproduce feather-flight pattern with todays nano-tech etc.. lets hope so.. But simply molding a plastic skirt has not been working, to produce equivalent flight characteristics. /Twobeer P.S. Some syntetic shuttles still use natural cork as well btw.... So I assume not even cooler plays with a 100% syntetic shuttle... as those usually comes with a set of two rackets and a net at the local gas-station D.S.
May be one day we can see synthetic shuttle plays and feels the same as feather shuttle. (I am also waiting for the day for the blow up doll too) unti then, we love feather and let's just leave it to another discussion. Let's just shake hands and have 2 mugs of beeeeeeeers.
actually, today's plastic material can surpass cork performance. Feather shuttle use cork because it still need something to hold the feathers and no use to have long lasting cork when the feathers only last few rallies. Synthetic (engineered plastic) cork is superior, it does not deform or get soft with rallies, does not degrade with time or temperature. I'm not talking about compressed foam. Prince made a replaceable feather shuttle once before, the plastic base cork perform very well. Plastic shuttle use natural cork because it is cheaper. Mavis cork is composite cork, not one piece. When the wine industry start switching out cork to synthetic screw top, there are surplus of cork.
Cheaper feathers are using plastic cork, ranging from all plastic to a mix of natural and plastic. The reason they use plastic for the cork is to reduce the cost of natural cork, which is expensive. The better quality corks are even more expensive. The top grades goose feathers all use 100% natural cork. Actually, one can learn to tell a shuttle whether it is duck or goose feathers or natural or plastic or a mix cork by feeling and hitting a few strokes. The replaceable feather shuttle was poor in performance and that was the reason it couldn't sell for the price they were asking. Cheap wines use synthetic cork, not quality wines. Just get a bottle of wine in a synthetic cork and put in on your driver's seat when you park the car outdoors. You car set will have an opened bottle of wine waiting for you. Also do you know that plastics and wines don't mix? Imagine putting wine in a plastic bottle. That plastic cork in a wine bottle is a small representation of just that.
i think u r outdated with your thinking( ie, your mental wall). Switching out of natural cork to screw cap and plastic cork have already gain international acceptance to the point the natural cork lobbiests are fighting back, on environmental reason, to support cork forest because it support bio-diveristy. However, this thread is about performance, environmental reason aside. 'But the increasing popularity around the world of screw caps and plastic stoppers has cork producers and environmentalists alike worried. In a recent report, “Cork Screwed,” the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) predicts that, at the current rate of adoption by wine producers, screw caps and other synthetic non-cork wine stoppers will dominate the market by 2015, calling into question the future of Mediterranean cork forests. In order to stem the tide, the organization is supporting efforts by Portuguese cork producers to certify their practices as sustainable by the non-profit Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), which promotes sustainable, economically-viable forestry practices around the world. ' ------------------------------------------ Why the switch to plastic corks/screwtops? Nobody has a single, definite answer as to why certain wineries have moved away from natural corks - that is, corks made from the bark of the cork oak tree, which grows mostly in Portugal and Spain in lovely, arid forests. Some people have claimed that there is a shortage of cork available for wine production, as new wine regions are popping up all over the world (twenty years ago, if you had mentioned that you had a great Australian/South African/Peruvian red with dinner, you would have been involuntarily committed). Cork is also increasingly being used in other applications as well, such as flooring. The most oft-recited reason for switching to synthetic corkage is that natural cork allows roughly 10% of corked bottles to go bad (also known as "cork taint", or simply "corked"). A fungus that is found in cork bark may be the culprit for the loss of many hundreds of thousands of bottles annually. Synthetic corkage doesn't carry the same risk of fungal infection, so wines can not only last longer, but you don't lose a huge portion of your vintage to mold. So, from a vintner's standpoint, plastic corks are a very frugal item, indeed. So, plastic cork means it's a cheap wine, then? Not necessarily. I've opened a few expensive bottles of wine that have featured plastic corks. When I started doing my cork research, I was hoping that synthetic corks were the key to finding the most frugal, sensible wine available. It turns out that you can't judge a wine by its corkage. There are a plenty of people who likely feel that synthetic corks take the artistry out of wine-making, or that synthetic corks are indicative of a cheap, mass-produced wine, but as it turns out, you can't really tell which wines are going to feature synthetic corks until you actually open them. My absolute favorite wine in the whole world uses natural cork. Hell, Charles Shaw uses natural cork. So, there's a mental barrier for me to jump over when I open a bottle of wine with a synthetic cork. The difference is likely purely mental. As Treehugger points out: "Natural corks have proven themselves over the years but it’s the cultural resonance that extends even to the novice drinkers. This is something that the traditional cork industry has capitalized on and has taken huge strides to fight back. U.S. cork importers have created a rigorous testing system to weed out tainted cork while the Portuguese cork industry has launched an extensive $8 million campaign to commend the natural cork."
I think that rather then constantly arguing about if feather or nylon shuttles are better we should focus on the reason this thread was posted. Which is better Mavis 300 or Mavis 350, if you want to argue over what material shuttles should be made of then you should post your own thread. Stick to the actual topic of this thread.
plastic cork can be made to be recyclable and duplicate performance. Recycling natural cork means compressing chopped up cork, not up to par with virgin cork.
Until I started playing with feathers in tournaments this year, I never thought that shuttles would slow down as much as they do - always looking to play quick shots. Feathers demand more from me than just reflexes and agility.
I agree. This is also what I've found. (For those arguing over plastic vs feathers --- I believe any reasonably skillful player can adapt to either type of play after a few warmup rallies. It's a different style.)
As of today no plastics, including Yonex 300, come near to feathers. All plastics have a skirt and all plastics collapse inwards when hit. Feathers do not behave this way, and as a result are the only type of shuttle in badminton that "flies" like a bird. A feather shuttle, being conical in shape, has high drag. This is the reason why when hit a feather shuttle will speed outwards initially and then slows down. Plastics cannot do this because the plastics deform and collapse in mid-air, thus presenting a changed and reduced surface resistance which increases the speed. Plastics do not fly like birds but are more like a baseball being hit.
duh, here is another revelation, AS feathers don't fly like mavis plastic, and hamburgers don't taste like steaks either but we have no problem eating both.
Plastics doesn't increase in speed when the skirt collapses after leaving the the stringbed. Compared to a feather shuttlecock, a nylon one slows down a lot less.
clay versus grass http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu7MgXr6Vt8&NR=1 a test of skill and adaptation. I like to see a plastic versus feather tournament
Sounds like a silly idea. No respectable top badminton players would want to be seen with plastics. Do you think that Lin Dan would like to be seen playing Cooler using plastics? Preposterous!
Hi Folks: In the recreational badminton clubs in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada ... we use Mavis 300. We tried switching players over to the Mavis 350 ... but the players didn't like them as well. The flight of the Mavis 350 is supposed to be closer to a real bird. Also, the Mavis 350 bird last at least 3 times longer (since the back of the bird is fused together instead of the "rough ends" of the Mavis 300 which tend to break down quickly. Depending on the skill of the players, a Mavis 300 bird could last from 1 to 7 games. A Mavis 350 will typically last 2 to 3 times longer. This is not a debate about feather vs plastic birds. Plastic is a great alternative for recreational players. It's good for people who do not want to spend a fortune replacing birds all the time. Players who play competitively in tournaments should practice with what they will use in a real game. - Emba33
Why not put it the other way around? Playing feathers doesn't make you a top badminton player. I wouldn't think Lin Dan would like to play you even if you present him a tube of top-notch feathers
