[Innova] The secret to choosing the right Destroyer

[Twmccoy]

There are actually some straight winged drivers that are very overstable. Stuff like the Max, XCaliber, and some variations of the Monster.

I think the highest PLH I've ever seen on a driver is the Nuke OS and Force. You can spot those two molds in a stack of discs easily just by noticing the very high PLH. And we all know how those two molds fly....

Frankly, I think a Nuke OS is just a Force with a wider rim.

 

[Lumberjack504]

Sure sure. I got that. From the 20 minute video that analyzes wing shape without once discussing PLH.

I agree PLH is king, if that's what you're getting at. Although I do have destroyers with higher PLH but a straighter wing than other destroyers, that fly less overstable than destroyers with lower PLH but a more concave wing (anecdotal, I know, but true nonetheless).

So...is it PLH or is it wing shape? I think it's a mixture of the two. At the end of the day you just have to throw the damn thing, but all of these traits that we can analyze hopefully help us handpick what we're looking for and maybe get us in the ballpark.

 

[PMantle]

So...is it PLH or is it wing shape? I think it's a mixture of the two.

Absolutely.

 

[ODRB]

Absolutely.

^ yup.

 

[Casey 1988]

I agree PLH is king, if that's what you're getting at. Although I do have destroyers with higher PLH but a straighter wing than other destroyers, that fly less overstable than destroyers with lower PLH but a more concave wing (anecdotal, I know, but true nonetheless).

So...is it PLH or is it wing shape? I think it's a mixture of the two. At the end of the day you just have to throw the damn thing, but all of these traits that we can analyze hopefully help us handpick what we're looking for and maybe get us in the ballpark.

Nope it is both of the ones you mention and dome height to why a Destroyer is flying the way it is. Dome height can be fixed on a disc by adding dome height or lowering the dome to get a disc to where you want it. Wing shape and PLH not really.

Plastic and the way that has cooled or is being run can also make a difference more so with Champion or G Star.

 

[XC_Eddy]

I am absolutely perplexed as to how people are not furious about this. What a ridiculous lack of quality control.

People like having options under the same cool name. Everyone wants to throw a destroyer. Not everyone wants their destroyer to do the same thing. People aren't mad because with the variance tons of people can find a destroyer that works well for them.

Wizards very greatly from run to run even within the same plastic type. The number of S's is meaningless. People defend this lack of quality control by saying that you've got many options to meet your preferences within one great mold. If you find a run you like, buy up a stack of those suckers.

 

[Casey 1988]

People like having options under the same cool name. Everyone wants to throw a destroyer. Not everyone wants their destroyer to do the same thing. People aren't mad because with the variance tons of people can find a destroyer that works well for them.

Wizards very greatly from run to run even within the same plastic type. The number of S's is meaningless. People defend this lack of quality control by saying that you've got many options to meet your preferences within one great mold. If you find a run you like, buy up a stack of those suckers.

This is why I never used Wizards as my main putter was trying for Wizard to be my long putter outside the circle but that never ever happened, mainly I was trying to use the approach G9i so that could have been part of the problem for me.

The Destroyer until recently did not have the issues of wing shape, that has usually been really consistent and the straight wing has made people including Pros turn to the Wraith as then the Destroyer is no longer a Destroyer mold and currently the Wraith has been molding up fine without the straight wing Wraith's have had in the past on occasion.

 

[XC_Eddy]

This is why I never used Wizards as my main putter was trying for Wizard to be my long putter outside the circle but that never ever happened, mainly I was trying to use the approach G9i so that could have been part of the problem for me.

The Destroyer until recently did not have the issues of wing shape, that has usually been really consistent and the straight wing has made people including Pros turn to the Wraith as then the Destroyer is no longer a Destroyer mold and currently the Wraith has been molding up fine without the straight wing Wraith's have had in the past on occasion.

Wizards are great, you are missing out. I've been using the same primary putter for 10 years. I'd love to get another old school wizard from the same era.

