Rubber Review #19: MAGNES Red V Dual-Drive — Thumbs Down, Not That Good!
This installment of the Rubber Review series, a joint feature with the Mushroom Field Guide, covers MAGNES Red V Dual-Drive — not that good, thumbs down!
Test blade: Stiga Mantra Carbon
Quick Take
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Red V Dual-Drive (50 degrees) and Silver V Dual-Drive (47.5 degrees) are this year’s new additions to MAGNES’s Vega series. They borrow the term “Dual-Drive,” which, much like “hybrid,” is just plain-language marketing — both basically mean a slightly tacky non-Chinese rubber.
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As for hardness, the Red V Dual-Drive is naturally positioned for the forehand: 50 degrees, Max thickness (about 2.2mm), bare weight around 77g, and roughly 52-53g after cutting. It’s a heavy rubber, priced around 180 yuan.
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The surface is semi-tacky and the topsheet feels very smooth. The packaging is attractive. Expecting it to rival the Platinum V, I put it through some testing.
Playing Impressions
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On hardness: roughly equivalent to Hurricane 39-40 degrees, but overall it’s fairly thick and heavy, which makes it harder to drive through — you don’t get that metallic “ping” so easily.
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On feel: the feel is rather muffled and doughy, not crisp or clean. The slightly tacky surface gives good control, and the sponge is the ball-grabbing type rather than the hard-and-brittle type. Even though the hardness isn’t high, it’s harder to drive through than the DNA Dragon Grip, and it’s a feel I personally don’t care for.
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On spin: the Red V Dual-Drive’s tackiness is similar to the Platinum V and the Dragon Grip, but the sponge is doughier and grabs the ball more, so its spin lands somewhere between Hurricane and Platinum V — at a normal level.
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On speed: the tacky surface plus the doughy sponge mean the Red V Dual-Drive’s outgoing speed isn’t fast. It feels about as quick as the 729 Battle, and even after putting power in, the speed isn’t quite there. Among non-Chinese rubbers, its speed is on the medium-to-slow side.
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On arc and power: the arc is fairly long, and the rubber’s sense of power is close to the 39-40 degree Battle blue sponge — not especially top-tier.
Final Verdict
Paired with a fast-attack blade like the Mantra Carbon, the Red V Dual-Drive feels doughy and dead without power, and once you do put power in, the arc comes out long and flat while still being hard to drive through. Overall it’s pretty underwhelming.
It actually performs better on the backhand: flicks are very stable, it holds the ball well, and when you swing it out with power the quality is decent. But the rubber is just too thick and heavy, so playing with it on the backhand gets tiring and laborious.
If you want to give this line a try, I’d personally suggest the Silver V Dual-Drive (47.5 degrees) on the backhand — that should be pretty good. As for the Red V Dual-Drive, I don’t think it’s worth recommending.
PS: This article only reflects the author’s one-sided impressions. Thanks for reading and for taking it as a reference. Rubbers vary from piece to piece, and results also differ depending on the blade you pair them with. Comments and corrections are welcome.