BallReviews
General Category => Miscellaneous => Topic started by: john178 on June 21, 2012, 01:10:06 PM
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What are some of the best bowling balls (any brand) for dry lanes ?
I'm a right hander and like to play the track area (15th board to gutter). My ball speed is generally between 13.5 and 14.5.
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Urethane all the way. New pieces are coming soon too.
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Since I am a hammer guy, I would have to go with the new blue for when they get really dry. But the Razyr is by far the best dry lane ball I have ever thrown.
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The new Columbia u2 sounds like a good piece. Resurgence core with urethane.
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Poppycock and horse manure on Urethane
UNLESS you are extremely rev dominant.
I am rev dominant but balls like the Blue/Green centaur, the Slingshot, the Recon Silver, Chainsaw (& SOS) and even the Tropical Breeze solid have all the control of the urethanes, with the exceptional hitting power of resin, except maybe the original Desperado, which does hit like resin.
So unless you are extremely rev dominant or the backends are 25 feet long and sanded, try a mild resin before trying urethanes.
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Poppycock and horse manure on Urethane
UNLESS you are extremely rev dominant.
I am rev dominant but balls like the Blue/Green centaur, the Slingshot, the Recon Silver, Chainsaw (& SOS) and even the Tropical Breeze solid have all the control of the urethanes, with the exceptional hitting power of resin, except maybe the original Desperado, which does hit like resin.
So unless you are extremely rev dominant or the backends are 25 feet long and sanded, try a mild resin before trying urethanes.
+1, some people are so quick to throw out urethane suggestions, when in actual practice 1/10 Bowlers should be using urethane. For most, urethane will flat 10 all day. Especially when going left to right (right handed) which is what most people do on dry Lanes.
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Poppycock and horse manure on Urethane
UNLESS you are extremely rev dominant.
I am rev dominant but balls like the Blue/Green centaur, the Slingshot, the Recon Silver, Chainsaw (& SOS) and even the Tropical Breeze solid have all the control of the urethanes, with the exceptional hitting power of resin, except maybe the original Desperado, which does hit like resin.
So unless you are extremely rev dominant or the backends are 25 feet long and sanded, try a mild resin before trying urethanes.
One of the better posts on BR this past month! Agreed...this dumbing down to urethane might make sense to a few but the able bowler can use lessor hooking resin equipment with better carry than using urethane.
To me using urethane with some speed straighter to get best angle might make sense for some. When 15 to the gutter is blown up ability by better bowler moving in using axis rotation with a lessor hooking orb also might make sense in more than one way. Depending on his/her bowling stats/technique.
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I forgot. I thought I was still in the 80's. What's urethane anyway? Learned to bowl with urethane. I remember when urethane used to hook a ton back then. Never had a problem with kicking out the 10. I am certainly not rev dominant. Maybe because I was able to control my speed and entry angle. Then with these resin balls like the first one out. I forgot the name of it but it changed the game. Oh yeah, the Excailbur. Then all of a sudden, what is a symmetrical ball versus asymmetrical? Then you got the particles. Then after that the soaker coverstocks. Then we have the changing of lane conditioners since resin, particle, and soakers burnt the lane up faster. Now we have resin that is like particle. I would rather bowl with urethane than the equipment out now. Place the cores that are in balls now into a urethane coverstock and screw resin. bring back some kind of integrity of the game that is barely still there. But everyone wants the 'hook in a box' instead of learning how to bowl the right way. Yeah, the heck with urethane. Thats just old school. I certainly need to get in the 21st century. I can't wait until we can use a remote control bowling ball in a sanction league. Can you imagine what that would be like? I wonder what kind of coverstock and cores would be in those. It would be like the old atari bowling game. I shot a lot of 300's with that. I also shot 300's with urethane and took me a helluva long time to shoot one with resin and particle. I left a lot of flat 10's with modern equipment and still do.
