Butterfly’s ‘SK7 Classic’ is a traditional type thick 7-ply plywood blade that Butterfly has re-released with a new design of the past ‘SK7’. ‘SK7’ is a clipper-type thick, 7-ply plywood blade released by Butterfly in November 1999. It became a big hit when the table tennis ball changed from 38mm to 40mm in 2001, becoming the best-seller of 7-ply plywood. However, in 2015, when Butterfly launched a new pure plywood blade series, the ‘Hardrow’ series, many existing products were discontinued, and unfortunately, one of them was the ‘SK7’. However, as the polyball became established and the demand for traditional 7-ply plywood blades increased significantly, Butterfly felt the need to revive the once discontinued ‘SK7’, and the product that emerged was the ‘SK7 Classic’. no see. The wooden structure is almost identical to that of the existing ‘SK7’, but the head shape is slightly different due to changes in the manufacturing process, and the shape of the grip is also different from the former ‘SK7’. Performance characteristics are believed to have been adjusted to meet the needs of the poly ball era, but the original characteristic of ‘pure plywood with high resilience’ is the same as the former ‘SK7’. ‘SK7 Classic’ is priced low as it is pure plywood, so it also serves as Butterfly’s entry-level blade. When the ‘SK7 Classic’ was released, ‘SK Carbon’, a carbon version, was also released at the same time, forming the new ‘SK’ series. (When ‘SK7’ was released, ‘SK’ was simply an abbreviation for ‘Shake’. At that time, Butterfly released ‘SK7’, a shake hand, and ‘CN7’, a middle pen, at the same time. As time passed, the original meaning of ‘SK’ has been forgotten and only the name remains.)

Buttefly ‘SK7’, which had been released in 1999 and became the great hit thanks to its natural feeling and very high elasticity, once discontinued in 2014. But, because the demand for the traditional thick 7-ply wood blade increased again afterwards, Butterfly newly released ‘SK7 Classic’ which can be considered as the reprint of ‘SK7’ in 2017.

‘SK7 Classic’ is also the pure wood version of new ‘SK’ series. In Butterfly blade range, ‘SK’ series serves as an affordable blade family for starters. However, the proper player level of ‘SK’ series isn’t limited to entry level.

Blade construction is traditional 7-ply wood of ‘Clipper’ type, but differently from ‘Clipper’ there isn’t dyed layer. The top layer is Limba, and all the other layers are Ayous. Average of overall thickness is around 6.7mm. (The thickness written in Butterfly catalog is 6.8mm.)

Head size is 157mm x 150mm which is the regular head size of Butterfly. Average weight of measured pcs. is 90.6g. But, we can find many pcs. whose weight are under 90 gram or over 93 gram.

The shape of FL (flared) handle is different from the Butterfly standard FL (for most of Butterfly blades including ‘InnerForce Layer’ series) or Butterfly semi-wide FL (for ‘Viscaria’, ‘Fan Zhendong’ series and so one). The width is around 26mm (at top) ~ 27mm (at bulge) ~ 26mm (at narrowest section) ~ 34mm (at the end), and the thickness is around 24mm (at thumb) ~ 25mm (at the end). Although it appears thick in terms of size, it is somewhat slim when held because the cross-sectional shape is more shaved than the typical FL handles of Butterfly. The ST (straight) handle which isn’t shown in picture is also slimmer than regular Butterfly ST handle although the size in number is identical (= width 28mm x thickness 23mm).

Like the other Butterfly blades, there is squared Aluminum plate with new Butterfly logo at the end of handle.

There isn’t printing on the backside of head. And, there is small rounded hologram lens at backside of handle.

The rounded hologram lens which has been applied from 2014 is now one of the symbol of Butterfly blade.

‘SK Carbon’ and ‘SK Classic’ were released together in 2017. Two models shares the basic design as ‘SK’ series.

The main advantage of ‘SK Carbon’ and ‘SK Classic’ is that those two blades provide high performance while being low in price.

Two models are distinguished from each other by coloring. The theme color of ‘SK7 Classic’ is dark blue, and that of ‘SK Carbon’ is black. And, two lines in sky blue and dark gray respectively make the harmony with base colors. Inside lens, yellow and silver work as point colors respectively.

The color of hologram lens of ‘SK7 Classic’ is orange while that of ‘SK Carbon’ is green.

‘SK7’ had been a strong rival to the Stiga ‘Clipper Wood’ and variations since its release until it was discontinued. And, ‘SK7 Classic’ is taking over that role in poly ball era.

Following are the performance indices of SK7 Classic (avg.weight = 90.6g) :

– Ep = 2.05

– Ec = 1.86(Ec/Ep = 0.91)

– Vp = 1.27

– Vl = 1.30 (Vl/Vp = 1.03)

Please note that above are average values and can be updated by further measurement.

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