The destroyer is still made with the destroyer mold. The mold didn't change. Changes to the plastic itself and variances in the environment in which discs are produced lead to the inconsistencies between destroyers and other discs.

 

[cjman]

The destroyer is still made with the destroyer mold. The mold didn't change. Changes to the plastic itself and variances in the environment in which discs are produced lead to the inconsistencies between destroyers and other discs.

The video demonstrates, without any uncertainty, that different mold pieces are being used.
Your points, once presented by Dunapice, have been shown to not be the entire truth. Yes, there is variance in the final product due to cooling and plastic, but there's more.

 

[XC_Eddy]

The video demonstrates, without any uncertainty, that different mold pieces are being used.
Your points, once presented by Dunapice, have been shown to not be the entire truth. Yes, there is variance in the final product due to cooling and plastic, but there's more.

The video shows that there are two molds and probably have been for a while. Both had patent numbers on them that have been taken off. There were two grind distinct grind patterns where the patent number used to be. The creator of the video handled 50 destroyers and found either the 3 block or 4 block grind pattern on all of them, meaning that they all came from one of two molds.

I took this to mean that the mold itself has not changed, and there are two different mold sets being used to make destroyers, but that there are no discernable differences between the flights of the destroyers that come from each. The 3 block grind pattern mold and the 4 block grind pattern mold didn't show any correlation to flippy or beefy destroyers, or at least this video didn't demonstrate any. The only thing he demonstrated was a correlation between wing shape and flight shape.

He didn't go into any correlation between which mold the disc came from and how it flies. Nor did he look for a correlation between which mold the disc came from and wing shape. That's a different study that this guy or someone else with a decent sample size of destroyers will have to go into. Unfortunately, there's no way to tell on the pat # destroyers which mold it came from, so the study would have to be on newer ones that all have 1 of the 2 distinct grind block patterns.

This video demonstrates that two molds are being used to make destroyers, but does not prove that the mold has changed (which people have suggested). The old PFN destroyers likely came from the same two molds that the new ones do.

 

[PMantle]

I took this to mean that the mold itself has not changed, and there are two different mold sets being used to make destroyers, but that there are no discernable differences between the flights of the destroyers that come from each. The 3 block grind pattern mold and the 4 block grind pattern mold didn't show any correlation to flippy or beefy destroyers, or at least this video didn't demonstrate any. The only thing he demonstrated was a correlation between wing shape and flight shape.

He didn't go into any correlation between which mold the disc came from and how it flies. Nor did he look for a correlation between which mold the disc came from and wing shape. That's a different study that this guy or someone else with a decent sample size of destroyers will have to go into. Unfortunately, there's no way to tell on the pat # destroyers which mold it came from, so the study would have to be on newer ones that all have 1 of the 2 distinct grind block patterns.

.

I have only had one cup of coffee, but I am having trouble following you here.

 

[XC_Eddy]

I have only had one cup of coffee, but I am having trouble following you here.

Let me try again. Below are screenshots I took of this guys pictures. Both of them have distinct marks from where the patent number was ground off of the mold. There are two patterns of marks, both pictured below. The top one has 3 "blocks" that make up the pattern and the bottom one has 4 "blocks." By "block" I mean the continuous rectangular stretches where you can see that a grinder was used on the mold to remove the pat no. Someone removed the pat no in 3 grinds on one molds and 4 grinds in the other, thus producing 3 or 4 "blocks." This confirms that there are two different mold pieces being used to make destroyers.

So every destroyer, or at least the 50 this guy has, comes from one of these two molds. He looked at 50 no patent number destroyers and found one of the two grind patterns on all of them.

The video looked at wing shape. He found that Destroyers with a flat or convex wing fly straighter and that Destroyers with a curved concave wing fly more OS. You can use this information when buying a Destroyer to have a better idea of how it should fly.

