Monday 20 August 2012

Choosing the Right Badminton String Tension

Now this is a question I get asked on a very frequent basis; "What tension should I have my racket strung at?" or another question I get asked is, "I have ........ string, what is the best tension for that string in this racket?" And I'm sorry to disappoint you, but there is no real answer to that question. As with almost every part of stringing and racket management it is completely subjective to the individual, however, there are a few rays of light that I may be able to shed on the situation.

It all depends on what you want out of a set of strings, less tension = more power, whereas a higher tension = more control, this is due to the trampoline affect, but I may go on to talk about that in another post. If someone just came to me and they didn't know what string or tension they wanted then I would always string the racket with Bg65ti at 24lbs. This is a standard set up for many club level players who don't really care what string they have in their racket as long as it lasts a reasonable amount of time.

24lbs is also the tension that I would recommend starting at if you are unsure of what tension to use in the first place. I would then increase or decrease by 1-2lbs depending on if it is too tight or too loose. Also changing string will affect what tension you will want your rackets strung at. For a thinner gauge of string I would recommend a slightly higher tension due to the extra power that the string is likely to generate by itself, that is why I used to have my rackets strung in Bg80 at 26lbs, but when I changed to Bg66U I upped my tension to 28lbs to compensate for the extra power that comes with Bg66U. However, a while ago I went through a stage of using Bg65ti, and I had to have that strung right down at 24lbs as I needed to be able to generate a bit more power as it is a less powerful string.

So in my opinion try most strings at 24lbs first, then increase or decrease from there and the type of racket it is very rare affects what string to use, unless it is a Carlton Razor or something like that with an extremely weird stringing pattern.

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