UPDATE MAY 2020: I actually really liked this premise; I’m sad to see that it’s no longer in production. This review for interchangeable riding crop tips remains as a reference for anyone who wants more information.
The Interchangeable Crop Top System is a Sportsheets product that includes a crop and three interchangeable crop tips. The crop is a total of about twenty-seven inches when the tip is attached, and the Real-Size pictures on the product page are accurate.
The packaging for this item is “holy my!” large. I was completely surprised when it came in the mail because it requires a very large box for shipping. The box is about three feet tall and about eight inches wide, but it displays the products nicely, and it is tasteful enough to give as a gift. It won’t be amazing for giving as a gift, but it is tasteful. The items come inside a plastic tray which slides out nicely to allow you to take out the crop and the tops. Again, this package is huge, so you’ll have to fold it to fit it in the trashcan (or proudly carry it outside with no trashbag to throw it away). I wouldn’t recommend keeping it for storage though, as it’s much, much larger than the product itself.
The tray itself includes those little electric-type ties that pull tight to keep the tie from loosening. This is a giant pain in the butt to remove to get your items out of the packaging. I ended up cutting myself with the scissors multiple times. On the back of the packaging, there is instructions for how to use the crop and exchange the tips, but it’s really self-explanatory, and most people will have absolutely no problem figuring out how to change the tips on their own.
The crop itself is a moderately-long crop. The crop is 21″ inches long, but it becomes about twenty-seven inches when a tip is inserted. The crop handle is covered in a slip-resistant material, and the tip of the crop as well as the base of the crop are made of metal which gives them a bit of a more “professional feel” to them. I almost feel like I’m holding a crop that would be used for horse training or something. The shaft of this crop is not flexible at all. At All. It stays completely straight, and because of this, it gives all of your tips a lot more of an “oomph” when used. It definitely ups the stinginess factor. The handle itself is long enough for most anyone’s hand, and this crop also includes a little hanging/wrist strap. The top portion of the wrist strap can be moved up to make the strap larger if you’d like, but I just use it for hanging the crop. Your wrist will fit though.
Something worth mentioning is that the rubber used for the handle and the wrist strap do have a slight scent to them. I wish I could identify the scent, but I can’t. It just smells like some sort of rubber to me. Cleaning it a couple of times with warm water and soap greatly made the smell go away, but it never was bothersome in the first place. It was just there.
The biggest flaw to this crop is that there’s metal near the tip. This can be very painful and dangerous for those who don’t know how to handle a crop. Metal just plain HURTS. The metal is, however, what keeps the tips attached to the crop. This could be, depending on your experience level, a sincere downfall though, as the metal makes up the entire body of the tip handle as well as the tip of the crop. If you are even off a little bit on aim, your partner could get a lot more pain than they bargained for – especially with a harder hit. With a harder hit with the metal portion, you could actually harm someone, so if you like being rough with crops, please, please make sure that you know how to aim before choosing this crop.
I was concerned that the tips would fly out of the handle during rough usage. I have had absolutely no problems with this, and I’m pretty rough on crops. In fact, I took this outside (near nothing breakable in the middle of a park), and swung it around like a madman trying to get each one of the tips to pop out. None of them did. As long as you push the tips in as far as they can go, there should be no issue. They’re also extremely easy to remove, so Sportsheets has a good system going on it. Judging by the “pop” noise the tips make when I remove them from the crop, I’d say that there’s some sort of air pressure that holds them in tightly.
Each one of the tips is unique, but they are about the same sans the shape. Each tip is made from layers of leather. Each one is a different color, and the layers of the leather on each one are stitched together with firm, well-done stitching. The leather is softened on each one. The tips of each crop are held onto the little metal shaft by tightly-wound thread along multiple places along the crop tip. This thread may deteriorate over time, but I sincerely doubt I will have any issues with it. None of our other crops have shown issues with this thread method in the past.
Each tip varies in terms of leather flexibility. The black wide tip is the most flexible as the edges of the crop aren’t sewn together. The purple one is the next most flexible as it has thinner layers of leather and has a wider surface area. The hand is the least flexible because it has a lot of layers of the leather and has a lot of stitching on it. The flexibility can made quite a bit of difference during use as well.
The Black Wide Tip crop is probably the one that most people will want to use the most. It is the least stingy because it isn’t as firm and doesn’t have as much stinging. It is most flexible, though, so if you hit with just the very tip, it can definitely be painful as the tip will come down with the help of gravity.
The Heart Tip is also stingy, but it is the middle-man between the most-stingy of the hand and the least-stingy of the Black Wide Tip. This one covers a wide surface area, and surprisingly, if you hit hard enough, this tip does cause a cute little heart on the surface of your lover’s skin.
The Hand Tip has a lot of stitching on it, and as such, it’s extremely firm and unflexible. This can lead to a lot of stinginess, so be prepared for that before you use it. This one is also the most thick in layers of leather. The handprint design doesn’t turn out nearly as well as the Heart tip design seems to when hitting the skin.
All three of these crop tips are very stingy. Most crops are very stingy, though, so this is something that I expected. However, this item is definitely not for someone who is just looking for a light-hearted way to hit their partner – these little crop tips can definitely hurt, and if used roughly enough, they can definitely leave marks on your partner as well. Each tip looks cute and offers a slightly different sensation, but the general sensation between all of the tips is “stingy”, so be aware of how hard the tips hit before you start hitting your partner with all of your strength. I would say that only advanced users should use this roughly because of the stinginess along with the metal piece that requires good aim.
For cleaning, leather (even the faux kind) dislikes soap, so wipe it down with a slightly damp washcloth. Because this material is porous, this item MUST be fluid-bonded. However, it comes with multiple tips. When you think about it, this lends itself amazingly to those who have multiple partners. After all, there’s one tip for Suzy, one for Brad, and one for Alicia. None of the partners are at risk of sharing anything because each tip goes to another partner. Get more partners? Just purchase more tips. It’s like a swinger/multiple partner person’s dream. Regardless, though, try to keep bodily fluids off the tips to avoid ruining the leather, and for storage, I recommend allowing the tips to lay flat where they won’t get squished, and the crop itself can be hung up for storage.
I like this crop. It works well for our purposes, but it’s definitely stingy. I also have to be very careful about aiming this one because of the metal pieces. However, I like the flexibility of being able to change the tip of the crop and how great this would work for those who have regular, multiple partners for safety’s sake. However, when it comes down to it, what makes a crop’s sensation is a mix between the length of the crop, the flexibility of the shaft, and the tip itself. This crop only controls the tip portion, so don’t expect too much of a differing sensation with each crop tip.
