Nittaku ‘Acoustic Carbon Inner’ which was released in 1st May 2014 is the inner fiber version of ‘Acoustic Carbon’ which had been released in December 2013. ‘Acoustic Carbon’ is a fiber blade based on ‘Acoustic’ which is a 5-ply wood blade in the ‘Instrument’ series. And ‘Acoustic Carbon’ has become very popular as it became famous as the blade of Mima Ito. In particular, due to the change of table tennis ball, ‘Acoustic Carbon’ has been considered as a blade that can be recommended for the players who want to replace their pure wood blades in ‘Instrument’ series with more powerful blades. However, even though the ‘FE Carbon’ which is the artificial material for ‘Acoustic Carbon’ is thinner and softer than common woven carbon fibers, the outer fiber construction of ‘Acoustic Carbon’ makes its feeling somewhat far from what we can expect from ‘Instrument’ series. The common way for solving that is to change the construction to inner fiber construction, and the result is ‘Acoustic Carbon Inner’. ‘Acoustic Carbon Inner’ gives much softer and much more natural feeling when compared with its outer fiber version – ‘Acoustic Carbon’ – although the elasticity has been significantly reduced by the change of construction. ‘Acoustic Carbon’ is a very easy-to-use blade, and provides high performance when the skilled player makes a clear impact.

As its name expresses, ‘Acoustic Carbon Inner’ is the inner fiber version of ‘Acoustic Carbon’.

The blade construction of ‘Acoustic Carbon Inner’ is same as that ‘Acoustic Carbon’ except for the placement of artificial material. The top layer and the middle layer are Limba. The center layer is Tung. FE Carbon which is an woven carbon fiber but thinner and softer than ordinary woven carbon fiber is placed between the middle layer and the center layer. Overalll thickness is around 5.4mm.

The size of head is around 157mm x 150mm which is the regular size for most of blades.

The width of FL (flared) handle is around 26mm (at head side) ~ 27mm (at bulge) ~ 26mm (at narrowest point) ~ 32mm (at the end). And, the thickness of FL handle is around 22.5mm (at thumb) ~ 23mm (at the end). The size of ST (straight) handle which is not shown in the picture is around 28mm (width) x around 22mm (thickness).

The printing on the head is similar to those of the other models in ‘Instrument’ series. The simple description on the blade is printed on the left bottom of the foreside of blade head. And, the sliver printing on the right bottom of the foreside of blade head indicates that this is a carbon blade of inner fiber type.

The nameplate made of transparent plastic is applied on the foreside of handle.

Nothing is printed on the backside of head, and there isn’t backside lens.

Brass plate including Nittaku logo is applied at the end of handle.

A card in included in the packaging of ‘Instrument’ series. It is written in Japanese as : “Thank you very much for purchasing a SELECTED BLADE made by string instrument manufacturing technology. We make every effort to manufacture our products, but please understand in advance that the blade may break or bend when subjected to impact because the blade is made of natural materials.”

Following are the performance indices of Nittaku Acoustic Carbon Inner (avg.weight = 82.9g) :

– Ep = 1.36

– Ec = 1.22 (Ec/Ep = 0.90)

– Vp = 1.08

– Vl = 1.21 (Vl/Vp = 1.12)

Note : Current values seems to be somewhat lower than expected. Probably that is because the avg.weight is very low when compared to ordinary weight range of inner fiber blades (around 87~92g). 82.9g is also much lower than the official average weight of this model (= 90.0g).

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

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