Carbon shinai...

[forbidden]

I searched on the forum to find something about carbon shinais...but I couldnt find what I was looking for.

I wanted to know if carbon shinais are used in "high end" championships.
I know those shinais last for a long time (forever?)... but the price is a bit much... but i read some says its worth it... anybody who has much experience using carbon shinais who can tell me anything about this?
(weight on carbon shinais OK to use in tournaments ? )
(are they better balanced? )

From what i read online it seems to be around 230 dollars for a carbon shinai and about 10 % of that price for a regular bamboo shinai... means you can almost buy 10 "normal" shinais at price of 1 carbon one.. hmm

heeeeelp =)

[Shogun97]

Hi there,
äääähhhhh.......what do you mean by carbon? I looked it up and it doesn't make any sense.
I really want to help you but I can't if I don't know what a carbon Shinai is!
Can you please tell me?
See you

[Neil Gendzwill]

By carbon shinai he means Hasegawa Carbon Fibre shinai. The answer is that they are legal at most tournaments, but nobody at a high level uses them. The balance is OK if you get the DB series, but they feel funny. Also they're not customizable at all, they're all the same. So if you like a thicker or thinner handle, or the balance a little different, or a different width, you can only choose from within the few models Hasegawa offers.

For a day to day teaching beginners knock-about reliable shinai, they are just fine.

[Mitsurugi_xx]

I searched on the forum to find something about carbon shinais...but I couldnt find what I was looking for.

I wanted to know if carbon shinais are used in "high end" championships.
I know those shinais last for a long time (forever?)... but the price is a bit much... but i read some says its worth it... anybody who has much experience using carbon shinais who can tell me anything about this?
(weight on carbon shinais OK to use in tournaments ? )
(are they better balanced? )

From what i read online it seems to be around 230 dollars for a carbon shinai and about 10 % of that price for a regular bamboo shinai... means you can almost buy 10 "normal" shinais at price of 1 carbon one.. hmm

heeeeelp =)
no one at the high end uses it.. i have a CF... and I think I described it before as feeling as a dead stick.... it's so front heavy... It's good for basic practice though.... just not tourneys or free practice.. hope that helps.

[kennosen]

Hi there,
äääähhhhh.......what do you mean by carbon? I looked it up and it doesn't make any sense.
I really want to help you but I can't if I don't know what a carbon Shinai is!
Can you please tell me?
See you
..he means 'carbon fibre' a type of shinai that is made of ... thats right, carbon fibre... ;¬)

they are supposed to be very durable compared with a bamboo one. I have thought about getting one myself, but they are around £100 here in the uk! One of our japanese 4th dan uses one, he has had no problems with it over a period of 3 years!

[Dave Fowler]

Pretty much the same comments as Neil's. I use mine when I'm teaching that way the I don't have to worry about the students taking chunks of bamboo out if they happen to hit to hard or incorrectly. But as soon as it's free practice or official type tourny I switch to my nicely balanced and weighted shinai's.

[forbidden]

Thank you for your replies.

I've also heard rumours that Carbon fibre shinai can make marks into the opponent's Do(armor).

If it is not used much it is definitely not something I want to get used to, and besides =)... I like my bamboo shinai.


Thanks again

*bows*

[Halcyon]

i use a carbon shinai for kihon practice and then switch to a bamboo shinai for jigeiko. as someone said before, i also find it a little bit top-heavy. but for kihon, i don't really mind that, since i try to keep my waza rather big during kihon.

besides, when i switch to bamboo, i love that feeling of lightness i get from the weight being closer to the handle.

however, i would caution beginners from relying too much on the "indestructibility" of carbon shinai. i know some beginners who have picked up some bad habits because of that. ... namely, they hit too hard and without proper tenouchi. if they kept doing that with a bamboo shinai, it would be a very expensive habit.

[Catherine]

The other thing with Carbon fibre shinais is that they don't absorb as much of the impact as the bamboo shinais. I used a carbon fibre shinai for a couple of practices just to try it out and found that my forearms were stiffer than usual after training.

Like the other people on the forum, I like the variety in bamboo shinai, when you get a good one, it's like nothing else!

Catherine

[Dajurama]

Greetings! Usually I'm using the bamboo shinai for kihon practice. I've been using the carbon fibre shinai for jigeiko for couple years now. I used to get a new bamboo shinai in every month. Yes, the carbon fibre coated shinai is very hard to be broken. However I've seen that the carbon fibre shinai got broken during the jigeiko. I could not believe it. According to my experience, there is the limited lifetime of the carbon fibre shinai. I've been told it's 5 years or so. And I think that's why they sell a piece of the carbon shinai separately. It's like $75 per piece or something as I recall. The carbon fibre shinai is just bamboo shinai with outside carbon fibre coated. So, if you hit it very hard, you could broke it. My favorite is the men. I've easily broke the bamboo shinai during the jigeiko.

