BallReviews
General Category => Miscellaneous => Topic started by: Jesse James on September 29, 2017, 07:57:53 PM
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I live in the DC, MD, VA, area.....affectionately called the DMV! We are transitioning into our fall season and some wild stuff has been happening. Talked to my best friend this morning and he told me he had to change out a ball in his bag before going bowling, because it just cracked on him, the entire circumference of the ball!!
It was a Black Ops- Global ball. then I spoke with another friend and he said the very same thing happened to him. He had a Radical Ridiculous crack, and a DV8 Grudge crack all the way around.
So I go to my car, and.......amazing.....my Brunswick Vintage LT-48 cracked from the thumbhole, all the way around the ball, too!
Only thing that I can say is....the extreme variance in temps right now is creating these cracks. We are very hot in the midday, like mid 80's to low 90's, but then at night it drops down to about 50-60 degrees, kind of chilly and the balls can't keep up with the core expansion rates!!
A rare but wild occurrence to say the least!
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I live in the DC, MD, VA, area.....affectionately called the DMV! We are transitioning into our fall season and some wild stuff has been happening. Talked to my best friend this morning and he told me he had to change out a ball in his bag before going bowling, because it just cracked on him, the entire circumference of the ball!!
It was a Black Ops- Global ball. then I spoke with another friend and he said the very same thing happened to him. He had a Radical Ridiculous crack, and a DV8 Grudge crack all the way around.
So I go to my car, and.......amazing.....my Brunswick Vintage LT-48 cracked from the thumbhole, all the way around the ball, too!
Only thing that I can say is....the extreme variance in temps right now is creating these cracks. We are very hot in the midday, like mid 80's to low 90's, but then at night it drops down to about 50-60 degrees, kind of chilly and the balls can't keep up with the core expansion rates!!
A rare but wild occurrence to say the least!
I bet humidity changes are an even more likely culprit than temperature. Here in Sonora land 40 degree temperature changes in a day aren't that uncommon (especially in the sun) and only had one ball crack due to being stored in a hot garage for five years.
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I'd have to agree, Jesse. Temperature fluctuations of 50 to 90 degrees is not likely the culprit; as here in NJ, it's more likely that PLUS extreme fluctuations in humidity (here it will also go from 40/45% during the day to as much as 90% at night.
Best suggestion I can make is to bring the balls into the garage, at least, if not into the house or the basement overnight. Like storing balls at home, it is best to keep them in the plastic bag in which they came, inside the box. That will at least shield them from humidity changes, but not temperature changes.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
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Crazy stuff...
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Balls cracking does seem sadly to be one of those rare random events that sucks but is nearly impossible to prevent completely. Most pro shops even have had balls crack on display. Sometimes there is bad batches and not much you can do about it but hope it cracks under warranty (long live 3 year on Hammers stuff). I only have one ball really that is nearly irreplaceable if it cracks (although Red Razor hard to find these days too) and it is the one ball with most legendary reputation for cracking (EPX T1). Knock on wood.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
In the current (October) issue of BJI, there's a round table summary of 3 dfferent bowling technical people suggesting ways of preventing cracking.
Hank Boomershine of Roto-Grip/Storm strongly suggested my idea: keeping balls in their original plastic bags. He has an experiment running: storing balls on wooden and metal racks. He suggests that the wooden racks draw the water from balls allowing them to crack, while metal does not.
Check it out.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
Red Alert came out in like 97...
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
In the current (October) issue of BJI, there's a round table summary of 3 dfferent bowling technical people suggesting ways of preventing cracking.
Hank Boomershine of Roto-Grip/Storm strongly suggested my idea: keeping balls in their original plastic bags. He has an experiment running: storing balls on wooden and metal racks. He suggests that the wooden racks draw the water from balls allowing them to crack, while metal does not.
Check it out.
The problem with keeping balls in plastic is it becomes a pain if use them even semi-frequently. If I had to guess I would say its probably better to throw a ball once a month if possible than keep in plastic. That said I have started storing some of my old urethane in plastic in ball boxes with a wash cloth folded up on the bottom in the garage. Store a lot of my urethane on ball cups on a wooden Ikea floor shelf dealy in our bedroom closet (big luckily, edge to wife picking house lol) but also store my balls in a couple of ball totes one on floor and one on another Ikea floor shelf. May not be good to store balls in totes and ball bags but I rotate them often and being a ball junkie store balls where I can lol.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
In the current (October) issue of BJI, there's a round table summary of 3 dfferent bowling technical people suggesting ways of preventing cracking.
