Wondering if anyone knows how much it costs to oil one lane with a 40 foot long house pattern using Kegel Fire and/or Ice conditioner.  Have bowled 3 different centers so far starting this winter and all 3 featured short/lightly oiled patterns.  I was told that the centers are just trying to save a little money.

Most Kegel patterns use 40 or 50ml. Our house uses Stone Street, 42 ft 50ml.

the people that I bowl with, MOST prefer how the lanes are right now. Short and low volume, they have spoken. Some have threatened to leave the house if management didn't do anything about the 40 footer, but I doubt they would have left because the closest house that's privately owned puts down more length and volume to last 5 to 6 games.

I don't mind the "dry" because that's my weakest part of my game. but, I would pay to have our lanes re-oiled before our second shift.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Nobody wants to hear it, but bowling balls are WAY too strong.

 You can put a 42ft, heavy oil condition out, and three people with low grit, "high performance" balls can blow it up in a game or so.

 It isn't an oil/conditioner problem. I can remember a time when we used 1/2 the oil used these days, yet it would last all night.

 The oils these days are really great, much better than anything we had back then, yet today's bowling balls blow it to bits in nothing flat.

 It isn't an oil problem. The oils just fine.

this is true. I can start the night with the likes of a Jackal, Crux, or Guru. But then, I have nowhere to go once I've eaten a hole through the center of the pattern. So instead, I start with a Venom Shock and leave myself room to move left or go to the Redline once I can't carry the corners. But the problem is the hook monsters that do the "work" for you. Yet leave you stranded by the 2nd game.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Nobody wants to hear it, but bowling balls are WAY too strong.

 You can put a 42ft, heavy oil condition out, and three people with low grit, "high performance" balls can blow it up in a game or so.

 It isn't an oil/conditioner problem. I can remember a time when we used 1/2 the oil used these days, yet it would last all night.

 The oils these days are really great, much better than anything we had back then, yet today's bowling balls blow it to bits in nothing flat.

 It isn't an oil problem. The oils just fine.

In theory I agree.  I feel this is the case for most people.  However, I do know my center is tough where even weak equipment is too much.  I am currently playing inside of 15 with a Motiv QZ2.  We have a lefty throwing a Turbo urethane. 

But I agree, the balls today are very strong.  I have not thrown a "high performance" ball since the Rhino Pros from the early 90s.

The difference in cost between high volume and low volume is minimal, but it costs way more than $1 lane to run lanes.

Oil
Cleaner
Cloth
Machine maintenance
Batteries @ about $600/year
The machine itself. New Flexes are $35k. Cheap machines these days are $25k.
Labor

On top of all that the great majority of league bowlers would rather have the lanes on the drier side. The vocal minority is the group that wants more oil on the lane.

I can agree with all but the labor. The individual that is oiling the lanes is getting paid regardless if they are oiling the lanes or standing at the counter with there face buried in there cell phone.
We bowl second shift and we have our house strip and oil before we bowl. They charge us an extra .10 per bowler per night to do this. Twelve 3 person teams so they get an extra $129.00 a season from our league.

According to a 2014 jayhawk price list

A 5 Gallon jug of Kegel Ice or Fire Lane conditioner is $245.00

okay If I figured it right.

5 gallons is 18927 milliliters.
say 30 milliliters per lane.

That would be about 631 lanes worth, for a 32 lane house that would be about a 20 day supply, if they just oiled once a day with that amount of oil each day.

$245 / 631 lanes would be about .40 cents per lane. for just the oil.

that wouldn't factor in the other overhead like labor, power usage, waste, clean up etc.

Here are prices for all lane machine products needed:

Oil - $215 - $220 for 5 gallons
Cleaner - $80.00 for 5 gallons (usually a 5:1 ratio +/-)
Machine Cloth - $85.00 for 4 rolls

Depending on your distributor there may be freight charges, BUT most good distributors have a dollar value to get free freight. 


On another post regarding oil volumes (poster said kegel patterns) the 50 is the pump not the volume of oil.  The highest volume (looking quickly) I saw was the 2013 USBC masters which had 30.30 for 39ft.  Most house shots will have somewhere in the neighborhood of 18-24 for 38-40 feet.

As stated before there's alot of people out there using ball WAY too aggresive for the pattern.  And of course you have the outside boards with little to no volume on them.

Not oiling is NOT saving you tons of money.  We oil our lanes everyday (sometimes twice) 364 days per year, no exceptions.  Also remember the TRUE purpose of oil is to protect the lane surface. 

So we've seen from a few people here that the savings is extremely minimal at best, so that leads me to ask:  Why do centers continue to rationalize using less oil when it's shown it doesn't lead to savings? 

Because lower skilled(measured in rev rate only) bowlers usually do better with more friction. One of the houses where I bowl has a different shot during the day versus the night because the seniors complained about there being too much oil.