I've had a few days to play with them, so I feel it's time to give a little write-up on them.
As far as the construction goes, these are really impressive. If you've ever checked out their gallery of
photos, you should have noticed how shiny and sleek they all look. They're pretty much a mirror finish. The connection does rotate, I know some people had asked about that before. As far as I can tell with a magnet, everything is made of aluminum except for the small bbs that are inside, which are steel. I'm honestly wondering how they make these, because from what I see the sticks are just 1 solid piece of aluminum, I don't see any seams or caps or anything like that, so I'm thinking maybe they just somehow got the connection in, put bbs inside and welded it shut and ground it so smooth they didn't leave any seam. Either way the chucks are extremely solid and durable. Even for aluminum I feel the only way I could dent these is by banging them on a metal post or something!
As far as the noise of them goes, it's way more intimidating than I could have expected. Most of the noise comes from the 4 bbs inside the chucks (2 in each stick) and the 2 rings that go around the chain. I had read somewhere that the rings didn't add much to the noise, but I disagree. I taped them down to the end of the chuck so they wouldn't move or make any noise, and they quieted down significantly. It seems like the rings make a lot more noise during things like wrist rolls, and the bbs make a lot more of the noise during things like strikes or bounces. Either way these are extremely loud, anyone in the house can probably hear these things when I swing them around XD With the flashy metal and all the noise they make, I think if you ever actually had to take these against someone, they wouldn't even get near you
The weight is, of course, heavier than most of the wood chucks I've been using. They feel heavier than my Woodall's cocobolos, but yet they spin easier. That's sort of a weird thing I'm feeling with them is that despite their weight, they sort of... lie to you about it and feel really light and smooth. I had an experience a few days after doing a wrist roll over my head, and they just dropped right out of my hand because I forgot how heavy they actually were XD. It's also noticeable when I would try aerials, as they would wrist roll like my zebrawood, but throwing them in the air they suddenly felt heavier than my cocobolos do. It's not really a complaint, it's certainly a very different chuck from what I've been using the last few years and obviously would need some technique adjustments. Doing wrist rolls with them feels really good, I can see why Chinese styles love the wrist roll so much XD
Overall I paid I believe it was $85 USD ($30 for the chucks, $35 for shipping, and $15 for engraving). The price is very high for a pair of chucks. $15 was to engrave a small chinese 7 into them, which seemed a little high for something small like that, seeing as they had to engrave their logo into the bottom anyways. Shipping was also expensive, but it came from China to the US, and it left their place and made it to my house in a little over 48 hours which is DAMN impressive. They can combine shipping on doubles for a discounted price, which is good. I'm on a budget so I opted to just order the one. Overall these nunchucks are in the Woodall's price range, and
I think it's fair to say that these are the Woodall's of metal chucks. I have seen they also make wood nunchucks, and I'm wondering how theirs compare to Woodall's.
I am still perfectly satisfied with these. It's great having a pair of chucks like these that are finally something new to play with after years of the same old stuff. I haven't tried them yet, but from what I've heard form other people, I'd imagine these are like the prochucks of metal nunchucks; something very different feeling, something actually new to play around with. Alex was also really great working with me and he replies to emails very quickly. Thanks again, Alex. I'm curious to hear what Levi and Uzumaki might have to say about them!
Edit: I forgot to mention he was nice enough to send a tassel with mine! Here's a picture of mine. I usually nickname all my chucks, and I'm trying to get the name "sevens" to stick, but I can't stop calling them "MY BABYS!" XD
