One man’s journey to the center of the bowling ball | Hacker News Reader

One man’s journey to the center of the bowling ball

wired.com

61 pointsvoisin14 comments

> ...and bowling-world fame.

[Unrelated to the core topic] Is anyone else on mobile only seeing the first paragraph? If I open the article on desktop, I see the full article, but on mobile, it simply ends after that paragraph (followed by a featured video about the “dreaded 7-10 split”). There’s no “Continue Reading” (or similar) button/link and no notice that I may have exceeded a monthly limit of “free articles”.

This started happening to me a few weeks ago; my assumption was they'd changed their paywall promo thing and my Pihole was blocking it.

I can't read Wired anymore on my normal devices for reading (iOS, cookies disabled). The page loads content briefly, and then blanks out. I'm not sure what the cause is, it's quite annoying. I'll just use a desktop for some of the more interesting looking stuff... which this qualified as.

Bowling is something I've wanted to become more involved with, ever since I was on a team competing (poorly) in the Austin Cup several years ago. I shouldn't be surprised that some people in the sport took the physics to this level. This was an amazing story.

I really wish this article had FEM simulations, or some form of quantitative analysis as to what is going on. I am sure that the detailed Newtonian mechanics of bowling is really quite complex, but as a visual monkey I would like a more informative diagram (or ten)…

Don't they need to have an asymmetric core to counterbalance the finger holes?

From my understanding, the material where the finger holes are drilled is not heavy enough to make a difference. However, where the holes are drilled relative to the rotation center of the ball, does make a difference.

I remember when, in college, the pro-shop of my local bowling alley described asymmetric cores and how finger holes in relation to the center of gravity changed ball movement.

It was revelatory. It made me feel like a superman to toss a ball down the lane and see it reliably curve towards the intended target.

To read this was a joy. I'm not sure why all the hate that it's not filled with more diagrams, or the (justified) hate with Wired's paywall strategies. But the human side of engineering was artfully portrayed and engaging.

I thought they had a liquid center.

Trash article, I'm not going to read tens of pages just to get to the meat of the matter.

The journey is the goal.

The article is well written and delivers what it promises: to tell the story of Mo Pinel and his designs. What were you expecting?

“I apologize for such a long letter - I didn't have time to write a short one.” - Mark Twain

I expected it to get to the meat somewhere within the first few pages

Anyhow, there's tons of articles like this on the web, clearly there's demand.

Ah yes. I suppose I don’t mind the length as it didn’t feel long to me.

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