Hank Boomershine of Roto-Grip/Storm strongly suggested my idea: keeping balls in their original plastic bags. He has an experiment running: storing balls on wooden and metal racks. He suggests that the wooden racks draw the water from balls allowing them to crack, while metal does not.
Check it out.
The problem with keeping balls in plastic is it becomes a pain if use them even semi-frequently. If I had to guess I would say its probably better to throw a ball once a month if possible than keep in plastic. That said I have started storing some of my old urethane in plastic in ball boxes with a wash cloth folded up on the bottom in the garage. Store a lot of my urethane on ball cups on a wooden Ikea floor shelf dealy in our bedroom closet (big luckily, edge to wife picking house lol) but also store my balls in a couple of ball totes one on floor and one on another Ikea floor shelf. May not be good to store balls in totes and ball bags but I rotate them often and being a ball junkie store balls where I can lol.
I only store the ones not in rotation in the original plastic bags in their original boxes. The ones in occasional rotation I keep in ball cups on wooden shelves; a few (3-6) I keep on an old rug in front of the wooden shelves. The ones in my bag I bring indoors and keep in my office near the garage door on the 1st floor of the house.
I've had 2 balls crack out of about 175 - 200 balls, for the 25 years or so that I have used this system. One cracked all the way around (A Sensor/C; it had sat in one place for about 8 years, untouched.) and one cracked around the finger holes.
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Heat and humidity changes, I can understand. I had a C300 Scout with about 15 games on it. Needed room in my bag, so I put the Scout in the closet. It was a walk-in closet and the door wasn't closed, so it was the same temperature as the rest of the house. 2 days later, the ball cracked.
WOW! Just wow! Gotta have something to do with the newer chemical compositions of the covers as well, since these were all newer balls.
And yet, I have a Brunswick Red Alert, that I've had re-drilled twice, in the same bag, and it does not even have cracks around the finger holes!! I bought that ball in 1992!!
Go figure.
In the current (October) issue of BJI, there's a round table summary of 3 dfferent bowling technical people suggesting ways of preventing cracking.
Hank Boomershine of Roto-Grip/Storm strongly suggested my idea: keeping balls in their original plastic bags. He has an experiment running: storing balls on wooden and metal racks. He suggests that the wooden racks draw the water from balls allowing them to crack, while metal does not.
Check it out.
The problem with keeping balls in plastic is it becomes a pain if use them even semi-frequently. If I had to guess I would say its probably better to throw a ball once a month if possible than keep in plastic. That said I have started storing some of my old urethane in plastic in ball boxes with a wash cloth folded up on the bottom in the garage. Store a lot of my urethane on ball cups on a wooden Ikea floor shelf dealy in our bedroom closet (big luckily, edge to wife picking house lol) but also store my balls in a couple of ball totes one on floor and one on another Ikea floor shelf. May not be good to store balls in totes and ball bags but I rotate them often and being a ball junkie store balls where I can lol.
I only store the ones not in rotation in the original plastic bags in their original boxes. The ones in occasional rotation I keep in ball cups on wooden shelves; a few (3-6) I keep on an old rug in front of the wooden shelves. The ones in my bag I bring indoors and keep in my office near the garage door on the 1st floor of the house.
I've had 2 balls crack out of about 175 - 200 balls, for the 25 years or so that I have used this system. One cracked all the way around (A Sensor/C; it had sat in one place for about 8 years, untouched.) and one cracked around the finger holes.
Yeah I am only up to about 20 myself so sure over time more and more are going into plastic bags as already hitting point where can't throw everything often. Agree probably the single biggest thing you can do to avoid cracking is not leaving balls out in your car for any amount of time. In general though also would recommend to most people if have to keep balls in garage to keep polyester and 2 piece urethane out in garage first as they are less likely to crack.
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I've also been lucky where I've only had like 3 or 4 crack on me of the many many balls I've owned throughout the years (with the normal temps and rotation).
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Had my Hustle Pro crack on me while I was bowling with it. It hadn't been hot or cold for several days. Ball had been in the house before I took it to get some practice. Had bowled with it the week before and at least every other week during league seasons.
The crack went from the thumb a quarter of the way around away from the fingers.
