A golf ball is a ball A ball is a round, usually spherical but sometimes ovoid, object with various uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for simpler activities, such as catch, marbles and juggling. Balls made from hard-wearing materials are used in designed to be used in the game of golf Golf is a precision club-and-ball sport, in which competing players , using many types of clubs, attempt to hit balls into each hole on a golf course while employing the fewest number of strokes. Golf is one of the few ball games that does not require a standardized playing area. Instead, the game is played on golf "courses", each of.

Under the Rules of Golf The Rules of Golf and the Rules of Amateur Status is published every two years by the governing bodies of golf to define how the game is to be played. The Rules have been published jointly in this manner since 1952, although the code was not completely uniform until 2000 (with mostly minor revisions to Appendix I). The Rules Committee of The R&, a golf ball weighs no more than 1.62 oz (45.93 grams), has a diameter not less than 1.68 in (42.67 mm), and performs within specified velocity, distance, and symmetry limits. Like golf clubs A golf club is used in the sport of golf to hit a golf ball. Each club is composed of a shaft with a lance and a clubhead. Woods are mainly used for long-distance fairway or tee shots; irons, the most versatile class, are used for a variety of shots; putters are used mainly on the green to roll the ball into the cup, golf balls are subject to testing and approval by the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews is one of the oldest and most prestigious golf clubs in the world . It is based in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, regarded as the worldwide "Home of Golf". Formerly, it was also one of the governing authorities of the game, but in 2004 this role was handed over to a newly formed group of and the United States Golf Association The United States Golf Association is the United States' national association of golf courses, clubs and facilities and the governing body of golf for the U.S. and Mexico. Together with The R&A, the USGA produces and interprets the Rules of Golf. The USGA also provides a national handicap system for golfers, conducts 13 national championships,, and those that do not conform with regulations may not be used in competitions (Rule 5-1 — also see rules of golf The Rules of Golf and the Rules of Amateur Status is published every two years by the governing bodies of golf to define how the game is to be played. The Rules have been published jointly in this manner since 1952, although the code was not completely uniform until 2000 (with mostly minor revisions to Appendix I). The Rules Committee of The R&)

History

Wooden Wood is a hard, fibrous tissue found in many plants. It has been used for centuries for both fuel and as a construction material for several types of living areas such as houses. It is an organic material, a natural composite of cellulose fibers embedded in a matrix of lignin which resists compression. In the strict sense wood is produced as balls were the first used golf balls until the early 17th century, when the featherie ball was invented. This added a new and exciting feature to the game of golf. A featherie is a hand sewn leather pouch stuffed with chicken or goose The word goose is the English name for a considerable number of birds, belonging to the family Anatidae. This family also includes swans, most of which are larger than true geese, and ducks, which are smaller feathers Feathers are one of the epidermal growths that form the distinctive outer covering, or plumage, on birds. They are considered the most complex integumentary structures found in vertebrates, and indeed a premier example of a complex evolutionary novelty. They are among the characteristics that distinguish the extant Aves from other living groups and coated with paint. The feathers in the ball were enough to fill a top hat. They were boiled and put in the cowhide bag. As it cooled, the feathers would expand and the hide would shrink, making a compact ball. If there were openings in the cowhide, stitchings were used to close them up. Due to its superior flight characteristics, the featherie remained the standard ball for more than two centuries. However, an experienced ball maker could only make a few balls in one day, so they were expensive. A single ball would cost between 2 shillings In the United Kingdom, the shilling was a coin used from the reign of Henry VII until decimalisation in 1971. Before decimalisation there were twenty shillings to the pound and twelve pence to the shilling, and thus 240 pence to the pound and sixpence and 5 shillings, which is the equivalent of around 10 to 20 US dollars today.^[1] Also, it was hard to make a perfectly spherical ball, and because of that, the ball often flew irregularly. When playing in wet weather, the stitches in the ball would rot, and the ball would split open after hitting a hard surface.