The guy who made this video did not say anything about which mold his flat winged Destroyers or his curved winged Destroyers came from. He didn't say: "This yellow Ricky Destroyer has a convex wing and flies straighter. It came from the 3 block mold. My Pink Destroyer with a concave curved wing came from the 4 block mold and flies overstable."

What he did was look at wing shape and then compared how they fly. He said "Here is my Yellow Ricky Destroyer, it has a straight wing. It has some high speed turn and flies far." Then he took another Destroyer and said: "Here's my pink McBeth stamp Destroyer. It has a curved concave wing. Look, it flies super OS and doesn't go as far."

He didn't check to see if either of the two molds produce destroyers with a particular wing shape. He didn't say anything like: "Destroyers made in the 3 block mold have straight wings and Destroyers made in the 4 block mold have curved wings."

The block marks show that there are two different Destroyer molds. We do not have any evidence yet showing any significant differences between the Destroyers that come from the different molds. It's possible that there are, but this video didn't study that. He only looked at the wing shape and how that affected the disc's flight.

Hope my 2nd attempt at an explanation made more sense. Drink more coffee.

 

[PMantle]

Hope my 2nd attempt at an explanation made more sense. Drink more coffee.

Perfect. :clap:

 

[texasissouth]

A friend of mine found a freak 4x Destro at Dicks the other day. I thought normally the convex wing bottoms tend to be on the lighter weight, but this was a 175, 4x embossed bottom with a crazy convex wing like a VDestroyer. I didn't catch a glimpse of how many blocks the bottom had. It was not super HSS.

 

[jjmiller]

I currently have 4 Destroyers. The first two I ever bought in late 2013/early 2014, and two more from 2018.(both embossed) All were purchased brand new by me.

The first two are old AJ's that I got my first and second years playing. Both are marked 168. One is the most overstable Destroyer I've ever seen, and the other was the least overstable one I've ever seen out of the box. No surprise, the beefcake Destroyer has a substantially higher PLH. After watching that video, I checked- it also had a more convex wing. And each these two AJ's show exactly one and the other of those little "grind marks" from the video.

The two newer Destroyers I have are both about identical in PLH, wing "convexity" or whatever the correct term would be, and both marked 175 grams. They also happen to fly about identically, which is somewhere in between my two older ones. They share the same grind mark, which is the same as one of my older ones.

All this tells me, based on my small sample size, is that PLH definitely seems to correlate to overstability- as we've always thought- and so does the shape of the wing. But it seems that the particular "grind mark" doesn't have much to do with the others.

There's probably a lot more variation in each individual batch of discs run than the mold(s) they may be coming from.

Oh, and interesting tidbit- I have a new Barsby commemorative Scorpius that looks and flies just like my two newer Destroyers, AND has the same grind marks...

 

[XC_Eddy]

A friend of mine found a freak 4x Destro at Dicks the other day. I thought normally the convex wing bottoms tend to be on the lighter weight, but this was a 175, 4x embossed bottom with a crazy convex wing like a VDestroyer. I didn't catch a glimpse of how many blocks the bottom had. It was not super HSS.

Your friend's finding supports the wingshape theory then. It probably has a lower PLH than super beef destroyers, too.

I currently have 4 Destroyers. The first two I ever bought in late 2013/early 2014, and two more from 2018.(both embossed) All were purchased brand new by me.

The first two are old AJ's that I got my first and second years playing. Both are marked 168. One is the most overstable Destroyer I've ever seen, and the other was the least overstable one I've ever seen out of the box. No surprise, the beefcake Destroyer has a substantially higher PLH. After watching that video, I checked- it also had a more convex wing. And each these two AJ's show exactly one and the other of those little "grind marks" from the video.

The two newer Destroyers I have are both about identical in PLH, wing "convexity" or whatever the correct term would be, and both marked 175 grams. They also happen to fly about identically, which is somewhere in between my two older ones. They share the same grind mark, which is the same as one of my older ones.

All this tells me, based on my small sample size, is that PLH definitely seems to correlate to overstability- as we've always thought- and so does the shape of the wing. But it seems that the particular "grind mark" doesn't have much to do with the others.

