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Author Topic: Drilling upside down  (Read 4431 times)

RealBowler

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Drilling upside down
« on: November 20, 2006, 08:45:08 AM »
Can a ball be drilled upside down?  Meaning, can you place the finger holes on the opposite side of the pin?

When looking at some of the AMF balls with the "bell" core, I see that some have the core "inverted" and some don't.  So it got me wondering if I had a symmetric ball, say the BVP Wizard, could I flip it over and drill it with the core "inverted"?

How bad would the weights be off?  I know balls have side weight and top weight, but do they also have bottom weight?

Just curious.
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JohnP

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Re: Drilling upside down
« Reply #1 on: November 20, 2006, 09:54:59 PM »
I'm assuming you mean flip the ball over and drill it with the cg on the bottom.  Now the "top weight" is bottom weight, and when you drill the ball you add 2 -3 oz more of bottom weight.  So if you start with a ball that had 3 oz top weight, you now have almost 6 oz of bottom weight.  Not a good idea.  --  JohnP

shelley

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Re: Drilling upside down
« Reply #2 on: November 21, 2006, 08:37:16 AM »
As John said, for first-quality balls, top weight becomes bottom weight.  You can mark the spot 180* from the pin, call it the anti-pin, and use that to lay the ball out with the existing CG.  You've just turned a 3" pin into a 10" pin, though.

That works real well with super-long-pin balls.  If you get an x-out with a 10" pin, flip it over, mark the anti-pin, and go to town.  But for first quality, it probably won't work unless the top weight is almost zero (which is going to be a blem anyway).

SH

RealBowler

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Re: Drilling upside down
« Reply #3 on: November 22, 2006, 11:10:40 AM »
Okay, so how much "bottom" weight does a ball typically have?

If you took a ball with a symmetric core that appears to be mounted in the center of the ball, like the AMF300 Venom (http://www.amf300.com/index.cfm?p=balls&bid=26), what is the difference between the top weight and bottom weight.

I know it probably has something to do with the weighting of the core - sorry, I've never seen just a core, so I don't know if they are heavier on top or bottom, etc.

I just thought I had seen stuff from Columbia/AMF/Track that had similar cores, but mounted "upside" down.....like the core in the Messenger Ti - I swear I've seen that core mounted both ways, but I can't remember the balls.
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Haywood

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signature. This is enough.
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JohnP

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Re: Drilling upside down
« Reply #4 on: November 22, 2006, 07:56:00 PM »
Top weight/bottom weight, positive/negative side weight, and finger/thumb weight are all differences in the weight of two halves of the ball.  For example, on an undrilled ball, place the true (not necessarily the marked, that's a discussion for another thread) center of gravity (cg) dead center on the top of the ball.  Now, come down to the equator of the ball and saw it it half.  If the top half weighs more than the bottom half, the ball has top weight equal to the difference in the weights.  If the bottom half weighs more than the top half, it has bottom weight.  So you don't have top and bottom weight in the same ball (unless you're a mathematician, then the top and bottom weights are the same absolute value but with different signs).  Of course, you don't actually cut the ball in half, you draw a line and use a balance (the most popular type is called a Kaufman balance) that compares the weight of the two halves and gives you the difference.

For a drilled ball, the grip center (gc) replaces the cg at the top of the ball to determine where to draw the line for top/bottom weight.  A line from the center of the bridge through the center of the thumb hole and continued around the ball (this is called the grip centerline) determines the two halves for positive and negative side weight.  Again, you don't have both but one or the other.  And a line perpendicular to the grip centerline through the gc (this line is called the grip midline) and continued all the way around the ball determines the two halves for finger/thumb weight.  I hope this helps clear things up for you.  --  JohnP

shelley

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Re: Drilling upside down
« Reply #5 on: November 22, 2006, 11:11:49 PM »
There have been several companies or ball lines that use the same core but inverted.  Dynothane's Element line, for example.  The first two Elements, the original and the AU79 put the flip block at the top with the core "hanging" under it while the newer ZR40 and NE10 put the flip block at the bottom with the core on top of it.  Same core, just inverted.

Top weight in an undrilled ball is, in a sense, a measure of how far the core is raised in the ball.  It doesn't necessarily have to do with how high the core "looks" or how "centered" it is.  For example, the Track Mutant looks like it would have bottom weight because there looks to be a significant amount of core towards the bottom of the ball.  But those pieces towards the bottom don't have to be made of the same material as the rest of the core, and they may, in fact, be lighter than the filler, adding weight to the top (I don't know, really, but it sounds good).  For the AU79 vs. the ZR40, the flip block may be of a different density in each ball to allow top weight to exist, even though the block is now on the bottom in the ZR40.

SH