Head to head
Ashaway Dynamite Soft 17 vs Wilson Reaction 16
They split the measurements 3–3. The widest gap is ball bite, where Dynamite Soft 17 is 46 percentile points ahead. Every figure is a testing-machine result at a fixed reference tension.
Measured, side by side
Bars are percentile against all 791 strings, and the marked side is the one that measures better, which is not always the one you want. A firmer bed is worse for your elbow and better for your control, and no measurement knows which of those you came for.
Which one wins, by problem
Each string's standing on the site's rankings, out of every measured string in the database. This is where a comparison stops being arithmetic and starts being a decision.
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Dynamite Soft 17567th
Reaction 16664th
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Dynamite Soft 1795th
Reaction 16135th
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Dynamite Soft 17730th
Reaction 16706th
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Dynamite Soft 17166th
Reaction 16182nd
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Dynamite Soft 17321st
Reaction 16296th
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Dynamite Soft 17717th
Reaction 16655th
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Dynamite Soft 17183rd
Reaction 16192nd
Swapping between them: what tension?
Bed stiffness is published at one reference tension, so the only honest conversion is to scale it. These are starting points from 52 lb, not prescriptions. The calculator takes your own tension.
Coming from Dynamite Soft 17 at 52 lb
String Reaction 16 at 39.7 lb 18.0 kg
Coming from Reaction 16 at 52 lb
String Dynamite Soft 17 at 70.0 lb 31.8 kg
Clamped. The proportional answer was 70.2 lb, outside what most frames are rated for.
Hybrid: what if you used both?
Estimated, not measured. No hybrid combination has been tested as a bed. These figures are the two strings' own lab measurements weighted by how much of the bed each one actually is. Treat them as a guide to which way a pairing moves, never as lab data.
Dynamite Soft 17 mains / Reaction 16 crosses
Reaction 16 mains / Dynamite Soft 17 crosses
Which goes dead first?
Estimated from tension loss, which is the only thing the database measures about ageing. This is when the bed stops playing the way you strung it, not when the string breaks.
Dynamite Soft 17
~27 hours of play
Reaction 16
~28 hours of play
Both strings in full
| String | Gauge | Price | Stiff lb/in | Loss % | Power % | Spin | Bite COF | Friction COF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ashaway Dynamite Soft 17 Nylon/Zyex | 17 | find | 120 | 28 | 91 | 2.6 | 0.527 | 0.204 |
| Wilson Reaction 16 Nylon | 16 | find | 146 | 26 | 91 | 2.4 | 0.424 | 0.177 |
Add a third string Dynamite Soft 17 in full Reaction 16 in full