12 bamboo shinai X 5 years > 1 or 2 bamboo shonai + 1 carbon shinai
= 60 bamboo shinai

For the conclusion, the carbon shinai is good for me in the way that it gives me the nice balance for my men attack and it still saves some money of mine.

[JSchmidt]

12 bamboo shinai X 5 years > 1 or 2 bamboo shonai + 1 carbon shinai
= 60 bamboo shinai


12 shinais a year??? I go through 3, maybe 4 shinais in a year.
How many times a week do you practice??

Jakob

[samurai999]

I searched on the forum to find something about carbon shinais...but I couldnt find what I was looking for.

I wanted to know if carbon shinais are used in "high end" championships.
I know those shinais last for a long time (forever?)... but the price is a bit much... but i read some says its worth it... anybody who has much experience using carbon shinais who can tell me anything about this?
(weight on carbon shinais OK to use in tournaments ? )
(are they better balanced? )


heeeeelp =)

They don't last forever. I've seen people who've snapped them in practice. They are strong however. But, the balance is funny. I just can't get used to them. I use one but as a last resort if all my shinai break. It just doesn't match the feel of a bamboo shinai. Hasegawa usually retains spare parts for people who've broken a slat or something...

I have also heard that if you use them for too long, your "posture when you hit" changes. Hard to describe this, but something about your posture changes when you try to hit men.

Edit- I never use carbons in tournaments. The balance is so funny (since I am used to usign bamboo shinai) that my swings feel totally different compared to a bamboo shinai....

My 0.02$(US)
Tim

[Shogun97]

..he means 'carbon fibre' a type of shinai that is made of ... thats right, carbon fibre... ;¬)

they are supposed to be very durable compared with a bamboo one. I have thought about getting one myself, but they are around £100 here in the uk! One of our japanese 4th dan uses one, he has had no problems with it over a period of 3 years!

Thank you kennosen!
I have asked my Sensai now and I have now all I have to know!
I tell you if I find anything !
However I'll keep to my bamboo Shinai!

[ctan]

Hi! I own a DB 39 and I personally think that the balance is a little top heavy for competition purposes. Great for practise though.

In terms of bamboo shinais, I used to use the ebogu Hyoei's, but they are pretty "heavy" too. The best shinai for competition I've come across is one of the more expensive ones from Sehyun (I'm not exactly sure which one it is; AA or AAA or something like that; it was given to me by a Korean friend). It felt so light and...."fast"...I was sure it didn't meet regulation weight. But it did.

To go a little off topic (please ignore if you feel it's too off), I'm told that the difference in weight/balance between a dobari and chokuto shinai is actually really really slight. Is this true? (I've only ever used dobari-style shinais.) Also, I read somewhere that the difference in performance really comes from the mechanics of the different style shinai and that this is related to a speed threshold for one's swing. So, if your swing is faster than a certain threshold value, then chokuto shinais apparently outperform dobari shinais in terms of getting the blade onto the target area faster. But, below this "speed threshold", dobaris tend to perform better in this sense. This apparently is the rationale behind why very/more advanced kendoists prefer chokuto-style shinais. Is this true?

[ctan]

Hi, Samurai999! I'm interested in this "posture change" observation you made. I haven't personally observed any change in my posture, but that could be just that I'm not aware of any such variation when in fact change has occurred. The thing I find about carbon shinais is that they are certainly a lot more "whippy" than bamboo shinais...so, maybe that tends to encourage one to "overstretch"/"over-reach" on the hit? Is that what you're referring to, maybe? I know that striking tsuki with a carbon certainly feels weird...the shinai *really* distorts, but I don't do that often enough to get bothered by it.

[Wout]

Hmm I heard (and witnessed and expierienced) that carbon shinais make you hit harder (not better or faster) because you don't feel the same amount of feedback that you have with a bamboo shinai.

My teacher said once that using a carbon shinai as a kyusha is not a good idea becaise you will aquire the bad habit of hitting too hard without proper tenouchi (if you hit hard without proper tenouchi with a bamboo one... well you should try once or twice but your left tumb will feel it after practice.) also it is inapropriate for kids because if they constantly hit too hard it will be hard on their shoulders. Training with a carbon shinai is kinda nice once or twice but idd your arms feel all swollen up after the training and the next morning they are quite stiff.


Personally I like the bamboo ones if one has splinters I repair it at sunday afternoon before practice, I think it's kinda relaxing and takes me in the mood of going to kendo (and break em again).

[Shogun97]

I searched on the forum to find something about carbon shinais...but I couldnt find what I was looking for.

I wanted to know if carbon shinais are used in "high end" championships.
heeeeelp =)

Sorry forbidden, haven't find a thing!
I can't answer your question by now, but I'll ask my Sensai in the evening!
I'll write back tomorrow.

