Gen 4: Designed to Fail Probably, but Destined to Fail Absolutely

We have finally gotten an extensive look at Generation 4 paddles, or whatever you would call them. For the purpose of this post, we are assuming that they are conventionally cored paddles and not the foam designs being built by other companies. We believe that these foam designs are ironically destined to succeed, but that is a topic for another post.

These paddles are made by further compromising the core by cutting out areas near the bottom left and right corners and injecting them with a foam that looks like cheap epoxy or TPE. The former foam, which was either an EVA copolymer or something else, has been replaced with something close to Styrofoam. In x-rays, we have also found that many of these paddles from Joola's Generation 4 show signs of being filled in the core to the center. Taking them apart pretty much destroys evidence of this, as the foam is very fragile like Styrofoam and falls apart when deconstructed, but we do have x-ray evidence of this.

Either way, from an engineering perspective, these paddles are constitutionally less stable than Generation 3. By continuing to butcher the honeycomb core, they are simply exacerbating any problems that their previous generation had, if they had problems with construction. This brings up questions in our minds if this whole fiasco was maybe just a crypto recall by a very powerful company.

Either way, the fact that influencers are reviewing these after the company has failed multiple times is hilarious and an absolute sign of the disparity in the community. We do not want to do business with Chris Olsen anymore, and we mean that. If we wanted to send paddles to him, we would have inquired about it. We will not send paddles to him in the future, and we recommend that new paddle companies do not send them to him either. If you do send paddles, make financial arrangements in advance. Otherwise, don't bother. A man who brags about being screamed at by a manufacturer for an hour happens to be quite fragile. This is a trend among this type, and likely applies to the paddle we are discussing as well.