For StuartA, Earl Weiss, Kacey & any others who use a board holding "machine" in breaking. (I assumed Kacey does as it seems to be more of an ITF-style thing). Do you make them yourselves, or can you buy them somewhere? How many boards can can hold? What's the usual minimum number of boards you'll hold before saying, "ok, time for the holder?" (eg. At 4 boards do you say, "it's time?") What are the advantages & disadvantages of these holders?
We use board holders (as oppsoed to people) as it makes things equal. those these days you can buy some types of holders, they are expensive and usually have to be wall mounted, so we usually make them ourselves out of wood.
As for how many boards they can hold, it varies depending on how its built. Our adult holder can hold 4 boards, however, in the UK nearly everyone uses rebreakable boards, which even the standard ones are harder than wood to break, as they have only one grain and are usually denser. So 4 breakable boards is probibly equal to 6 wood (pirana pine).
Depending on where you buy the rebreakable boards (as it varies widly these days), we also use black and red boards. in "ye old days2 a black board was the equal of 2 cream/standard boards and a red board was the equal of 3. these days however many companies produce them and have ignored the old standards to make them the equivilant of belt colours, meaning a red board is often easier than black etc. Though we still work on the old criteria and try to ensure the boards we get follow that. So, theoretically, our main breaking holder could hold the equivilant of:
6 pine boards (11 x 11 inch by 1 inch thick)
or
4 Cream boards
or
4 black boards (ie. the equivilant of 8 cream or 12 pine)
or
4 red boards ((ie. the equivilant of 12 cream or 16 pine)
For demo's in the past we have used wood, purely as it looks good athetically and we dont have to carry breaking holders around, for gradings we use a holder so its equal, with cream boards for under 16's, black board for kup grade adults and 1 black, 1 cream for dan gradings, and 1 black for jumping techniques. Oh, we also have a junior holder.
Stuart
Not the best pcture in the world, but you can see the holder. Its raised for the jumping turning kick technique required for those attempting 2nd dan.
junior holder - we use the block/steps to adjust the height for bigger kids (and sometimes small adults)