C.U

[AlexM]

Carbon shinai are "legal" for practice, tournaments and gradings. If they're IKF approved then it wouldn't make any sense not to allow them for one activity and not for another.

You won't see them used most at the time at tournaments and gradings because of various reasons such as the sound they make and the feel of a good bamboo shinai.

I use a carbon for everyday practice but with a tournament coming up I'm wondering if I won't use it in competition for the first time as well. I'm so used to the bloody thing that switching to a bamboo shinai now might just feel a bit too weird.

[samurai999]

Hi, Samurai999! I'm interested in this "posture change" observation you made. I haven't personally observed any change in my posture, but that could be just that I'm not aware of any such variation when in fact change has occurred. The thing I find about carbon shinais is that they are certainly a lot more "whippy" than bamboo shinais...so, maybe that tends to encourage one to "overstretch"/"over-reach" on the hit? Is that what you're referring to, maybe? I know that striking tsuki with a carbon certainly feels weird...the shinai *really* distorts, but I don't do that often enough to get bothered by it.

Ya, I heard that your posture changes when you swing. More specifically, your arm positioning. It sorta looks like you are hitting from the top down with your left hand ending up higher than your right. But, this change is very gradual. You have to use it for a while and use it consistently for these changes to become noticeable. I guess a good description is what you describe as "overstretching or overreaching".

The distortion in that carbon should be normal for a shinai whose material property is much stronger than that of bamboo. Bamboo splits. Carbon sorta yields. This goes into engineering principles, but that is the idea.


yet again, my 0.02$(US),
Tim

[Mitsurugi_xx]

however, i would caution beginners from relying too much on the "indestructibility" of carbon shinai. i know some beginners who have picked up some bad habits because of that. ... namely, they hit too hard and without proper tenouchi. if they kept doing that with a bamboo shinai, it would be a very expensive habit.
ya.. i have to agree on that.. when you hit men wrong or too hard... sometimes a normal shinai would just explode.. then you'd know not to do that again.. but with the carbon you can hit as hard as you want, many times at the wrong places (like the metal frame) and it still wouldn't bust.

[Dajurama]

12 shinais a year??? I go through 3, maybe 4 shinais in a year.
How many times a week do you practice??

JakobI do practice hard.^^;;;;; I go to the dojo 3 or 4 times a week. However when I have the school beark, I practice everyday. Once I had broken 3 shinais in a week. It was bad luck for me. Sometimes I keep one shinai for 3 months. So, I'd say the avarage number of consumming shinai a year is 12 for me.

[JSchmidt]

Sounds to me like you need to examine your technique. Even when I was practicing 4-5 times a week, my shinais still lasted 3-4 months at the minium.
Granted, you get the odd freak break, but 1 month on average is not good.

Jakob

[Will]

My guess is you don't even maintain your shinais. I remember when I was practicing 5 days a week in high school I broke 4 shinais that year, 2 of which were in the same month (kind of made sense cause i rotated between the shinais).

If you broke them during school break (probably summer) your shinais probably dried out, make sure you keep them oiled up. It'll save you money in the long run.

[AlexM]

Well, I switched to using a bamboo shinai today in order to get used to it before the tournament. I had forgotten how nice a bamboo shinai feels as compared to my clunky carbon. There seems to be alot less feedback from the hits and they feel so much crisper. I hadn't used a bamboo shinai in months. It felt wonderfull...

I had also forgotten the joys of breaking a latice... followed by much muttering and swearing under my breath... Always the left-side latice/take that pops. I checked it every two or three drills of kihon, it seemed fine until a small piece cracked. All that oiling for nothing. Fortunately I have extra take laying around (big surprise) and one piece perfectly with the three other remaining bits: it should last at least half a practice.

As much as I'd like to ask the collective opinion of the entire boards to find out WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH MY SWING, I'll stick to asking those around me. Those who give their opinions here will be mercifully swept aside.. and if they don't I'll come to practice with them and they will have to serve as motodachi for my men-uchi :D .

And hey... as long as the Habs keep winning I could break 20 shinai and still feel good (ok, not that good). Note: Habs winning is like heroin: I don't care how they get me my fix of victories as long as they get it to me.

[Shogun97]

Well, my Sensai told me they are legal in tournaments, but AlexM told you ages before!
Damn!!!!!!
C.U

[Dajurama]

Thank you for the tips, JSchmidt and Will! So... I'll have to rotate the side of the shinai every week or so. And I need to put some oil in the back of the pieces of the shinai. Yeh....I guess you guys are right. As I recall, I easily broke the shinai when I practiced new techniques or combination attack. So I'll watch my moves more carefully. And the weather is very dry here. I don't use the dry machine that much because my laundry drys fast in the room. Even the jean pants dry up in an hour and half in summer time here. Again I really appreciate for your tips.