Ball Arsenal from beginning to current

[vdubtx]

Thought it might be fun to show everyone's ball arsenal from when you started(or close to it) bowling until now. I have balls dating back to pre 1990 that my dad gave me, to balls purchased when I was league bowling in early 90's to my current 4 ball arsenal.

First is my Dad's old Dick Weber 5 Star rubber ball that I used mid-end 80's:



Next is a plastic Columbia White Dot that I used to use on wooden lanes, about 1990 or so.



Next we have an Ebonite urethane blue ball. This is when I can remember starting to get a bit more serious in the early 90's.

[vdubtx]

Next up is a Red Hammer urethane pearl again early 90's





Then, I took about 12-13 years off of the sport to focus on work and my family. Got back into bowling and it was like night and day. Used my Red Hammer and blue ebonite for a few years until I got back into the swing of things.

I then purchased in 2005 or so, by far my favorite most consistent ball, the Columbia U-Turn. This is my go to ball and I still use it to this day, this ball has been involved in each of my 4 300 games. At this time I also switched to 15lb balls.

[vdubtx]

Shortly after getting the U-Turn I wanted something a bit more aggressive that could be used in higher oil concentrations. This is the Track Slash. This was never a high performing ball for me, and while I shot several 279's with it, never broke that barrier. I now use it to experiment with and regularly have it plugged and redrilled. The last replug was to try out natural finger tip vs. a grip insert. Next up will be to the the Tri_grip set up that ICEMAN is now using.




I then saw quite a few players using Hammer Black Widow products and waited until the Black Widow Red Pearl was released to check it out. This ball was involved in one of my highest sanctioned series(781), and used in a 300 game along with the U-Turn.

[vdubtx]

I then decided to replace my old Columbia Spare ball with a Ebonite Maxim. This ball, although just being a spare ball, is responsible for my average getting to where it is today. Without this ball, those pesky right side pins would not be picked up at the 90+% range that I get with this ball. I highly suggest a spare ball for those that have any sort of trouble with the corner pins.




I went about 5 years or so before getting a new ball. The reason for this next ball was to take it to Nationals. I knew that the U-Turn and Black Widow would not be able to hold up with a heavier/difficult pattern. The First Blood is what I had decided on and here she is.

[vdubtx]

Next came the totally lucky win from this very board. Thanks for the Roto-Grip Disturbed Bowling Boards.



Here is the whole line up set from top left to bottom right in chronological order.

[Zaxmazr]

Awesome collection! I wanted a Black Widow back in high school SOOO badly!

[dnhoffman]

Fun thread, was cool to see your timeline. Thanks for sharing.

[Zaxmazr]

I wish I still had some of my old balls. However, they would be basically straight balls that I 2-fingered in leagues.
My absolute first ball was this sparkly red ball with my initials 'ZAM' on it. SO ballin.

[DLP]

Mine's a short list but

Started with a Teal Brunswick T-Zone
then hubby got a Black Mamba - so I got his Ebonite Cyclone
which was to heavy - so I got a Pyramid Path that was lighter
Then adopted a Storm Fringe from the pro shop
and then a few weeks later won the DV8 Diva from this site

Then at the end of August started having everything re-drilled left handed

so now I have my Path, the Fringe, and the Diva all LH drilled.

Going to move back up in weight at some point in the future so now I have to figure out what's next

[Stormed1]

Seeing as I have owned well over 1000 balls it would take up too many pages to show. I started back in 63 with an AMF Strikeline (the one with the red stripe around it)> I got serious about the game in 75 after I retired from racing sports cars. In the 70's i had many yellow dot's, Sur D's LT48 (rubber nad plastic),Crown Jewels. Ebonite Mag 10, RotO RC%, Black angle,purple Angle,Edge. The 80's saw Black,Wine and Slate U-Dots Black,Blue,purple,pimk,Blue & Red Pearl Hammers plus the Nail, the U2 Solid & pearl & BUD2's, AMF Cobra's and Gold dots and of course the Vector 1&2, tHE 90'S Brought the beast's (urethane & resin,solid & pearl),Turbo's (solid & pearls, Nitro's (urethane & resin)SuMo.Phantom's King Cobra ,Reactive Hammer (Blue & purple) 3d offset Hammer, Black Infinity,Gold Grenade. The Ebonite Crush & Blue Wolf,The Excaliber, and every Storm ball from the original Teal through the but not including the Virtual Gravity plus about a doen overseas Storm balls. 2000's brought Roto Grip Cell, Cell pearl , Strike Cell (overseas) Dynothane Vendetta ,Things (All variations), Energy's ( all variations),Element AU79,Centrifigul Mass, Columbia Chaos,Mass Chaos,Track Assassin, 900Global Break (solid & pearl), Break Point (solid & pearl)<Bank (solid & pearl), Hook (solid & pearls) S-75,Wisdom,Bank Roll,Lunatic, Link & Missing Link, Bounty Hunter pearl.. AMF OMG< Shredder,Shred-It,Clutch (solid& pearl) Double Clutch pearl. Radical Slant (solid,Hybrid & pearl, Times Up (solid & pearl) Motiv SX!, Ascent solid, QZ2 Blue & Bacdraft, Primal,Primal Impulse, Primal Scream, Sigma Tour,Sigma Hybrid Thrash,Thrash frenzy, Venom Strike,Venom Toxin,Raptor Attack and numerous White Dot,T-Zone Spare Storm, Ice Storm, Golden Globe and Motiv Sniper spare balls plus another 20 oor 30 I forgot about and many of the balls listed I had multiples of.