My son had two crack on him that he didn't use that much, old Shout and his Sky Rocket. Storm products don't do well in our house for some unknown reason. Unfortunately, it's what both my son and I throw. Really sucks.
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I think it was GTGT that suggested keeping balls inside an airtight plastic bag while stored inside your roller. This should alleviate cracking.
(oops looks like someone already suggested that..)
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I personally believe it is a humidity issue. Why.....because here in Florida, we keep our house at a constant 78 degrees during the hot months which is most of the time, yet on certain days the house feels warmer than other days. I check and it always states 78 degrees.
As a result I have 17 balls crack all the way around the ball since 2013. I keep them in plastic bags and rotate them every 30 days. Frankly, based on my experience I don't think any of that effort amounts to a hill of beans but if you believe otherwise, I respect your beliefs.
Nine 900 Global/AMF, Six Storm/Roto, One Columbia 300, and One Motiv.
I was completely surprised when I found my Chronic Paranoia drilled in March 2017 completely cracked in July 2017 as I have never personally heard of a Motiv ball cracking outside of the original Tag. Motiv honored under the 1 year warranty.
The real kicker for me was a AMF "Unreal" purchased on closeout & drilled in May 2017, yet I was not in a position to throw it until August 2017 when I discovered it was completely cracked from thumb all the way around to the ring finger.
Damn, I will always wonder what that ball might have been, but I'll never know.
I always believed a ball increased in diameter from humidity until the pressure cracked the cover stock. Yet, my PSO tells me it is the opposite. Balls actually
shrink which results in a ball cracking. He showed me a number of balls which he put his Pro Sect on and they were smaller & out of round. I'm not an expert, so I can't dispute.
Either way, the modern bowling ball is costing me much more than I would prefer. But as the old saying goes, life is to be enjoyed and you can't take the money with you.
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Anybody ever seen a urethane ball especially 2 piece crack except perhaps around the fingers?
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Had my Hustle Pro crack on me while I was bowling with it. It hadn't been hot or cold for several days. Ball had been in the house before I took it to get some practice. Had bowled with it the week before and at least every other week during league seasons.
The crack went from the thumb a quarter of the way around away from the fingers.
My son had two crack on him that he didn't use that much, old Shout and his Sky Rocket. Storm products don't do well in our house for some unknown reason. Unfortunately, it's what both my son and I throw. Really sucks.
There are other reasons besides rapid changes in temperature and humidity, that can cause balls to crack, including bad pours and bad curing at the factory. There are mistakes that the driller does, like drilling with dull drill bits, drilling too fast, putting the pin too close to holes, not beveling all holes, using too much crazy glue, among others.
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Anybody ever seen a urethane ball especially 2 piece crack except perhaps around the fingers?
Unfortunately yes. I had a Storm Thunderflash crack around the entire circumference while sitting on my ball rack. I think it is more rare, but it can happen.
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Anybody ever seen a urethane ball especially 2 piece crack except perhaps around the fingers?
Unfortunately yes. I had a Storm Thunderflash crack around the entire circumference while sitting on my ball rack. I think it is more rare, but it can happen.
I doubt it has anything to with the actual coverstock's make-up, but more to do with their being 3 different materials, subject to expansion and contraction, at different rates: core, filler and coverstock.
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Have you ever weighed a ball right after you drill it and then again about a year later? Usually a loss of up to 5 or 6 ounces. What happens when people lose weight: they shrink and wrinkle. I think all balls shrink and some just crack from inherent coverstock weakness.
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I know one thing for certain! You NEVER place a ball on a concrete floor without some kind of cup or pad underneath it.
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If you are leaving your balls in your car and it is parked outside, you begging for them to crack.
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I know one thing for certain! You NEVER place a ball on a concrete floor without some kind of cup or pad underneath it.
I have been placing several balls on used rug on the concrete floor of my basement for 20+ years now. I guess the rug insulates them from the effects/influence of the concrete.
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Is that so Jeff? That's good information to know, you learn something new every day.
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Is that so Jeff? That's good information to know, you learn something new every day.
The fact of their sitting there, yes; the guess, as to why, is a sheer guess.
FYI I do have a dehumidifier running almost constantly in the basement; it keeps the humidity within a range of 50 - 65%, rather narrow as things go theses days. That might mitigate the balls sitting on the rug. They do sit there for months at a time.
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Thanks for clarifying.
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Switch to 2 piece Lane Masters , I have balls that are 10 years + old no cracking !