In 1848, the Rev. Dr Robert Adams Paterson (sometimes spelt Patterson) invented the gutta-percha Gutta-percha is a genus of tropical trees native to Southeast Asia and northern Australasia, from Taiwan south to the Malay Peninsula and east to the Solomon Islands. It is also an inelastic natural latex produced from the sap of these trees, particularly from the species Palaquium gutta. Chemically, gutta-percha is a polyterpene, a polymer of ball (or guttie).^[2][3] The gutta was created from dried sap of a Sapodilla Tree. The sap had a rubber-like feel and could be made round by heating and shaping it while hot. Accidentally, it was discovered that defects in the sphere from knicks and scrapes of normal use, could provide a ball with a truer flight than a pure sphere. Thus, makers started creating intentional defects in the surface by hammering the ball to give it an evenly dimpled shape which would cause the ball to have a more consistent ball flight. Because gutties were cheaper to produce and could be manufactured with textured surfaces to improve their aerodynamic qualities, they replaced feather balls completely within a few years.^[4]

In the 20th century, multi-layer balls were developed, first as wound balls consisting of a solid or liquid-filled core wound with a layer of rubber thread and a thin outer shell. This idea was first discovered by Coburn Haskell of Cleveland, Ohio in 1898. Haskell had driven to nearby Akron to keep a golf date with Bertram Work, then superintendent of B.F. Goodrich. While he waited for Work at the plant, Haskell idly wound a long rubber thread into a ball. When he bounced the ball, it flew almost to the ceiling. Work suggested Haskell put a cover on the creation, and that was the birth of the 20th century golf ball. The design allowed manufacturers to fine-tune the length, spin and "feel" characteristics of balls. Wound balls were especially valued for their soft feel, and continued to be popular until the early years of the 21st century^[5].

Modern balls usually consist of several layers of various synthetic materials like surlyn or urethane A polyurethane is any polymer consisting of a chain of organic units joined by urethane (carbamate) links. Polyurethane polymers are formed through step-growth polymerization by reacting a monomer containing at least two isocyanate functional groups with another monomer containing at least two hydroxyl (alcohol) groups in the presence of a blends. They are usually classified as two-piece, three-piece, or four-piece ball according to the number of layers. They come in a great variety of playing characteristics to suit the needs of golfers of different abilities.

Regulations

The current regulations mandated by the R&A The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews is one of the oldest and most prestigious golf clubs in the world . It is based in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, regarded as the worldwide "Home of Golf". Formerly, it was also one of the governing authorities of the game, but in 2004 this role was handed over to a newly formed group of and the USGA The United States Golf Association is the United States' national association of golf courses, clubs and facilities and the governing body of golf for the U.S. and Mexico. Together with The R&A, the USGA produces and interprets the Rules of Golf. The USGA also provides a national handicap system for golfers, conducts 13 national championships, state that diameter of the golf ball cannot be any smaller than 1.680 inches. The maximum velocity of the ball may not exceed 250 feet per second (76 m/s) under test conditions and the weight of the ball may not exceed 1.620 ounces.

Until 1990, it was permissible to use balls of no less than 1.62 inches in diameter in tournaments under the jurisdiction of the R&A.^[6]

Aerodynamics

When a golf ball is hit, the impact, which lasts less than a millisecond A millisecond is a thousandth (1/1000) of a second, determines the ball’s velocity In physics, velocity is the rate of change of position. It is a vector physical quantity; both magnitude and direction are required to define it. The scalar absolute value of velocity is speed, a quantity that is measured in meters per second (m/s or ms−1) when using the SI (metric) system, launch angle In geometry, an angle is the figure formed by two rays sharing a common endpoint, called the vertex of the angle. The magnitude of the angle is the "amount of rotation" that separates the two rays, and can be measured by considering the length of circular arc swept out when one ray is rotated about the vertex to coincide with the other and spin A rotation is a movement of an object in a circular motion. A two-dimensional object rotates around a center of rotation. A three-dimensional object rotates always around an imaginary line called an axis as the Euler's rotation theorem shows. If the axis of rotation is within the body, the body is said to rotate upon itself, or spin—which rate, all of which influence its trajectory A trajectory is the path a moving object follows through space as a function of time. The object might be a projectile or a satellite, for example. It thus includes the meaning of orbit—the path of a planet, an asteroid or a comet as it travels around a central mass. A trajectory can be described mathematically either by the geometry of the path, (and its behavior when it hits the ground).

