Pro Tour Lead Tape — 16 g
€7.90
“A gram has no value in itself. It only has value somewhere.”
Lead tape is sold by weight, and weight alone does not say where it acts: the same two grams at two different points do not give two neighbouring setups. Inertia goes with the square of the distance to the axis — what a roll of lead tape is missing is not precision, it is the arithmetic that goes with it. That is in the sections below, figure by figure.
Four rolls of 4 g, 16 g in all, around 186 cm of tape. Count 11.63 cm per gram. Thin, high-density foil: it fits under the bumper guard or inside the hairpin without thickening the frame or interfering with the strings.
Lead is what you reach for once the setting is found. To look for it, use tuning putty — it sticks anywhere, comes off clean and lets you change your mind.
Quantity
What one gram changes, depending on where
Reference frame 310 g, balance 32.0 cm, swingweight 320, calculated with ΔSW = m(d−10)² — the formula we work with at the bench.
- 12 o'clock, at the tip — about 66 cm from the butt: +3.1 swingweight points per gram, +6.3 for two. Balance moves to 32.22 cm.
- 10 and 2 o'clock — about 62 cm: +2.7 per gram, +5.4 for two. Balance 32.19 cm.
- 3 and 9 o'clock — about 53 cm: +1.8 per gram, +3.7 for two. Balance 32.13 cm.
- The hairpin — about 44 cm: +1.2 per gram, +2.3 for two. Balance 32.08 cm.
- Top of the handle — about 22 cm: +0.1 per gram. Balance 31.94 cm.
- The butt — about 12 cm: +0.0 per gram. Balance 31.87 cm.
The same four grams are worth +12.5 swingweight points at the tip and 0.0 at the butt. At the butt they move the balance from 32.00 to 31.75 cm without touching inertia at all. That is not a weaker setting, it is a different one.
Where to put it, and what for
At 12 o'clock: swingweight — what the racquet opposes to being set in motion. At 3 and 9 o'clock: torsional stability on off-centre hits, for 1.8 swingweight points per gram against 3.1 at the tip. In the hairpin: a compromise, when you want mass without changing the behaviour much. Under the bumper guard, none of it shows. In the handle, lead has no useful effect left — two centimetres from the measuring axis, that is the putty's ground.
One limit worth knowing: adding mass makes a racquet more stable and slower. The right setting is the highest mass your stroke can carry without arriving late.
Applying it, and taking it off
Degrease the area with alcohol. Cut the length you want with scissors — 11.63 cm per gram — peel the liner and press firmly. The acrylic adhesive takes the shock and the vibration of a committed rally, and it comes off without a tool if you change your mind.
This is lead: keep it under the bumper guard or under a grip, wash your hands after handling it, and keep the rolls away from children.
Find the setting first, then fix it
Tuning putty looks for the setting, lead makes it permanent. Press putty where you are thinking of adding weight, go and hit with it, move it, hit again — then lay the same mass in lead, thin enough to disappear under the bumper guard. If you would rather not work it out by trial at all, the customisation service does it on your own frame: measured before, calculated, applied, measured after, and handed back in writing.