I used to be really good at yo-yos. Not as good as you see in the videos, but good enough that I could have competed in local state competitions. I didn’t, because back in the early 90s that wasn’t exactly something you heard about. I could do the Eiffel tower, split-the-atom (sometimes), and several other moderately difficult tricks. I have approximately 100 yo-yos in a box someplace. The Duncan professionals were my favorite. My finger and hand were all calloused. Towards the end I was working on mastering my offhand for dual yo-yoing, as well as the inside and outside loop so I can loop continously.
Nice that is called 2A yoyo now (as in, two of them). 1A is just one. I think they have offstring and other stuff too. You should get back into it! Get the Chinese Amazon special and make us proud!
1A is String tricks with one yoyo.
2A is Looping with two yoyos.
3A is string tricks with two yoyos.
4A is offstring, the yoyo comes off the string.
5A is freehand, the string is not tied to your finger.
I bought a couple of fancy yo-yos last year, including one that won’t come up unless you do a trick with the string. I just don’t have the patience anymore, and my hand can’t handle it for more than a couple of minutes. Still good for impressing the shit out of the kids, though. ;)
As the great warrior-poet Ice Cube once said, today was a good day.
We got a small stainless steel, a fancy bimetal, two delrin (one with a metal ring, so technically bi-plastic), two budget aluminums, and a plastic. Not sure I like the plastic one but the delrins are 👌
As a kid my life was a Dunkin Butterfly.
Oh noes @arrendek
Before Pedro Flores introduced the Filipino practice of looping the string (rather than tying it or otherwise fixing it) around the axel, the yo-yo had been known by a variety of different names: the bandalore in France, the quiz in England, the chucki (an Indian name) during an 18th-century popularity boom in Europe. Historians assume that the yo-yo was known as a yo-yo in Asian history, reaching back at least as far as 1000 B.C. in China. In Europe, archaeologists have found twin discs with fixed axels and images that seem to depict people playing with yo-yos as early as 500 B.C. in Greece. This ancient pedigree fuels the myth that the yo-yo is the second oldest toy in history.
😟
Sleeping is epidemic!
Whatever the history, looping the string over the axel enabled players to make the yo-yo “sleep” at full extension, which opened a new world of tricks and techniques to master, transforming the yo-yo from an object of curiosity that helped pass the time into a modern “skill toy.” Flores also introduced the first yo-yo competitions, which then powered the yo-yo wave ridden by Duncan and other emerging companies. In the modern yo-yo era, the technological challenge has been to produce yo-yos that “sleep” for longer periods. Before Flores, yo-yos didn’t really sleep at all. Early Duncan yo-yos, with the string looped around the wooden axel, would sleep for a few seconds. By the 1970s and 1980s, manufacturers were experimenting with different weight distributions and material densities to increase spin times; the axels were changed from wood to brass. By 1991 the American Yo-Yo Association recorded the longest “sleep” time at 51 seconds. Ten years later, in 2001, after the introduction of the ball-bearing trans-axel yo-yo, the AYYA record was more than 13 minutes. Eleven years later, in 2012, the new world record was set at 30 minutes and 28 seconds, using a specially designed yo-yo from the Hong Kong firm C3yoyodesign. These technological transformations in the nature of the yo-yo have profoundly changed the way in which people relate to them.
That object lessons series of essays is pretty sweet. And the books look interesting. Like the 33 1/3 series, but for things instead of albums.
I did some research and I got a Velocity. It’s the one with the little dials so you can adjust the space between the halves of the yo-yo. It’s supposed to be good to learn on and the dials let you take it from responsive to unresponsive.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LSNDQ6I/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=ATE49QNLVS035&psc=1
We’ll see how this goes.
Ooh I wish you had asked, I hated that one because it is neither responsive nor unresponsive but exists in an annoying analog in-between no mans zone.
It’s okay. I’m pretty sure I’m going to fool around with it for a week or two and stick in my shoebox of shame along with the harmonica, card tricks, and coin palming book.
I have literally a billion yoyos, let me send you a good one. Consider it payment a token of my appreciation for all your hard work on the forum, here.
LOL. Sure. Just keep in mind that I’m probably going to take a full week to ever do a bind.
That travelling yoyo show turned up at my brothers junior school and him and his friends were all into them for a bit and it always makes me chuckle when its on the Simpsons. Especially seeing the 4000 mile difference.
Guess what showed up in my mailbox today?
It’s gorgeous. Big shout-out to @wumpus! I can’t wait to drop this on my toes and put divots into the hardwood floor!
A classy guy like you deserves a classy yo-yo.
You’re a sleeper agent sent by Big Yo-Yo to infiltrate this community and brainwash us all!
Admit it!
Figured this was the best place to share this :)