‘Foundation’ series announced in October 2024 is a new blade family of KTS (Kim Taek Soo) which is the Korean table tennis brand. Up to now KTS has managed two major blade families – high-end ‘Problade’ series for professional or highly skilled players and entry-level ‘Ngineered’ series for entry ~ middle class players. The concept of newly added ‘Foundation’ series is to provide professional class blades like ‘Problade’ series at a reasonable price close to that of ‘Ngineered’ series. ‘Foundation’ series consists of four fiber blades, and among those four three models – ‘Foundation ALC’, ‘Foundation GF.K’ and ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ – were released first.

‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ (= ‘Foundation Ebony’) is an inner-type blade whose artificial material is glass fiber. Its name indicates that it is a special version of ‘Foundation GF.K’ which is an outer-type blade with the same artificial material. But, the constructions of those two art totally different from each other. Instead of Koto of ‘Foundation GF.K’, harder Ebony wood is used for the top layer of ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’. But, the feeling is softened by the reduction of thickness, and the overall feeling is adjusted to be more natural by deeper placement of the artificial material. It doesn’t provide high elasticity when the player hits the ball very strongly, but instead it provides extreme stability and controllability when the player aims at very early timing after bounce. Therefore, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ fits for the players who mainly play with very aggressive topspin at close-to-table area. Also, it makes very good harmony with the rubbers whose performance setting is biased to rotation, for example traditional sticky rubbers or modern Hybrid rubbers.

‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is a fiber blade whose artificial material is glass fiber. It is suitable for very aggressive topspin that aims at the rising of ball. Four models in ‘Foundation’ series share the same graphic design, and each model is distinguished by the point color of the handle wood block and the head printing. The theme color of ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is Orange. In addition, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is also distinguished by the dark color of its Ebony top layer.

‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is an inner-type fiber blade of 5+2 ply construction. The top layer is Ebony, the middle layer is Ayous, and the center layer is Kiri. Glass fiber is inserted between the middle layer and the center layer. Overall thickness is around 5.0mm. Although hard Ebony wood is used for the top layer, we can expect that its overall feeling will not be stiff because it is much thinner than ordinary inner-type blades and its center layer is softer than the Ayous wood that is generally used as the center layer of inner-type blades.

The size of head is around 157mm x 150mm. There can be small differences by piece.

This FL handle is completely flat on the top and bottom, and it doesn’t have bulged section between the root section and the narrowest section. The width of FL handle is around 27mm (at top) ~ 26mm (at narrowest section) ~ 34mm (at the end), and the thickness of handle is around 22mm (at thumb) ~ 23mm (at the end). The unique FL handle whose top and bottom are completely flat reminds us the handle of old Butterfly blades such as ‘Gergely’ or ‘Primorac Carbon’, although the FL handle of KTS blade is rounded at the edge differently from that of ‘Gergely’. Although this FL handle isn’t a wide or semi-wide handle, it provides quite good stability thanks to the flat top and bottom.

The Tiger Face ‘金擇洙(Kim Taeksoo)’ logo which is also applied to the top blade family – ‘Problade’ series – is printed on the top of the foreside of blade head. And, on the bottom of blade head, the logo of ‘Foundation’ series, the name of blade model, the name of artificial fiber, the construction and speed sign (= OFF) are printed. In the standard of KTS, the speed sign ‘OFF’ means that the blades is for offensive play by topspin, and the speed sign ‘OFF+’ means that the blade lays emphasis on speed.

The aluminum plate that includes the Tiger Face ‘金擇洙(Kim Taeksoo)’ logo is applied at both sides of handle.

Aluminum logo plate that includes KTS logo is applied at the end of handle.

The printing and the aluminum panel are applied also at the backside. Because the backside of handle is same as the foreside of handle, we can’t tell the foreside from the backside when the rubbers are attached on the head.

On the backside of head, the information on brand and company is printed at top, and the kind of artificial material and the name of series are printed at bottom.

The first announced three models ‘Foundation’ series are optimized for the offensive strategy by topspin. KTS is writing the speed sign ‘OFF’ for this kind of blades.

‘Foundation ALC’ (left) which is the outer ALC blade with Koto top layer is the most elastic among three models. ‘Foundation GF.K’ (middle) which is the outer glass fiber blade with Koto top layer provide moderate elasticity. ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ (right) which is also called as ‘Foundation Ebony’ is an inner glass fiber blade with Ebony top layer. ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is the least elastic among three. But, it provides greatly enhanced stability of very aggressive topspin

Glass fiber is the artificial material for two models – ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ (left) and ‘Foundation GF.K’ (right). Glass fiber seems to be the artificial material which is most preferred by KTS because it provides very natural hitting feeling. It is expected that more models with glass fiber will be launched by KTS in the future.

The constructions of ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ (left) and that of ‘Foundation GF.K’ (right) are noticeably different from each other. ‘Foundation GF.K’ has 5+2 ply outer construction with Koto top layer. But, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ has 5+2 ply inner construction with Ebony top layer. And, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is much thinner than ‘Foundation GF.K’.

‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ (left) is specialized blade for very aggressive topspin which aims at very early timing after bounce, while ‘Foundation GF.K’ is the blade for various kinds of strategies those are oriented by topspin. Both of those two provides high level of stability and controllability when used by entry level players, while providing higher power when compared with all-wood blades of similar elasticity levels.

‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ is a blade specialized for very aggressive topspin. It provides superb stability when the player aims at very early timing after the bounce of the ball because the blade deflects very easily while the hard top layer transmits the sensation of impact very directly and clearly. For keeping high level of controllability, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ focuses on generating the speed of the ball through the rubber’s ability rather than the elasticity of blade. Therefore, the rubbers whose performance is concentrating on spin are suitable for the combination with ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’, especially at its forehand side. The sticky rubbers including new hybrid rubbers are also recommended for the combination with with ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’. We can think that the characteristics of ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ inherits the characteristics of some 5-ply wood blades for aggressive topspin, for example Stiga ‘Offensive Classic’ or DHS ‘Hurricane King’. Although the elasticity level of ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ isn’t noticeably higher than those of that kind of 5-ply wood blades, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ can make more powerful ball because its energy efficient is relatively higher thanks to its artificial material. But, we can’t expect high speed when we hit the ball strongly at a large angle. Also, although it provides excellent stability, ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ will not be able to control the ball as precisely as other blades such as ‘Foundation GF.K’ can. It is necessary to understand this kind of characteristics well and use ‘Foundation GF.K Ebony Special’ according to its purpose. Very aggressive topspin attackers who always aim at early timing after the bounce will be satisfied with this blade.

Following are the performance indices of KTS Foundation GF.K Ebony Special (avg.weight = 86.2g) :

– Ep = 1.13

– Ec = 0.97 (Ec/Ep = 0.85)

– Vp = 0.94

– Vl = 1.06 (Vl/Vp = 1.12)

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

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