Cuesoul Armour 23g
DETAILS:
BRAND: Cuesoul
WEBSITE: https://www.cuesoul.com/
MODEL: Armour
WEIGHT REVIEWED: 23g
TUNGSTEN CONTENT: 90%
AVAILABLE WEIGHTS:
STEEL: 21g – 23g
SOFT TIP:
PRICE: £53
Review Date: 18th February 2017
I remember when I first seen these Cuesoul Armour darts a few months ago, I was very intrigued by the design and was also very happy to see some green darts lol. So I was certainly keen to try some and here we are 🙂 If you have not seen them before it is a dart with a tungsten core and an alloy sleeve that fits over and screws onto the tungsten core and the sleeve also has the stem built in. Its not an entirely new idea as I have something similar from the 1980’s but those did not have the stem incorporated into it. These are available in a range of 9 colours, I got the green and amber brown and the total weight including the flights is 23g.
The darts are beautifully packaged again from Cuesoul, there is an outer cardboard box and inside a very nice red alloy case with a dense foam insert holding the contents. Thoughtfully they have added a small yellow ribbon to help in removing the darts, a nice touch 🙂 As I said above there is 2 sets of sleeves the amber brown and the green which is already screwed onto the tungsten body, some spare springs which go inside the sleeve and 2 sets of standard flights matching the colours of the sleeves and some flight protectors.
The design of the set up is a straight barrel type and the tungsten body has a tapered nose with some diamond shapes cut into it. The grip on the tungsten part is a thin cut ring grip which is fairly deeply grooved then the alloy sleeve echos that grip in two main areas, although not as grippy, and it also has smooth sections and two distinct bands with what it says on the box are air convection holes. The part where the stem slopes has a kind of micro grip.
Although I mentioned above about some similar darts I have from the 1980’s nevertheless the concept for these is still quite unique. It certainly appeals to my nature of liking things that are a bit different and overall its a very fun dart.
With my front grip they felt rather nicely balanced which I was not expecting as its quite long even though the stem section is short the equivalent barrel length is far longer than I would normally expect. I thought they would be fishtailing like crazy but the exact opposite was true they were actually very stable and smooth through the air which was a nice surprise. I enjoy throwing these overall, I think partly becuase they are so stable and partly for the novelty/fun factor.
So now to some obvious problems. Firstly the sleeves are alloy and after playing they will and have got marked a little too easily, not excessively so at present but in time they will be worse and wont look as great as they do now but that happens with any dart I guess. Secondly as the stem is incorporated into the sleeve its possible you will get a robin hood that could damage it like ordinary alloy stems but having said that it is shaped in such a way that is seems to minimize the points potential for digging in and bending the tangs. I have tried doing it quite hard by hand and the point just glides over, so it still remains to be seen how durable it will be until I get a genuine robin hood.
But the fact you can or should be able to replace the sleeves and have any colour option you choose is a nice idea.
The concept of the replaceable sleeves is not only good for people who may want different coloured set ups but they could possible have different types of grip also although unless they can make different shapes it will always be in a straight barrel design.
Now to a problem that may or may not be unique to me. When throwing the darts I often find the sleeves coming loose, it could be the same for others or it could be the way I kind of turn the darts in my grip when throwing at release but even so they would come lose just through the contact with ones in the board or when pulling them out the board. I feel that is a problem that can get annoying quickly and probably some more thought should have been put into it in finding a solution. A rubber O-ring around the tungsten thread may have worked, I think the spring is not really doing enough to hold it tight. My solution has been to apply some plumbers tape around the thread and that has made a big difference and they have not come loose so far.
One last thing is I noticed when the darts land in the board there is a slight ping noise, I dont think it shows on the video but I can hear it, was not really annoying but thought I would mention it, may its the spring inside?
So other than a few issues I think the darts themselves look awesome, especially in green! 🙂 The quality is overall very good but they fly really well and now I have sorted the working loose issue I think I will probably be throwing them much more.
A nice idea and great fun but may be not a dart for everyone which is understandable due to its uniqueness.
RATINGS:
LOOKS: 10
GRIP: 6
WEIGHT MATCH: 9
QUALITY: 7
VALUE: 7