Wilson PSC 6.1 + Natural Gut/Syn Gut @ Cross Re-do

My last session of tennis was unusually gruelling.

That day, my partner was very well rested and well fed. From the first few hits, I knew he wanted some serious hitting. So, I picked my preferred weapon - the heavily leaded 370g+ PSC 6.1 with the NG/SG combo.

It was a cloudy, early morning. Cool and refreshing. But in less than 20 minutes of rallying, my shirt was completely soaked. Sweat was even dripping from my sleeves and there was plenty of droplets around the baseline.

As he stepped up the pace, I matched him and returned tit for tat! When he hit crosscourt corners, I drove the ball deep down the line with heavy topspin. When he dropped, I lobbed. We were totally spent after an hour.

Towards the latter half, I noticed a gradual drop in my racket's power and directional control. I attributed it to fatigue and continued using the racket.

But something about the stringbed just felt very very different! I got another partner to try it and the answer became apparent immediately!

The synthetic gut is dead!

It was easy to diagnose. I took the freshly strung RD7 (link) with only about an hour's worth of use as a benchmark. The RD7 fullbed synthetic gut was fresh, lively and very crisp. The stringbed was responsive. Pocketing was deep but rebounded fast and very consistently.

The PSC6.1's stringbed felt very flat, lifeless and low-powered. Ball contacts felt "murky" and mushy. It was like hitting with deflated tennis balls.  Rebounds from pocketing felt delayed and reluctant. Totally uncharacteristic of natural gut! Little wonder since I've used this for about 10 hours.

So?

After removing the crosses, I examined the natural gut carefully. Not much notching but it is very very dry. I read that coconut oil was used to lubricate the string during the manufacture process. 

So I took some and smeared it along the mains. After sitting for about 15min, I wiped the strings down with a clean piece of tissue.

Then I weaved the crosses with a fresh set of synthetic gut at only 28lbs. This tension was decided based on the frequency of the re-used mains.

I measured the racket's length and hoop width before and after cutting the old crosses, and also after re-doing the crosses. There was very little distortion. So far, I have been relying on this frame distortion as a gauge to select tension and it seems to be working very well.

Just bouncing a ball off the ground, I could already feel the breadth of new life in the strings. The deep and powerful pocketing of the gut surfaced again. The comfort, stability and total absence of vibrations is so addictive. And the crispness came back too!

Playtest:
- Yes! I think the re-done crosses worked very well.
- All the usual characteristics of the stringbed that were present in the previous stringjob came back - power, spin, control and comfort.