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I forgot. I thought I was still in the 80's. What's urethane anyway? Learned to bowl with urethane. I remember when urethane used to hook a ton back then. Never had a problem with kicking out the 10. I am certainly not rev dominant. Maybe because I was able to control my speed and entry angle. Then with these resin balls like the first one out. I forgot the name of it but it changed the game. Oh yeah, the Excailbur. Then all of a sudden, what is a symmetrical ball versus asymmetrical? Then you got the particles. Then after that the soaker coverstocks. Then we have the changing of lane conditioners since resin, particle, and soakers burnt the lane up faster. Now we have resin that is like particle. I would rather bowl with urethane than the equipment out now. Place the cores that are in balls now into a urethane coverstock and screw resin. bring back some kind of integrity of the game that is barely still there. But everyone wants the 'hook in a box' instead of learning how to bowl the right way. Yeah, the heck with urethane. Thats just old school. I certainly need to get in the 21st century. I can't wait until we can use a remote control bowling ball in a sanction league. Can you imagine what that would be like? I wonder what kind of coverstock and cores would be in those. It would be like the old atari bowling game. I shot a lot of 300's with that. I also shot 300's with urethane and took me a helluva long time to shoot one with resin and particle. I left a lot of flat 10's with modern equipment and still do.
Bowl the right way? You must mean hitting up on urethane to get it to hit, oh, ok.
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Okay, I will put a plug in for the Slingshot, but my Pearl Urethane Avalanche gets more action from me (call me weird). Here's why. I bowl a second shift league, and by games 2 and 3 they can get quite dry.
Both balls cover about the same amount of boards for me, but the Urethane Avalanche responds slower to the friction, so it's easier to control the last few feet before the pins. It seems to hit better than any of the solid urethane balls I've seen so far, but that is all depending on the bowler and their exact situation.
To each their own, but when used in the right situation, there is still a place for urethane in 2012.
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I learned to bowl with rubber and plastic, then graduated to urethane and beyond. Even then when the lanes were dry, I preferred to throw rubber or plastic instead of fight urethane when there's not enough oil.
Personally, I don't like urethane for dry lanes. Urethane is great when there is head oil and flying back ends because urethane doesn't over react to dry. But when the whole lane doesn't have much oil, urethane rolls way too early, forcing me to move way left which causes the urethane ball to burn up way too early and hit weak.
Urethane seems to work fine for the guys with high ball speed and lots of turn (and axis rotation and/or tilt). With that game, urethane actually makes it past 30 feet before doing it's thing. For the majority of us, there are better options.
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First and foremost charlest is the man, he is super knowledgeable and always gives great advice. The Lane #1 Chainsaw and Chainsaw SOS pack a tremendous amount of punch in the dry, hard to go wrong with either.
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charlest is dead on here....
Too many bowlers think that a dry lane ball is something that lets them stay parked in the same location and hit the pocket. You need to move your feet away from where you were.
If you throw urethane and stay in the track....the better bowlers will leave you in the dust.
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Solid urethane and pearl urethane are different animals... On toasty lanes I will bowl anyone with their reactive stuff.
You can move your feet, but eventually every bowler has the point where you can't get the ball to corner all the way back, and still carry. I can play where most people have vacated and stay clean, while you can strike, open, strike, washout...
Maybe I am the exception, but dry is dry, and most reactive balls lose their control at some point. It's not for everyone, but it has been a life saver for me on second shift league.
By the way, I have come to know and appreciate charlest, and I don't necessarily disagree with his assessment, but there simply is not one answer to this question that will fit everyone.
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Are we talking "dry" or "complete toast" where the front's are all the way gone?
This is a key point....
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Let's be honest here...with strip/oil combo machines how often do you REALLY see toast now? I'm sure it's a rarity, but what...once every 2 or 3 years? Even if the heads are burned I'll take a bet with my resin stuff. I'll keep moving left and adding tilt and let you shoot 186 with a double, 6 10 pins and a pocket 8/10.
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Russell,
Once again, I bowl second shift scratch league with a bunch of guys with lots of hand. The oil we start with is gone very fast! After moving 10-12 boards with my feet and at least 4-6 with my target, I'm ready for something that I can control better.
Not always do I need a pearl urethane, but when I do, it's in my locker. I have lots of tilt, decent revs, and plenty of rotation. Getting skid is not always the answer.
Every bowler that has a "human" rev rate goes left, left, left, and eventually loses their entry angle. All I am saying is it's really nice to have something DIFFERENT to go to.
This site is full of guys who make "blanket statements" when they are only speaking from their own experience. That's all. Blanket statements such as "this type of ball will never work" get under my skin a little. I've got 10 years in the pro shop business, and I've learned that bowling is something that all different styles can excel in as long as they can repeat shots.
Once again, charlest, you, and the others may be right on target for what you typically see. Maybe your advice suits the masses. I'm okay with that. Just don't try and tell me what I can or cannot do with what I am bowling on. I've already done it well, and turned some heads doing it. Thanks for your concern, though.
