Comments on: “Changing of the Pit”

By: Chad

Chad — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:18:41 +0000

Thanks for the input Andy. I redesigned it so that the pit floor slopes away from the bowler and the pit curtain is now heavier and also angles slightly away from the bowler. It’s working great now.

By: Chad

Chad — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:08:34 +0000

Hi Randy,
I have been a fan of your videos for quite a while now. It’s great hearing from you.
I have redesigned the pit curtain and the pit floor now slopes away from the bowler. Since I made the changes I have not had 1 ball or pin rebound back onto the pindeck. Thanks again for your message and suggestions.
-Chad

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 15:41:34 +0000

Now I like bowling but I’m no expert on the mechanics of them so forgive me if this sounds stupid. One thought that springs to mind might be to angle the back wall so that balls are deflected down into the pit rather than straight back towards the lane. The strip curtains idea sounds good as well.

By: Randy Brown

Randy Brown — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 04:06:32 +0000

I sent you a private note congratulating you on this project. I built a lane in the garage for my son back in the ’80s, which I thought was pretty cool at the time (and I still do), but it pales in comparison to the technological wizardry of this thing. One area I think I can help you on is the question of the ball (and pins) bouncing back out on to the lane. I remedied that problem by simply angling the backstop downward, so that when the ball hits it, the ball ricochets DOWNWARD, instead of having it perpendicular to the ground, forcing the ball to bounce back toward the pins. (In the case of the lane I built, we were dealing with hollow plastic pins and softballs or croquet balls, not the solid pins and larger balls you’re dealing with, but I also had a “curtain” (made out of carpeting) that absorbed much of the energy of the ball and the flying pins, so they wouldn’t have any hard surface to bounce off of and back on to the pin deck. Plus, I had slanted the floor of the pit area so that everything would funnel back away from the pin deck and toward the back of the pit. The curtain came down (it was sort of curved so that it bulged toward the pins but was tucked father from the pin deck the lower you got), and then it ended (tacked on to a 2×4) with just enough clearance for the ball to roll underneath…another step that helped keep he ball from coming back out on the lane. We would occasionally see a pin bounce out (rarely, but it did happen — about the same frequency as on a real lane). But the ball NEVER came back out. Here are a few videos so you can see it. Some clips are before the masking unit was finished. Some were after it was put up. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpiK8Spl6Sc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3ck2uYgO6E http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCf1Nd87714 Enjoy. Randy

By: Chad

Chad — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 16:04:08 +0000

Thanks Slash. I have a new black rubber hanging curtain that I am playing around with but I hadn’t thought about the dock curtains behind them. You should post a vid on YouTube showing them in action.

By: Slash

Slash — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 06:08:20 +0000

On my basement alley I used 2 cut black rubber floor mats as pit curtains with plastic ‘dock curtains’ behind them. The ‘dock curtains’ are a rubber material used on truck docks at warehouses to keep the heat in/out while the bay is open. They sell it at home depot. That combination should be heavy enough to stop those candlepin balls you’re using. It works on my full scale 1/2 lane really well, even when someone throws a fast ball.