I was contacted by the creators of a new high-performance finger top project on Kickstarter. It is called the Janus top and they sent me two free samples to review. Here is the link to the project:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1785985788/the-janus-top and here are some photos:
The main feature is that it has ceramic balls on both ends for spinning the normal way or upside-down. I often spin finger tops upside-down to increase the challenge, so this made sense.
The body is in two parts: the spindle, which can be aluminum, stainless steel, copper or brass, and the outside ring, which can be of the same metals except aluminum. So there are 4 x 3 = 12 possible combinations. I got a steel spindle with brass ring and a copper spindle also with brass ring. They weigh 22.0 gr and 24.7 gr respectively. I specially like the contrast between the colors of the spindle and ring on the first one.
I think the tops look very nice. As each top is made of 3 materials (spindle, ring and balls) they are more interesting than another Kickstarter top we discussed, the
ForeverSpin. Also, they have more material where it matters (but same height) and out-spin it by a lot. I got 6.5 minutes on my second try (on glass) with the steel spindle and got 2 minutes upside down after a few tries. They are long spinners but, as explained by one of the creators, they are not specifically designed for very long spin times (unlike the discontinued Quark).
As you would expect for something turned on a CNC lathe, they are perfectly well balanced. The grooves on the spindle could be rough on the fingers if you spin them a lot, but being circumferential they won't add air friction. The tops feel the right size for a finger top. The only change I would have suggested is to expose more the upper ball so the top can spin on it at a greater angle when it is dying.
Having two I could do some battling. On a concave base the battle doesn't last too long to be boring as the mutual friction kills the spin, while they circle each other. It works pretty well. However, a right-handed person against a left-handed one will usually end up in a long spin touching each other and a tie as the tops just share the spin.
As finger tops go, they are pretty unique. With only a few days into the campaign, the project is already well funded.