Dimpled Paintballs

[MasterYoda]

I was wondering about the possibility of paintballs being formed with dimples similar to that of a golf ball. The idea here is to decrease the drag force on the ball. A ball with uniform round dimples forces the air around it to become turbulent sooner than that of a sphere. This decreases the drag substantially. An even better design would be a ball with uniform hexagonal dimples. This forces the point of separation even closer to the front of the ball, thus decreasing drag even more. Theoretically this would allow for more range. Is it feasible for a manufacturer to make and sell dimpled paintballs?

[pballguy17]

Hm... i dont' kno everything ur talking about, but i do kno this. dimpled paintballs (as u called them) if it does, give them more range, it's because they are moving faster, if they are moving faster, taht means ur shooting illgally. UNLESS the ball is leaving th barrel at legal limits, and just decelrate(sp) as fast as a normal paintball. or i'm babbling.. =\

[petefol]

i would think they would also be very hard to produce

[MasterYoda]

Unless a rule was instated where only spherical paintballs could be used to level the playing feild, then dimpled paintballs would not be illegal. There is such a rule in golf, otherwise we would all see golfballs with hexagonal dimples. If you think about it this way, a golf ball is going to fly farther under the same conditions as a sphere with the same characteristics without dimples. This is because the dimpled ball has less drag force on it, thus has a lower negative acceleration. F=ma, if the mass is constant, then it can be seen that the smaller force promotes a smaller acceleration. So a conventional paintball fired from the barrel at under 300fps should have less distance than a uniformly dimpled one fired at the same speed. What if they were placed in dimpled molds while they were dried? We have all found paintballs in a cheap bag of paint that have experienced a similar fate.

[docjon]

Paintballs already cost 5 cents to make. The
retooling costs would be prohibitive. I don't
think we would like to double the cost.

[docjon]

Have you ever seen what a golf ball does when it is
sliced. It zings of into the woods at about a 90 degree
angle. This is the problem. when the ball spins the
dimples increase the force on one side and decrease
the force on the other ( greater than without dimples)hence
the slice. Since you never know what direction the
paintball will be spinning you don't know whether the
ball will go into the ground or shoot up to the stratos-phere.

[bryan]

What effects would ball deformation have on this? Since the dimples must be uniform what if under the stresses of being fired it changed the shape of a few?

[docjon]

Ball deformation may not be a big issue. The reason I
say this is that by the time the ball leaves the barrel
the ball usually has regained its normal shape.

The problem with paintballs is this. You are dealing with
not only aerodynamics but fluid dynamics at the same
time, as long as the ball is spinning. If the ball does
not spin then I would bet the effects of fluid
mechanics would be small if not non existant.

The proof of better performance is in the putting.
I have seen weird things produce some amazing results
when the predicted model said no way. The only way
to know for sure is to go about making and testing.

Happy thanksgiving and God bless. jon

[toymyster]

Doc is absolutely correct!! If you could keep the paintball perfectly stable, then it could work!! But we all know that is impossible!! Therefore, if you make a dimpled ball, because of the liquid fill, not a single one would fly straight!!!

[sniper1rfa]

are the exclamation marks really neccessary?

although dimples would b impractical, ive always wonderd about somethihng like knurling the die, or even just taking sandpaper to them (both would have a similar affect).

and they DO make hexagonally dimpled golf balls, i have a sleeve of'em. :)

[Brak]

it wont work. 2 reasons: too much money, and they wont shoot far because the dimples will be letting air through instead of being pushed by it. golf balls dont have that problem :)

[rifleman]

http://www.automags.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1265&highlight=golf

Tom - "Been there, done that." :)



Adam

[flanders]

jjust not fesable

making dimples evenly in the ball is so hard to do do to the fact that it's filled with liquid that will go some wear golf balls are dimpled by carving in the serface no further compacting

it wont wok for the same reason that it you want it to work, air passes over and by it too easy

[automagII]

if you want dimpled balls get them off the shelf at walmart!
they have cool swirls!!!!!