A ball moving through air experiences two major aerodynamic forces, lift A fluid flowing past the surface of a body exerts a surface force on it. Lift is defined to be the component of this force that is perpendicular to the oncoming flow direction. It contrasts with the drag force, which is defined to be the component of the surface force parallel to the flow direction and drag In fluid dynamics, drag refers to forces that oppose the relative motion of an object through a fluid (a liquid or gas). Drag forces act in a direction opposite to the oncoming flow velocity. Unlike other resistive forces such as dry friction, which is nearly independent of velocity, drag forces depend on velocity. Dimpled balls fly farther than non-dimpled balls due to the combination of two effects:

First, the dimples on the surface of a golf ball cause the boundary layer on the upstream side of the ball to transition from laminar to turbulent. The turbulent boundary layer is able to remain attached to the surface of the ball much longer than a laminar boundary and so creates a narrower, low pressure, wake and hence less pressure drag. The reduction in pressure drag causes the ball to travel further.

Second, backspin In racquet sports, backspin , is a shot such that the ball rotates backwards (as though rolling back towards the player) after it is hit. The trajectory of the shot involves an upward force that lifts the ball (see Magnus effect). While a normal hit bounces forward, when backspin shots bounce, they tend to bounce off the sides or even bounce up generates lift by deforming the airflow around the ball, in a similar manner to an airplane wing A wing is a surface used to produce lift for flight through the air or another gaseous or fluid medium. The cross-sectional shape of a wing is referred to as an airfoil. The word originally referred only to the foremost limbs of birds, but has been extended to include the wings of insects , bats, pterosaurs, and aircraft. The term is also applied. This is called the Magnus effect The Magnus effect is the phenomenon whereby a spinning object flying in a fluid creates a whirlpool of fluid around itself, and experiences a force perpendicular to the line of motion. The overall behaviour is similar to that around an aerofoil with a circulation which is generated by the mechanical rotation, rather than by aerofoil action. Backspin is imparted in almost every shot due to the golf club's loft (i.e., angle between the clubface and a vertical plane). A backspinning ball experiences an upward lift force which makes it fly higher and longer than a ball without spin.[1] Sidespin occurs when the clubface is not aligned perpendicularly to the direction of swing Golf is a precision club-and-ball sport, in which competing players , using many types of clubs, attempt to hit balls into each hole on a golf course while employing the fewest number of strokes. Golf is one of the few ball games that does not require a standardized playing area. Instead, the game is played on golf "courses", each of, leading to a lift force that makes the ball curve to one side or the other. Unfortunately the dimples magnify this effect as well as the more desirable upward lift derived from pure backspin. (Some dimple designs are claimed to reduce sidespin effects.)

To keep the aerodynamics optimal, the golf ball needs to be clean, in order to avoid any impediments to the aerodynamic effect of the ball. Thus, it is advisable that golfers frequently wash their balls. Golfers can wash their balls manually, but mechanical ball washers A ball washer or ball shagger is a piece of equipment for the cleaning of dirty golf balls. Because golf balls have a rough surface in contrast to other balls and are used primarily on grassy surfaces, they tend to collect dirt more easily, which can seriously affect their aerodynamic properties. Ball washers are almost always found on golf are also available.

