{"id":765,"date":"2009-12-18T13:48:09","date_gmt":"2009-12-18T18:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/?p=765"},"modified":"2013-11-21T20:32:04","modified_gmt":"2013-11-22T01:32:04","slug":"olson-reactor-2-curling-broom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/?p=765","title":{"rendered":"Olson Reactor 2 Curling Broom"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As a semi-serious curler I take pride in having good equipment, and one of the items that has gone through a lot of changes over the years is the broom. From corn husks and horsehair to various synthetic pads; push-brooms to swivel-heads, and getting lighter all the time &#8212; especially now with these carbon fibre shafts. I&#8217;ve used a lot of different push-brooms over the years, and I have to say that I like the new swivel-head ones a lot better, but I really only have experience with the Olson ones. I notice that a lot of players with swivel-head brooms tend to grab a club broom for throwing since the downside of the swivel action is a lack of stability when leaning on your broom. The Olson brooms fix this with a tension adjuster, so you can lock your head in a good position for sliding, and loosen it up for sweeping (or, like I do, just find a happy medium where it will move stiffly, giving enough stability for the throw while offering flexibility for the sweep). Plus with the fact that it&#8217;s really super light you can sweep so much faster, which really does seem to make a difference both to the rock and to the quality of the cardiovascular workout you get.<\/p>\n<p>In short, I love my Reactor 2, as you can surely tell by the fact that I just got my 3rd one in as many years.<br \/>\n<script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script> <!-- 468x60, created 7\/4\/08 --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display:inline-block;width:468px;height:60px\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-1468596978203595\" data-ad-slot=\"4685444840\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/script><br \/>\nYes, they <em>definitely <\/em>have a reliability problem. They&#8217;re one of the most popular high-end modern brooms at our club (due in large part to the choice selection at our <a href=\/?p=233>pro shop<\/a>). I play twice a week, so I see roughly 100 curlers on a regular basis, and I&#8217;d guess that maybe 30 of them have a Reactor 2. I have <strong>personally witnessed<\/strong> 5 of these brooms fail (including the 2 of my own I&#8217;ve been through). That is a <em>terrible <\/em>reliability record. For the most part, the point of failure has been the plastic connector between the brush head and the shaft, in fact, all but the broom I just turned in today failed that way. I had hopes when I got my new one this year that the problem was fixed because they changed that bit of plastic. It used to be a matt black piece, and this year the brooms are sporting a grey plastic bit that has a bit of marbling to the colour, so I was hopeful that they found a new (hopefully stronger) plastic compound to use. Unfortunately, the shaft (the <em>carbon fibre<\/em> shaft) cracked on me in less than 2 months &#8212; given the timeframe (and how little the broom has been through in that time) I suspect it may just be a manufacturing defect. They did replace it for me free-of-charge, so we&#8217;ll see how the new one holds up.<\/p>\n<p>It almost makes me wonder if curling is going down the hockey road. I remember as a kid playing hockey I had one stick. I only got a second when I got too tall for the first one. These days, my brother buys his in packs of 3 because they seem to break all the time (though the bigger kids sometimes fight with theirs and do all sorts of other uncouth things that wouldn&#8217;t be tolerated on a curling sheet). I don&#8217;t mind too much &#8212; even at $125 for the broom, if it&#8217;ll last 3 or 4 years the broom&#8217;s a pretty minor expense compared to the ice fees, and it is a considerable improvement over the old fibreglass brooms (which started to crack on me after about 10 years of use). Longevity could also be the cost of shaving a few hundred grams off.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As a semi-serious curler I take pride in having good equipment, and one of the items that has gone through a lot of changes over the years is the broom. From corn husks and horsehair to various synthetic pads; push-brooms to swivel-heads, and getting lighter all the time &#8212; especially now with these carbon fibre [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=765"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holypotato.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}