Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

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VLe
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Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by VLe »

Thought to share this simple "tool" that I made for evaluating the finger and thumb hole pitches at home. I was actually experimenting with some molded finger and thumb holes for bowling ball and could not use the regular pitch gauge so I came up with this.

In order to measure the pitches you will also need a thin and straight "stick" as a pointer. For example a BBQ stick or a knitting needle would be a good choice. Just make sure the pointer is straight!


Here are the instructions for using this pitch gauge:

1. Print the attached .pdf (BB Pitch guide) in proper size. DO NOT use any "shrink to fit" command. Make sure that the scale is right by measuring the check boxes.

2. Glue it to a piece of cardboard etc or laminate.

3. Cut the marked area at the bottom of the page.

4. Measure the hole as shown in attached picture.


Kindly note that this is still an experiment and the results may not be very good. Always use proper tools to measure the pitches more precisely!

Edit: MAJOR UPDATE TO VERSION 2.0. The previous models had a wrong scale that gave too much pitch. If you are using the old scale, take half off from the measured pitches. Now the version 2.0 should be accurate. My apologies for any misreadings that people may have had with the previous model.
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Last edited by VLe on December 21st, 2016, 2:51 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by crashin12x »

Thank you for sharing.

So where's or what's the part that goes into the hole/s?
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by VLe »

Use some straight stick as a pointer as I mentioned in the first post. I took a few example photos. Sorry for bad quality, it was hard to take photo with one hand while measuring the pitches. :)
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by bowl1820 »

Good idea! Had been wanting to try something like that myself but never got around to it.

Comments:
Looks pretty accurate so far. I used a piece of a wire coat hanger for the rod.

Suggestions:
1- The light blue degree lines need to be a little darker, for better visibility.

2- If possible adjust paper size to fit on Letter Size instead of A4 (Letter size is a bit more common and A4 is longer than letter size). Otherwise most would have to use Legal size which is longer. This would allow printing on Letter size card stock (which is what I used).

Mod:
When cutting out the ball area, I left a area to punch a small hole and used a paper clip to make a hinge point for the rod.

Image

Thanks for sharing! Should be great for those wanting to do a simple pitch check, that don't have access to pitch gauges.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by VLe »

bowl1820 wrote: Suggestions:
1- The light blue degree lines need to be a little darker, for better visibility.

2- If possible adjust paper size to fit on Letter Size instead of A4 (Letter size is a bit more common and A4 is longer than letter size). Otherwise most would have to use Legal size which is longer. This would allow printing on Letter size card stock (which is what I used).

Mod:
When cutting out the ball area, I left a area to punch a small hole and used a paper clip to make a hinge point for the rod.
Thank you for these ideas. Hehe, since I live in Finland, we use A4 as standard paper size and I didnt even thought of that point much. I will add these modifications to this document and post updated files next week. In different paper sizes! I will also put darker lines to the document.

Im open for suggestions or ideas for further development. 8-)
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by JimH »

The difference between standard US letter size (8 1/2 by 11 inches) and A4 is marginal. A4 is 8 1/4 by 11 11/16 inches. As long as you do not 'shrink to fit' it should work.

Great idea VLe.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by bowl1820 »

JimH wrote:The difference between standard US letter size (8 1/2 by 11 inches) and A4 is marginal. A4 is 8 1/4 by 11 11/16 inches. As long as you do not 'shrink to fit' it should work.

Great idea VLe.
The difference is over a half inch (which is more than marginal), when printed at 1:1 (so it's at the proper scale) on Letter size paper. It cuts off the bottom part of his gauge.

While this doesn't affect it use, it cuts off part of his design.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by JimH »

When I said marginal I was thinking that by decreasing the size of the margin used by the printer it would fit on the page. I use A4 paper and I do not have access to 8 1/2 by 11 so I cannot test it.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by bowl1820 »

JimH wrote:When I said marginal I was thinking that by decreasing the size of the margin used by the printer it would fit on the page. I use A4 paper and I do not have access to 8 1/2 by 11 so I cannot test it.
Even if set at borderless printing you get clipping on the top and bottom on 8.5 X 11 paper.

This example shows the clipping that occurs using borderless printing. (top & bottom left corner)

As I said it doesn't affect the use, it's just a matter if you want it to look just right.
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by VLe »

As soon as the checkboxes are in right scale, the measurements should be ok.

I uploaded a new version of the BBPG in letter size. It should be ok but I can not print it in proper size here to confirm.

I also added an option to make some sort of hinge point for the pointer. I haven't tested this yet so I have no idea if it works. See the attached picture for more instructions. 8-)
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by bowl1820 »

VLe wrote:As soon as the checkboxes are in right scale, the measurements should be ok.

I uploaded a new version of the BBPG in letter size. It should be ok but I can not print it in proper size here to confirm.

I also added an option to make some sort of hinge point for the pointer. I haven't tested this yet so I have no idea if it works. See the attached picture for more instructions. 8-)
I just printed it and it fit Letter size great. The check-box's are right on scale.

The darker lines look much better and the hinge idea looks good (Can't try it at the moment)!

Great work!
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by Dkirkby »

I see this is an old post but hopefully I’ll get a response. I was just trying to figure out a way to measure pitches without purchasing an actual pitch gauge and found this. My question is if “0” is placed over center of thumb hole and the dowel/rod is placed into the center of hole won’t it always read “0” pitch with put something contacting the sides of the hole?
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by bowl1820 »

Dkirkby wrote: March 14th, 2021, 6:21 pm I see this is an old post but hopefully I’ll get a response. I was just trying to figure out a way to measure pitches without purchasing an actual pitch gauge and found this. My question is if “0” is placed over center of thumb hole and the dowel/rod is placed into the center of hole won’t it always read “0” pitch with put something contacting the sides of the hole?
No, since the diy gauge doesn't have the things to contact the sides of the hole it's using the center of the bottom of the hole to line up the pointer on.
The zero on the gauge is basically pointing towards the center of the ball.
The rod goes to the bottom of the thumb hole which has a cone shape due to the end of the drill bit and fits into the point formed there.
That point isn't pointing towards the center of the ball (unless of course the angle is 0) so when the rod fits into it, the pointer end of the rod moves off the 0 and shows you the pitch.

I made this back then and it worked pretty good, just print it on some stiff paper like card stock (unless you want to get fancy and mount it on cardboard or plexiglass.) and the rod is straight!

Crude sketch
hole ang-1.jpg
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Re: Simple tool for evaluating the pitches from bowling ball

Post by Dkirkby »

Thank you for your reply
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