Design

Dimples first became a feature of golf balls when a certain Taylor patented a dimple design in 1908. Other types of patterned covers were in use at about the same time, including one called a "mesh" and another named the "bramble", but the dimple became the dominant design due to "the superiority of the dimpled cover in flight".^[7]

Most golf balls on sale today have about 250 – 450 dimples, though there have been balls with more than 500 dimples^{[citation needed]}. The record holder was a ball with 1,070 dimples — 414 larger ones (in four different sizes) and 656 pinhead-sized ones. All brands of balls, except one, have even-numbered dimples^{[citation needed]}. The only odd-numbered ball on the market is a ball with 333 dimples, called the Srixon Srixon is a brand owned by SRI Sports Limited, a subsidiary of Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd., specializing in golf and tennis. Srixon is most well known globally for its golf balls, holding the largest number of golf ball patents worldwide, and having previously supplied other leading manufacturers such as Dunlop Slazenger with great success AD333^{[citation needed]}.

Officially sanctioned balls are designed to be as symmetrical Symmetry , generally conveys two primary meanings. The first is an imprecise sense of harmonious or aesthetically pleasing proportionality and balance; such that it reflects beauty or perfection. The second meaning is a precise and well-defined concept of balance or "patterned self-similarity" that can be demonstrated or proved according as possible. This symmetry is the result of a dispute that stemmed from the Polara, a ball sold in the late 1970s that had six rows of normal dimples on its equator but very shallow dimples elsewhere. This asymmetrical design helped the ball self-adjust its spin In particle physics and quantum mechanics, spin is a fundamental characteristic property of elementary particles, composite particles , and atomic nuclei.[notes 1]-axis during the flight. The USGA refused to sanction it for tournament play and, in 1981, changed the rules to ban aerodynamic asymmetrical balls. Polara's producer sued the USGA and the association paid US$1.375 million in a 1985 out-of-court settlement.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office The United States Patent and Trademark Office is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that issues patents to inventors and businesses for their inventions, and trademark registration for product and intellectual property identification's patent A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state (national government) to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for a public disclosure of an invention database A database consists of an organized collection of data for one or more uses, typically in digital form. One way of classifying databases involves the type of their contents, for example: bibliographic, document-text, statistical. Digital databases are managed using database management systems, which store database contents, allowing data creation is a good source of past dimple designs. Most designs are based on Platonic solids In geometry, a Platonic solid is a convex polyhedron that is regular, in the sense of a regular polygon. Specifically, the faces of a Platonic solid are congruent regular polygons, with the same number of faces meeting at each vertex; thus, all its edges are congruent, as are its vertices and angles such as icosahedron In geometry, an icosahedron is a regular polyhedron with 20 identical equilateral triangular faces, 30 edges and 12 vertices. It is one of the five Platonic solids.

Golf balls are usually white, but are available in other high visibility colors, which helps with finding the ball when lost or when playing in low-light or frosty conditions. As well as bearing the makers name or logo, balls are usually printed with numbers or other symbols to help players identify their ball.

Selection

There are many types of golf balls on the market, and customers often face a difficult decision. Golf balls are divided into two categories: recreational and advanced balls. Recreational balls are oriented toward the ordinary golfer, who generally have low swing speeds (80 miles per hour or lower) and lose golf balls on the course easily. These balls are made of two layers, with the cover firmer than the core. Their low compression and side spin reduction characteristics suit the lower swing speeds of average golfers quite well. Furthermore, they generally have lower prices than the advanced balls.

Advanced balls are made of multiple layers (three or more), with a soft cover and firm core. They induce a greater amount of spin from lofted shots (wedges especially), as well as a sensation of softness in the hands in short-range shots. However, these balls require a much greater swing speed that only the physically strong players could carry out to compress at impact. If the compression of a golf ball does not match a golfer's swing speed, either the lack of compression or over-compression will occur, resulting in loss of distance. There are also many brands and colors to choose from, with colored balls and better brands generally being more expensive, making an individual's choice more difficult.

