Abralon

[mike_thomas93]

I hope a lot of you know a good bit about this. Alright people, I'm a bit shaky on the meaning of Abralon. One of my friends gave me a quick meaning, but I didn't really understand it. So what are the benefits on abralon? And how does it compare based on how small or large the number is used? Like 1000 abralon versus 2000 abralon. Something like that. I've never applied that on any of my bowling balls, so I was just curious to know. What does the abralon do?

[vdubtx]

Abralon is a brand name of sand paper for bowling balls. The number is the grit of the pad. It is used to give different surfaces to bowling balls. In turn, the balls will react differently on the lanes with different surfaces.

[bowl1820]

Abralon pads are simply a foam backed abrasive pad.

They use the European P-scale for grits, which uses a tighter tolerance on the grits. Which just mean the grit is closer to the size the pad is rated at.

Where as paper uses the US ansi/cami scale and has a looser tolerance and can very in size more.

The bigger the number the smoother it is: coarsest -500-1000-2000-3000-4000- finest

[Stormed1]

The lower the grit the sooner the ball will hook and the smoother it will be off the spot

[e-tank]

the smaller the number the earlier ball reads the lanes and vice versa. For example a ball at 4000 grit will have more length and backend than a ball at say 1000 grit

[Mudpuppy]

it's all about the abralon. I have an abralon pillow case (4,000) that I use to sleep on at night.

The pro I use for all my bowling balls was explaining to me that a couple of years ago everything switched to abralon and he pointed to a huge stack of abralon pads he had in stock.

[mike_thomas93]

Thanks for the replies, guys

[dnhoffman]

I use Saair pads instead, all the research I did before buying a spinner and starting to do surface changes/resurfacing myself indicated that they last much longer than Abralon pads.

I've completely resurfaced about 5 balls for myself and teammates, and done countless surface changes and just recently replaced the 500/1000/2000 pads I use. Probably get at least one more use out of the 240 and 360 pads before I replace them.

There's a website I bought them off of where they were less than 2.50 a pad shipped.... Pretty awesome really.

[mike_thomas93]

Never heard of Saair pads. Are they any similar to abralon, besides you saying they last longer?

[dnhoffman]

Ya, lemme see if I can find a link for you (before Bowl1820 finds an appropriate video... Heh)

[bowl1820]

Never heard of Saair pads. Are they any similar to abralon, besides you saying they last longer?

There is no practical difference between Abralon and Siaair when new. Both use European FEPA grading (The P Scale)

Abralon uses silicon carbide as its abrasive, Siaair uses aluminum oxide as the abrasive.

Siaair lasts a little longer.

[dnhoffman]

Some quick google searches, I'm sure there is better info out there though:

http://forum.bowlingchat.net/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7523&hilit=siaair

http://www.bowlingcommunity.com/b/ubbthreads.php/topics/106965/Sia_Air_vs_Mirka_Abralon_Pads_.html

[dnhoffman]

There is no practical difference between Abralon and Siaair when new. Both use European FEPA grading (The P Scale)

Abralon uses silicon carbide as its abrasive, Siaair uses aluminum oxide as the abrasive.

Siaair lasts a little longer.

I knew, KNEW, that while I looked those up you'd post this...

And you're right, this is essentially what both links can be summed up to.

[mike_thomas93]

Thanks for the answer, and the videos. Seems like there a several types of abralon. Ugh so much to understand