There's probably a lot more variation in each individual batch of discs run than the mold(s) they may be coming from.

Oh, and interesting tidbit- I have a new Barsby commemorative Scorpius that looks and flies just like my two newer Destroyers, AND has the same grind marks...

Thanks for looking at a small sample size. I'm intrigued that your AJ's have different marks and fly completely differently. Do your two new Destroyers and your Scorpius share marks with your flippy AJ or overstable AJ?

Also, very cool note about the scorpius sharing the marks with destroyers. I still don't know what the difference between a Destroyer and a Scorpius is. Now we know for sure that they share at least one mold piece. I'd heard and read rumors that the Scorpius was the "old destroyer mold," assuming that they changed it at some point. That appears not to be the case.

 

[FretLessSlapMore]

Ive got a 2011 cfr star destroyer, thats 170g. So this was probably ran in between Avery 2 and 3 lines. its flat, os, gummy and slightly see through yellow star. What price range would an 8/10 one of these go for?

 

[cjman]

o.

The part of the mold that has/had the patents does not influence that shape of the wing or top of the disc. Those are 2 separate pieces, there are 3 independent mold pieces per disc.
I mention that there are clearly different core mold pieces being used to point out that over the years, there could be different wing and top mold pieces being used. Any combination of tops and wings could be paired with either core. Clearly, there are not a set of 3 pieces under lock and key that never are changed out.

There are distinctly different runs over the years that have wild differences. Not just an x out here and there that sticks out. Was it 2013 when 90% of destroyers were super OS with a PD2 style top. The next 2 years, the shape was more like a PD. The entire first year of swirly Wiggins have a straight, slanted rim like a Vulcan. Early days Destrulcans when Innova admittedly used the Vulcan top on a run of stock stamped Destroyers.

Would you be surprised to hear there is an L mold Destroyer that hasn't been openly presented (infinite discs having these produced as the Emporer?) I see this as similar to how there were Champ and Star Eagle Ls sent out without a stamp designating them as L. Recently, I've seen some Destroyers with a wing that resemble the Tern with a slight outward/convex bubble mid wing, totally unlike the common, desirable concave curve (think Firebird). I think it's too big a coincidence that I've only seen this style of shape or "cooling" since the Tern came out.

Mold pieces wear out and break. The Destroyer is a top seller. Getting new molds is a time consuming process, not having fresh Destroyers for a summer would be a costly issue. What if we got PD2 Destroyers because the Destroyer top was MIA and the PD2 top happened to be ready to press out beautiful OS monster Destroyers?

 

[Twmccoy]

Interesting thoughts. You could well be right. I've read so damn much about Destroyers lately that I'm starting to get sick of the whole thing. So many outlandish conspiracy theories out there.

All I know for sure is that the Destroyer has quite a bit of variation in looks and flight. You can literally pick up 5 Destroyers and have them all be uniquely different.

I'm done even trying to speculate what makes a Destroyer good (or not).

 

[jjmiller]

Thanks for looking at a small sample size. I'm intrigued that your AJ's have different marks and fly completely differently. Do your two new Destroyers and your Scorpius share marks with your flippy AJ or overstable AJ?

Also, very cool note about the scorpius sharing the marks with destroyers. I still don't know what the difference between a Destroyer and a Scorpius is. Now we know for sure that they share at least one mold piece. I'd heard and read rumors that the Scorpius was the "old destroyer mold," assuming that they changed it at some point. That appears not to be the case.

Had to check again- The two newer Destroyers and the Scorpius have the same "grind marks" as my older, super-beeftastic AJ Destroyer. The mellow AJ is the outlier of my four in regards to grind marks.

I've had probably 4-6 other Destroyers over the years, but never knew anything about those marks before. Probably not something I'll ever pay much attention to in the future, though. However, I would be interested to have a large sample size and see if PLH and the wing shape thing ALWAYS go together, like they do in the statistically insignificant sample size I have on hand...