Marking and personalisation

Golfers need to distinguish their ball from other players to ensure that they do not play the wrong ball. This is often done by making a mark on the ball using a marker pen A marker pen, marking pen, felt-tip pen, or marker, is a pen which has its own ink-source, and usually a tip made of a porous material, such as felt or nylon. Special tools for marking balls with the players names or initials are also available. Alternatively, balls can be printed with lettering, a pattern or a picture. Companies and event organisers commonly have balls printed with their logo as a promotional tool.

Trick balls

A number of designs of novelty ball have been introduced over the years, mainly as practical jokes for the amusement of fellow golfers, but also as "cheater" balls that do not conform to the Rules of Golf The Rules of Golf and the Rules of Amateur Status is published every two years by the governing bodies of golf to define how the game is to be played. The Rules have been published jointly in this manner since 1952, although the code was not completely uniform until 2000 (with mostly minor revisions to Appendix I). The Rules Committee of The R&. All of these are banned in sanctioned games, but can be amusing in informal play:

• Breakaway balls are brittle and hollow, and shatter into many small pieces when hit.
• Exploding balls are similar, but employ a small explosive device that disintegrates the ball when hit. Many courses have banned these as the charge can damage the turf, the player's club or even cause injury, leading manufacturers to develop the breakaway.
• Stallers are far softer than a normal golf ball, allowing them to be compressed far more easily and are given greater backspin when hit. Both of these give the ball a huge amount of lift, producing shots climb very high into the air with very little distance travelled over the ground. In the right conditions, such a ball may travel backwards along its flight path or even perform a loop-de-loop.
• Sponge balls are softer still; they are generally used as indoor or backyard practice balls, but some are deceptively similar in appearance to a normal ball. Such a ball will travel less than a quarter of the distance of a normal golf ball.
• Wobblers have a center of mass that is not in the exact center of the ball or is loose within the ball. When putted, the ball will move unpredictably off the intended line.
• Floaters are less dense than a regulation golf ball so when hit into a water hazard, they bob on the surface when a normal ball would sink.
• Super-distance balls have deeper dimples and are heavier than allowed by regulation, which allows them first to maintain momentum and second to maintain a thicker "envelope" of still air around them which reduces turbulence and wind resistance. Marketers of these balls generally advertise a 12-yard gain on most distance shots.
• Night golf balls Glow in the dark golf balls either luminous balls or inserted glow sticks.

Used and refurbished golf balls

Used golf balls are golf balls that have been played, most likely hit into a water hazard, then retrieved, cleaned up and resold. Used golf balls come in different gradings, and are commonly referred to as "lakeballs".

Cleaned recycled golf balls means "Cleaning only". The found golf ball goes through a wash process that allows the recovered golf balls to soak in a cleaning solution. The golf balls are then washed in a specially designed golf ball washer. All of these steps are performed without changing anything with the golf balls performance. Refinished and/or refurbished golf balls are subjected to a stripping, blasting or repainting process. A refinished or refurbished golf ball is a very low quality golf ball that goes through an aggressive surface preparation by chemical and/or mechanical stripping of the original paints from the golf ball. The stripped golf ball is then repainted and reprinted. At this point the golf balls performance has been altered in some manner. The weight may have changed, the actual size of the golf ball has been changed due to excessive paint or the dimples of the golf ball have been improperly filled. In some cases the refinished golf ball will not conform to USGA standards.

Radio location

Golf balls with embedded radio transmitters to allow lost balls to be located were first introduced in 1973, only to be rapidly banned for use in competition.^[8][9] More recently RFID Radio-frequency identification is the use of an object (typically referred to as an RFID tag) applied to or incorporated into a product, animal, or person for the purpose of identification and tracking using radio waves. Some tags can be read from several meters away and beyond the line of sight of the reader transponders A communications satellite’s channels are called transponders, because each is a separate transceiver or repeater. With digital video data compression and multiplexing, several video and audio channels may travel through a single transponder on a single wideband carrier. