Need a weak ball that still hits hard?

[fordman1]

That should make it arc rather than snap. More smooth. I also tried the new LT48.

[Amyers]

That should make it arc rather than snap. More smooth. I also tried the new LT48.

What were your experiences with the LT 48?

[fordman1]

It was stronger than I expected.

[Amyers]

It was stronger than I expected.

Lol I think that is what everyone I know who has thrown that ball says about it. If you need to even out the reaction a little from it take it down to 3k or 4k on the surface I think it actually rolls better that way. It tends to make the ball a little less angular and allows it to handle a little more oil which is great if you want to start off with it.

[mc_runner]

I'll chime in and also say the LT-48 was stronger than I expected! I had initially penciled it in as a ball-down from my Nano but it ended up reading a lot earlier on the lane than I figured it would.

[RobLV1]

As I've said on many occasions, if we could just get away from using the terms "weak" and "strong" for bowling balls, we would all have a much better understanding of them. I have reproduced a portion of an article from my website that explains my rationale:

Weak Ball - Strong Ball - Right Ball - Wrong Ball October 2013

Ever since the first article that I wrote for BTM in the fall of 2007, a theme that I keep coming back to is the potential pitfall of forming preconceived ideas about bowling. Whether it be forming an opinion about where to play on the lanes in a particular center, about how you will bowl on a particular pattern, or what ball to use, preconceived ideas can only hurt you, particularly if you treat them as gospel, rather than as informed suggestions.
Another theme to which I often refer is the power of words. As a coach as well as a former English teacher, I understand that words have incredible power. If you’ve ever dealt with multiple coaches over a period of time, I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about. Often the particular words that a coach uses to address something that you’ve heard several times before all of a sudden make sense. Saying the same thing using different words often makes all the difference. Such is the power of words.
It occurs to me that these two concepts are often very closely related in bowling. I came to this conclusion a few weeks ago when I was bowling some penny ante pot games one morning. I heard a bowler say, after the fourth game, that the lanes had gotten so dry that he was forced to use a really weak ball. I asked him what makes a ball “weak.” He replied, “The core and the cover.” He told me what ball he was using and it turned out to be the same kind of ball that I was throwing at the time. It just so happened that we ended up bowling on the same pair for the next game. I couldn’t help but notice that he was not throwing his “weak” ball nearly as well as he had been throwing a “strong” ball earlier. He was trying to help it hook. Was this perhaps due to the fact that he considered the ball so weak that it needed help?
What would happen if we all agreed to drop the judgmental words that we use to describe bowling balls, layouts, and lane conditions, and replace them with descriptive words that notate differences rather than judgments? A weak ball is merely one that is less aggressive than a strong one. A strong ball is just more aggressive than a weak one. Is it possible that by simply using descriptive rather than judgmental words to describe bowling balls, bowlers will realize that “matching up” to a given lane condition is not necessarily using a ball that hooks the most, but using one that strikes the most? I think so. The expression in golf used to describe the importance of the short game is, “drive for show, putt for dough.” I don’t think that golfers would mind if we borrowed their phrase for bowling: hook for show, strike for dough.
Anyway, first I tried to determine what different bowlers consider the primary factors that make bowling balls “weak” or “strong.” I was surprised at the diversity of answers. Most consider the total amount of boards covered as being the main factor in determining strength. Now, here’s the problem. For a low rev player, the main determiner of how many boards a ball covers is how soon it hooks. That’s determined by the low rg measurement. A low rg ball begins to rev up earlier, causing it to cover more boards from the foul line to the pocket. For a high rev player, on the other hand, it’s a combination of the low rg and the differential that determines how many boards a ball will cover. Finally, in both cases, the reactivity of the cover material in the oil, as well as in friction affects how many boards the ball covers. So what really makes a ball strong? Is it how early it revs up, how much flare potential it has, or how reactive the cover is in oil and in dry?
Now, let me really tickle your brain for a moment. Suppose a ball has a very reactive cover, a low rg to hook early, a high differential for maximum flare potential, and is used on a lane condition where it revs up too early, finds too much friction, over-reacts to the lane surface, and burns up at 40’ only to hit the pins like a toasted marshmallow, is it still strong? How can a strong ball hit like a toasted marshmallow? The ball is not strong after all, is it? But it’s not weak either because of its characteristics, it just hit like it is. It’s not strong, it’s not weak, it’s just WRONG for the lane condition. In other words, it just doesn’t match up. So, in this situation, you change to a ball with a higher rg for more length before it hooks, a lower differential for less flare potential, and a less aggressive cover material, and it retains its energy all the way down the lane a absolutely demolishes the pins. Is the weak ball now strong? No, it’s just the RIGHT ball for the lane condition. It matches up!
The whole concept of weak ball, strong ball, is only a problem because of the way that most bowlers approach bowling balls. They see bowling balls in terms of compensating for their perceived stylistic deficiencies, rather than in terms of complimenting their strengths. In other words, many bowlers try to buy a ball that hooks out of the box for the simple reason that their own style does not allow them to hook any ball as much as they would like to. They don’t realize that the touring pros can use the aggressive equipment that they use on television because of their styles. They have the ball speeds and rev rates to be able to use these aggressive balls on the tough lane conditions with heavier volumes of oil on which they bowl. When less powerful bowlers mistakenly try to use this same equipment to emulate the pros, they just end up with balls that are strong when they release them and weak by the time they reach the pins.
The same things can be said for the terminologies that we all use for layouts. You know, strong ball – weak layout, weak-ball strong layout, blah, blah, blah. So what makes a layout strong or weak? Traditionally we were all told that it was the distance from the pin to the PAP that created maximum flare. Most drillers believed that a pin to PAP distance of 3 3/8” created the maximum flare potential. Then a few of us considered the changes in modern bowling balls and began to believe that the strongest pin position was one half of the distance between the bowlers PAP and his ball track. A minor difference in most cases: somewhere between 3 ¼” and 4”.
Next, the Dual Angle System was introduced. According to this system, for symmetrically cored balls, maximum flare is achieved with a pin to pap distance of between 3” and 4”, but for asymmetrically cored balls, and pin to PAP distance from 2 ¾” to 6 ¼” will produce maximum flare. Finally, Storm introduced its Vector Layout System (VLS) where testing showed that in three identical balls with asymmetrical cores, all with a pin to PAP distance of 4”, the pin buffer (the horizontal distance of the pin from the vertical axis line) significantly changed the amount of flare, with a 2” pin buffer creating the most flare.
So now that we know that layouts are not nearly as simple as they used to be with the pin to PAP distance being the only determiner of the “strength” of the layout, can we please just refer to a layout as being one of the ways that we use to match a particular ball to a particular bowler and a particular lane condition? Every layout doesn’t have to be strong to go long and snap. Enough already! Oftentimes a bowler’s style necessitates the use of a layout that helps the ball to rev up quickly producing a more arcing motion. The fact of the matter is that when the lanes are played properly, using the oil to get the ball to the breakpoint before the friction takes over, most lower rev bowlers will see a ball that has been laid out to rev up earlier as being much “stronger” than a more angular motion. As I have said many times before, using a layout that is designed to go long and snap is not going to give you a ball reaction that resembles the pro’s reactions, unless you have a pro’s release.
Please note the reference to playing the lanes properly above. I am talking about, of course, bowling on a house lane condition where typically league bowlers not only use bowling balls that are much too aggressive for the lane condition, they are also playing the area of the lane at or outside of the second arrow where the ball encounters friction way too early. This is typically what causes the overly aggressive ball to lose energy and angle. Again, the preconception monster rears its ugly head as the bowler remembers the immortal words that his father told him forty or fifty years ago: “Always follow your misses. If you miss to the right, move your feet to the right.” Oh if only we could erase that ingrained thought from our bowling minds, what a bunch of happy bowlers we could be!
Judgmental terminology also affects the way we think about lane conditions. In Las Vegas this past summer, we went through one of the longest “monsoon seasons” that we’ve ever experienced. There were several weeks of scattered thunderstorms and high humidity. In a desert environment that is extremely dry for most of the year, high humidity can play havoc with lane conditions. Apart from the effects on our physical games from sticky approaches and thumb holes that seem to have shrunk considerably as we try to get our thumbs to exit cleanly, the humidity always seems to result in over/under reactions on the lanes. Balls in the oil seem to skid further, and balls in the friction either hook a ton, or burn up and go straight.....

For the complete article, please visit: www.modern-bowling.com in the Bowling Ball section

[Amyers]

As I've said on many occasions, if we could just get away from using the terms "weak" and "strong" for bowling balls, we would all have a much better understanding of them. I have reproduced a portion of an article from my website that explains my rationale:

Weak Ball - Strong Ball - Right Ball - Wrong Ball October 2013

As I've said before this article makes some good points especially if your talking about joe average bowler who sports a 160 average and bowls once a week. After rereading your article again here though I think you have made a false assumption in saying that "Most consider the total amount of boards covered as being the main factor in determining strength". I find with most bowlers it's not the total boards covered but the backend boards covered that they actually use as their strength comparison. I've seen numerous bowlers buy very aggressive balls that cover a lot of boards but because they don't have that backend change of direction they misunderstand how strong that ball actually is.

In truth it doesn't actually make any difference if we call a ball strong or aggressive or anything else. What matters most is we understand our style, where we play on the lanes, and the conditions we bowl on. I do believe that maybe being more descriptive of the actual ball motion could help. A good example is my post on the Lt-48 when I remarked about the ball being "stronger" than a lot of my friends who had purchased it had expected from it. Mc-runner then posted that his Lt-48 was "stronger" too but that it was earlier than he expected. Now to me there is nothing early about the Lt-48 is actually a pretty long ball from everyone I've seen so he's seeing something different. Now changing the word to "Aggressive" vs "Strong" helps nothing here but if Mc-runner didn't include more info we would think that we agreed when we did not regardless of the terminology used.

One of a few things are going on with my perception of the Lt-48 and Mc-runner's.

1.It could be that he is playing a different portion of the lane that the people I've seen throw it or that his THS pattern is way different than I'm used too. Possible but not likely as I know quite a few people who throw this ball and I've seen it on numerous patterns.

2.It could be that there is something in Mc-runner's style that could be the cause. Possible I haven't seen him bowl.

3.He could have a different layout on his than most of the ones I've seen. Also possible but to make it earlier than an IQ Tour Nano seems a stretch.

4.It could be that the ball is hooking so much more on the backend that it is forcing him farther left and he is mistaking the greater backend reaction of the LT-48 as being early when it's not it just covering more backend boards than his Nano. This is the most likely in my opinion but I don't really know for sure.

I'm sure there are some other factors here I didn't mention too that could cause our differences in perception of the balls. Another similar example would be my wife who has been bowling about 2 years she uses two balls a Brunswick Nirvana and a Brunswick Mastermind Braniac. If you asked her which of the two balls were more aggressive or stronger (insert word of your choice) she would tell you it's the braniac. Now we both know the Nirvana is the more aggressive of the two balls but the braniac hooks more on the backend on most THS patterns anyway so it forces her to move left to use it even on a fresh shot. In reality a large part of what causes the problems of trying to tell the strength or aggressiveness of a particular ball is the THS patterns we bowl on with the defined dry spots on most THS patterns any ball can get to the pocket and most will perform to some greater or lesser extent regardless of right ball wrong ball. Maybe you should have names the article the better ball. Throw those two balls on a flat pattern the difference is obvious on THS it's harder to tell It's differences like this that makes it more important to use more words to clarify what we are talking about that just can't be replaced by any moniker.

[RobLV1]

Two points:

1. I hear talk from 220+ bowlers who constantly talk about which ball hooks more, and they are virtually always talking about total boards covered, not just backend reaction.

2. My reason for recommending staying away from calling balls "weak" or "strong" is simply the fact that words do have subconscious connotations. In our society, we revere things that are "strong," and show disdain for things that are "weak." Those connotations do have implications for any bowler who does not understand ball motion in terms of where the ball hooks rather than when it hooks.

[mc_runner]

This is interesting. Rob, in point 1 is it always total boards covered on a house shot? Is it boards covered playing up 10, or through the oil, etc? I think the different lines and the THS has a lot to do with the perception of a ball being "strong" or not. To your point a tropical breeze or strike king played up 5 on a THS can "cover more boards" vs a strong ball that dies out 30 feet down the lane and rolls its way into the pins thus having a perception of being stronger in that instance.

To answer some of Amyers questions... it's probably a little bit of all of those things except 1. I had a few challenges with this ball from the get-go.

1. It's a "heavy" 15. So much so that nearly everyone who has picked it up has thought it was a 16. Unless it was a misprint on the box or a production/packing error, it was a 15. However I agree that it seemed heavier than my other 15lb balls. This difference in weight I believe led me to roll with less side rotation, and perhaps a little less speed, with the end reaction being that it read the lane earlier.

2. The layout was standard but the drilling was pretty bad. I tried a new PSO out for this one and he messed up my initial drilling (no measurements, he went off a previous ball, etc.). I no longer have the ball, but it was drilled pin up and right of the ring finger. Generic. Even after I got the ball re-drilled to fix span and thumb pitch however, it never really felt as comfortable or "right" as the other balls I had, which could also have led to the different roll I got with it off my hand.

3. I know that this one will probably irritate some people but I generally throw storm and this was the first brunswick product I had. I did noticed a different shape vs the storm and roto grip products, which was certainly something that made me feel that it read earlier.

I had some good games with the ball (even a 279) but never really got into a consistent groove with it. When I say it wasn't really a ball down from the nano I didn't mean that it covered more boards... only that it seemed to read the lane around the same point where I would have expected it to glide through a little more before beginning it's move.

[fordman1]

Wow good thing I didn't ask something complicated. All I wanted was a few recondition for a ball weaker that an LT48 and stronger than a pitch black. That and a good drilling pattern so I can play outside.
Now why do balls have ratings? Could it be that some are stronger than others?

230 is stronger than 160 right?

For the Pros a 10 hooks more than a 6 Right?

I may be old but I have a lot of confidence that I could shoot 300 and better than 750 this coming year.