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If you're a serious bowler, Urethane is one option in your arsenal and worth trying. Having said that, Urethane is far too conditional for me these days and not worth carrying around unless you're bowling on beat up wood surfaces where you see high friction from front to back.
For me, the amount of oil on most conditions is too much to use Urethane especially where the heads are chopped up but there is still oil down lane.
In the past twelve years, I've used Urethane for a whole set maybe three times (excluding the Pete). I bring my various Urethane pieces for nostalgia purposes mostly and my results are usually disappointing.
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As others have already said, there are different definitions of dry. When I think dry, I am thinking plastic.
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Russell,
....
Once again, charlest, you, and the others may be right on target for what you typically see. Maybe your advice suits the masses. I'm okay with that. Just don't try and tell me what I can or cannot do with what I am bowling on. I've already done it well, and turned some heads doing it. Thanks for your concern, though.
Lane,
You know I'm not telling you what to do, and you know what and why I'm suggesting what I did.
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Are we talking "dry" or "complete toast" where the front's are all the way gone?
This is a key point....
No, of course, we're not talking "toast".
I've bowled (a euphemism, of course) on lanes where plastic rolled out at 35 feet.
That's a condition, where you take the manager and roll his head down the parking lot to show him what a "brickyard" house is.
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Urethane can be very useful, and you don't need to be rev dominant to make good use of urethane. However it is very conditions specific. Where urethane works best is when you can use it to stay outside on a short pattern, or very bad surface that is breaking down. If a shot is simply getting really deep, but there is still decent oil if you get inside fourth arrow, then the best play is a pearl resin ball like a Versa Max or even a Frantic. You can really make use of a skid snap layout on such a shot because you want strong recovery from playing a lot of head belly.
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I am new at this , been bowling for almost 35 yrs. and the best ball I've thrown is
the plastic taboo .
My ball speed is 14 mph rev rate might be 200.
2 inch pin located under bridge and cg kicked out just a little
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I'm still going to get the new Karma urethane!!! Karma core with a new urethane coverstock that was created from the activator base!! The Avalanche urethane pearl used a powerkoil 18 base, of course both without the reactive resin!!! Charlest, you'll probably see a Desperado type reaction!!
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Just a couple of added notes. First as indirectly pointed out, the new urethanes seem a bit different than the urethane we used pre 1992. For one thing, they soak up oil almost as fast as resin balls. I have had my natural baked twice, and the pro shop guys were both amazed at how much oil came out.
Also, try using your urethane as a spare ball. I am a good spare shooter who throws throws a spare ball at everything but double wood spares. I have improved my spare shooting since going from plastic to urethane. My kill shot with plastic would sometimes squirt and go dead straight, and other times grab just enough dry to hook on the back end. It made spares like 3-10 and 3-6-10 very tough. I find my urethane will make a small early move when I throw my kill shot, but is much more predictable.
I also won $1000 using the natural at a high roller sweeper last season on fresh oil
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Being that the ball speed is around 14 mph, it seems that a urethane coverstock is a good suggestion.
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What are some of the best bowling balls (any brand) for dry lanes ?
I'm a right hander and like to play the track area (15th board to gutter). My ball speed is generally between 13.5 and 14.5.
When you say dry are you meaning the ball is starting to hook off your hand or that what your currently throwing is just too aggressive for the line?
If it is hooking off your hand? Ball will not. Friction is friction even for plastic and you will likely have to give up playing this line unless you change the way your throw the ball. Your better option is to move in until you find more head oil and adjust to the shot that way. Your other option is to flatten the ball out. It will still hook off your hand but may be more controllable and still have some decent hitting power to TRY and carry.
If it is just that the equipment your using is hooking too much down lane, or a little sooner then desired, but not hooking off your hand. Simply adjust the surface of some of your current equipment to get a much more desired and usable reaction. You can also adjust your release to help keep the ball from going sideways as quickly on the lighter oil. With the limited information of the conditions everyone can only guess at what your talking about.
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Good information here. I want to thank everyone for your input.
I know that the Taboo Spare is polyester with the infamous gas mask core. How does it compare to the Slingshot, Tropical Heat, and some of the Urethane balls mentioned in this post ?
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Any polyester shell, regardless of the core, is going to be a little more squirty if it encounters some oil ( even carrydown ). Even on the driest conditions, there is still some oil here and there. Unless you have monster revs, neither polyester or urethane is going to hit if you try to hook the lane no matter how dry they are. Urethane will work best going down the boards and almost rolling out into the pocket. Plastic works better if you can find a little bit of oil to use for hold area and get the ball to release energy at the back end.