drawing oil out of a bowling ball cheaply

[foreverincamo]

My pro shop guy gave me this tip. Take your ball and tape over all the holes. Take a five gallon bucket and put about 4 inches of cat litter on the bottom. Drop the ball in, fingers facing downward. Cover the entire ball in cat litter and place the bucket where it's warm. Give it a few hours and pull the ball out and wipe it clean. You can use the same cat litter all season. This will pull the oil out of the ball. What say anyone about this idea?

[bowl1820]

My pro shop guy gave me this tip. Take your ball and tape over all the holes. Take a five gallon bucket and put about 4 inches of cat litter on the bottom. Drop the ball in, fingers facing downward. Cover the entire ball in cat litter and place the bucket where it's warm. Give it a few hours and pull the ball out and wipe it clean. You can use the same cat litter all season. This will pull the oil out of the ball. What say anyone about this idea?

Yeah that's a old trick, I did it years ago.

It's the same principle as the Ebonite Hook Again system.

Takes little longer than a few hours, should leave it for at least a day or as long as you can.

While the warm would help, that cat litter don't warm up fast. Put the lid on the bucket to keep it from drawing in the outside moisture.

Sanding first can help also, it opens the pores up.

The tape over the holes isn't really needed, just point them down anything gets in them. Just dump it out and blow out the holes and wipe.

[fortheloveofbowling]

Check out this video on youtube: homemade bowling ball oven. I have not tried this but looks like it works.

[foreverincamo]

My wife left her ball in the trunk on a hot day and when she pulled it out there was a puddle of oil under it.Must be something to heat and getting oil out of a ball

[bowl1820]

Check out this video on youtube: homemade bowling ball oven. I have not tried this but looks like it works.

No video link!

If you go look in the video forum you can find some there.

[Shaneshu87]

i have seen and duplicated a bowling ball oven using a card board box, some duct tape, and a hair dryer.

1. seal one end of box with heat resistant duct tape (not duck tape)
2. place hair dryer nozzle up against box face, preferably closer to the top and horizontal, and trace the nozzle onto the box.
3. using a knife cut out the circle you just traced
4. do the same thing on the opposite side of the box closer to the bottom for a vent hole
5. insert hair dryer into hole and seal it with duct tape.
6 place towel on the "floor" of box.
7 insert bowling ball(s)
8 close flaps as air tight as possible (can use the duct tape, i just place mine up against a wall)
9 turn on hair dryer on high heat for 20-30 minutes.

it would help if you had a food thermometer you could poke through the box to monitor internal temp as you would not want the internal temp to exceed 150 degrees Fahrenheit.
****warning-i did leave the hair dryer running for a bit to long in my last baking, the box caught on fire. bowling balls were not damaged but my wife will not allow me to do this in my house any longer lol****

[rv driver]

My pro shop guy gave me this tip. Take your ball and tape over all the holes. Take a five gallon bucket and put about 4 inches of cat litter on the bottom. Drop the ball in, fingers facing downward. Cover the entire ball in cat litter and place the bucket where it's warm. Give it a few hours and pull the ball out and wipe it clean. You can use the same cat litter all season. This will pull the oil out of the ball. What say anyone about this idea?
Now there's an idea! The Storm Fresh Step. Gravelly texture to grip in the heaviest oil, and it smells like cat poop.

[foreverincamo]

Watched a video on making an oven from s shipping box and hair dryer. Temp controlled with a meat thermometer. I had my DV8 Marauder Mutiny resurfaced the other day. Still waiting to throw it. I'll try the cardboard oven trick once the wife goes shopping someday

[Bunny]

Tried this recently. Seemed to work great and free!

http://www.bowlingboards.com/threads/16644-Solar-De-oiler?highlight=solar+de-oiler

[Blomer]

I hear from a few people,how they left their ball in their car and it was all greasy and oily. Seems like it would work. A friend nought an oven so he did mine for free. My center charges about $20 for a ball or two for $30.

[Amyers]

I hear from a few people,how they left their ball in their car and it was all greasy and oily. Seems like it would work. A friend nought an oven so he did mine for free. My center charges about $20 for a ball or two for $30.

This is not a good method can damage the balls.

[Blomer]

This is not a good method can damage the balls.

I wasn't suggesting To leaving it in the car, since that happened in the car I was saying leaving it outside and rotating would work. I have a locker at my center with my equipment, though I do have a few more than what the locker can hold. Thinking of getting another locker. It's only $16 for a yr rental.

[Amyers]

Okay I get it but unless it's a really hot day I'm not sure you would get much out of it. Temperatures in a trunk can reach 160 degrees easily I'm not sure how much temp it takes to start getting oil out but I know most manufacture tell you to keep the at 140 or below.

[Blomer]

In any case, I wouldn't do it outside. Like I said, i had a friend do mine in an oven he purchased online.

[jnv32185]

All I know is I tried giving my old bowling ball one of those hot water baths to extract the oil and all I noticed was that it ended up hazy and never went back to its color. It did not affect the performance of the ball but it sure made it ugly. That was my first and last experience extracting oil.

[Aslan]

I am in the process of getting some photos up that show a homemade ball dehydrator I made recently. I used a food dehydrator ($35 used online) and a 5-gallon pail.

Unfortunately, I ran into a slight problem with the plastic trays of the dehydrator and almost damaged my ball…so I had to make a $10-$13 adjustment but it should be working fine again. Next time I de-oil, gonna take some photos, and post them.

[Amyers]

All I know is I tried giving my old bowling ball one of those hot water baths to extract the oil and all I noticed was that it ended up hazy and never went back to its color. It did not affect the performance of the ball but it sure made it ugly. That was my first and last experience extracting oil.

Did you resurface the ball after cleaning? You should take the finish down to 500 then water bath then resurface the ball to whatever surface you normally use. I've used the dishwasher method and the water bath method with mine and never had a problem

[jnv32185]

Did you resurface the ball after cleaning? You should take the finish down to 500 then water bath then resurface the ball to whatever surface you normally use. I've used the dishwasher method and the water bath method with mine and never had a problem

No I didn't realize I had to do that. So that probably is why I had a problem with it.

It is an old ball that I no longer use because I went down in weight do to a wrist injury so I probably will not bother to do that step but its good to know in case I attempt it on my new ball in the future.

[Aslan]

Check this out if you haven't already:

http://www.bowlingboards.com/threads/17339-Aslan-s-Ball-Dehydrator-(with-pics)?p=115727#post115727

[dnhoffman]

Aslan's innovative idea to build a ball oven from a food dehydrator eh? how innovative!


http://www.bowlingboards.com/threads/15710-DIY-Personal-Bowling-Ball-Oven

[Aslan]

Aslan's innovative idea to build a ball oven from a food dehydrator eh? how innovative!


http://www.bowlingboards.com/threads/15710-DIY-Personal-Bowling-Ball-Oven

Translation: dnhoffman has also done something similar and is adding a link to what he did.

[foreverincamo]

I wash my ball in warm soapy dishwater to get the lane/ball return gunk off, then place it in a plastic bucket and cover the ball in oil dry. I keep the ball in the garage where it's warm. Was given this tip by a pro shop owner. All I know is my ball hooks like it did when it was new after doing this.