What to do with old bowling balls?

[JasonNJ]

I was wondering what you guys do with bowling balls you don't use any more? Do you give them to the pro shop?

[NewToBowling]

Around here pro shops or the bowling alley won't even take them. Our AMF house uses their color coded balls so after market balls for them.

Most go to Goodwill

[taxexpert2]

I have seen many painted and used for lawn decorations. There are some alleys that will still take them. See a lot of used balls on E-Bay, maybe that is where they meet their final demise

[Aslan]

I built a bowling ball rack and have most of my new/undrilled balls and most of my retired arsenal sitting on it.

But I've asked myself the same question. Once the rack gets full of old, retired balls...I certainly am not going to build another one...especially if I'm still in an apartment. I guess ya just throw em in the dumpster or something.

Some places will take them in on trade toward a new ball purchase. But;
1) That is highly dependent on the Pro Shop...a lot of pro shops that do this end up with more old bowling balls than they know what to do with and eventually have to stop accepting trade ins.
2) You'll likely get $5-$10 for each ball.

The other option is to list them on Ebay and try to sell them...the problem there is bowling balls are heavy and cost $25 to ship. Most of the auctions I've seen online...unless it's a rare ball or something special....you'll be lucky to get a $15 bid with free shipping or lucky to get a bid at all if they have to pay $25 to ship it. The ball would likely need to be plugged to get enough interest...and that's another $5-$20 at the pro shop so then you need that much more to just break even.

You could give them to bowling centers...but unless they have some program where they donate them to special needs teams or whatever...a lot of times they don't want them either because most are drilled fingertip which casual bowlers can't use...and many centers have different color balls for different weights and standardized sizes for hands...so taking in random balls would cause too much confusion.

I've seen them at the Salvation Army and Goodwill. You could always do that...but it's a $0 return unless you get some kinda receipt or something. That might be an option as a small tax write-off.

I have the added difficulty that the 5 I currently have to get rid of are 16lbs which very few bowlers still throw.

[vdubtx]

Check with the youth leagues, maybe some high schoolers could use them?

[billf]

Our center takes them. They are put on a special rack for the youth leagues and high school team (usually JV).
Another thing we have been seeing a lot of lately is as the kids get bigger they get another ball and give their old one to a smaller kid.

I've given a few to newer adult bowlers. The ones in their first league using a house ball trying to hook the crap out of it.

[LyalC52]

I sell them or give them away as soon as I think they are done being useful to me. In most cases I don't think its worth the effort to try and find a buyer, so generally just give them away.

I've given a couple of mine to sheet metal workers. They pound a rod into the thumb hole so it will fit in a mounting jig. Then they use it to shape metal over.

Some I've given to a buddy that raises hogs. They push the balls around the pins for hours in end.

[Tony]

I have given a couple away to newer adult bowlers, thrown a few away in the trash, left a couple at the bowling center , still have a couple.
Last year got a couple of new balls and then decided to drop a pound, so gave one ball to a teammate and going to try and sell the other, since they only have 100 games on them they are probably worth something. Maybe I'll put it on the table next week with a sign on it 75.00 or best offer, after all it is a popular ball and weight , a 15lb Roto-grip Hyper cell skid .

[billf]

sell the other, since they only have 100 games on them they are probably worth something. Maybe I'll put it on the table next week with a sign on it 75.00 or best offer, after all it is a popular ball and weight , a 15lb Roto-grip Hyper cell skid .

100 games? Isn't that twice the life expectancy of a Roto-Grip? Just kidding. I had a Storm Victory Road with 3k games on it and got $40 for it.

[Aslan]

100 games? Isn't that twice the life expectancy of a Roto-Grip? Just kidding. I had a Storm Victory Road with 3k games on it and got $40 for it.

Billf is joking, but that's the other problem with selling used balls. There is no real consensus on ball life anymore. I've heard people say they throw 100 games and the ball is dead and I've heard people say with proper maintenance and regular cleaning they throw the same ball for 2 years and claim it reacts like new.

A lot of used balls on Ebay the people claim they threw it like 5-30 times...maybe they just bought it, tried it, and didn't like it. But for a person that believes a ball only has 100 games or less of life...they'd never buy used.

I try to use the general consensus average of 400 games. But as an arsenal bowler, I don't always use one ball versus another and since I tend to change an entire arsenal at once (especially if I'm changing weights)...I use 1000 games/arsenal.

Have I noticed "ball death"? Not really. My release is too inconsistent to tell if a ball dies or if I just didn't put as much hand in the shot.