Why does my much older ball hook more then newer more "aggressive" ball.

[Jessiewoodard57]

I tried an experiment suggested to me by a friend he suggested soaking the ball in 5 gallon bucket with warm water and dawn dish soap. I had a Hammer first blood that started not hooking for me I tried the bucket for a few hours and was surprised by all the oil film on the top of the water. I wiped the ball of and allowed it to dry a few days and wow what a difference that made.

[blazerunner]

Sorry for getting back so late to this post. Thanks so much for the info. I did go in to practice today at lunch and talked to my pro shop guy there about backing the ball but found out no proshop in my area has one but the one on our air force base, which I don't have access to. He recommended soaking my ball in hot water with some dawn soap for about 5 mins or so. Rinse and clean it and do it again in till I fill its done sweating. He also warned about doing it for to long as water would soak into the ball and could take some time if to much water soaks in.

After seeing Jessiewoodard57 post saying basically same thing I will try this but is there anything else I should know?

[Amyers]

I do suggest having the ball resurfaced after soaking

[Jessiewoodard57]

Amyers is right after allowing the ball to dry for a few days I did at least polish the ball with Reacta Shine

[blazerunner]

I will soak it this weekend then but quick question about resurfacing the ball. There is a ball spinner on my bowling alley and it has several options and I don't know which one to pick.

The options are

Sand 500
Sand 1000
Sand 2000
Polish
Clean
resurface 1000- finish
resurface 2000- finish
resurface polish-finish

What do the options mean exactly and what one do I pick. If I understand some previous post I shouldn't sand the ball down because of the house shot being to mild for an aggressive ball and the ball will lose energy going down the lane. So do I polish it?

I just don't really understand what polishing does. I think I understanding sanding it with 500 grit will cause more ridges on the ball so grabs the lane more, and in house shot that's not super oily will cause it to grab more but loose energy down the lane which i'm guessing causes it to come to flat when it hits the pocket. So what does polishing do and what option is best for me to pick to get my ball to hook more on a house shot.

Ultimately Would love to move about 5 boards to the left where I am now. I line most left edge on my left foot on the center dot roughly and my perfect spot is like 5 boards to the left of that center dot on the approach. I just feel more comfortable there and more accurate with my spares.



***EDIT***

I did recently use that same machine to put it down to 500 grit because another bowler (not my pro shop guy) told me to get my ball to hook more put it at 500 grit and that will help but it didn't seem to help. One reason I turned to this site so I can talk to people i feel know what they are talking about.

[Amyers]

500 Grit is probably way to much surface. I'm not experienced with resurfacing machines around here the proshop does it on a ball spinner. The factory surface for the Sinister is 4000 grit which doesn't seem to be an option there. If you currently have 500 grit on the ball and want more backend movement from it I would be tempted to just polish it and see how it does. Generally as you have higher surface grits on the ball they will go farther down the lane before starting to hook and move on the backend more. Lower grits cause the ball to start earlier and hook more total boards but less on the backend. Polish has the same effect of causing the ball to go longer and the underlying grit under the surface will cause the ball to grab the lane more or less also.

You also have to keep in mind to have the proper amount of surface for the amount of oil on the lane where you throw the ball. If you like to play outside the 2nd arrow you will generally need less surface than if you play farther in. Be careful of extremes you may get the opposite of what your looking for. A ball surfaced at 500 grit thrown down the 5 board may very well burn up and not move much at all or a ball with a 4000 grit surface that has polish applied over it thrown down 15 may never move at all because there wasn't enough surface to get the ball started almost like plastic. Don't be afraid to experiment and find what works for you there are no rules.

[Jessiewoodard57]

I don't trust those automatic machines. Who knows how worn the sanding pads really are inside it.

[NewToBowling]

I don't trust those automatic machines. Who knows how worn the sanding pads really are inside it.

From what I have read those are dinosaurs from the bowling stone age. Only to be used on plastic balls as the compound/polish they use will clog up newer reactive covers. If you need to polish use the pro shop.

[blazerunner]

How hard and how much does it cost to get a machine that will do it at home? Or is this not really available for home use?

[vdubtx]

How hard and how much does it cost to get a machine that will do it at home? Or is this not really available for home use?

Several brands available form home use, here is one:

http://www.shop.innovativeballspinne...5-102-PS12.htm