LKT Black Coffee Blade Review

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   got me 1 black coffee blade by LKT for one of my students 2 days ago. i was a bit curious upon seeing that it looked like an ebenholz 7. so i choose the 93.4 gm blade among its brothers because it was the lightest. the other black coffee blades were as heavy as 95gms. 

at first glance it looks like a fine quality blade and you would be fooled that it looks really like the stiga EB7. the handle is flared and wide the same measurements with that of the legend flared handle of most stiga blades. the blade head is bigger by a few mm than the stiga eb7. and the letters placed are KTL instead of LKT on the blade logo

the blade finish is above average chinese made blade. for its price $23, the blade head is lightly sealed like the eb7 but thinner. 

upon checking up the plies i noticed that the 3 inner plys are not the same wood to that of the eb7. the 3 plies of the black coffee have a smoother wood grain compared to the rougher wood grains in the eb7. you can't see it in the pic because of the camera quality.

now upon testing the rubber on the 1st day i placed slow rubbers like the old skyline 3 and super 729 fx super soft. hitting with both rubbers alternately on fh to fh and bh to bh was good. well, i was surprised it wasnt that slow since i thought its just another cheap chinese blade imitation. the blade itself even with 2 chinese rubbers (1 is lighter) is not heavy like that of the eb7. i cannot confirm until now if the black coffee is hollow on the handle. but when i was hitting the handle it made a solid sound. 

on the 2nd day i tested it with faster rubbers. fh = tin arc black max, bh = palio blitz red 2.0mm ....
it felt  heavy due to tha palio blitz but went on to test the rubbers. the palio blitz was fast on that blade. together with the blade it produced fast low to medium height loops. when i looped it with the tin arc it produced spinny lows with a medium arc on both fast and slow loops. blocking is good with the blade since you can feel the ball and you have good control. i would rate its speed as that of a regular clipper non-wrb. it is not as fast as the eb7 but still fast enough to do great attacks and the dwell time is good. 

i would recommend this to budget conscious players who are looking for a good alternative to the eb7, rw7 and clipper wood blades. it may not be as good as those blades but it is better than most 7 ply chinese blades like the 729 bomb or the yinhe uranus.. this is an intermediate to advanced level blade with very good control and helps a player add power on his shots while maintaining control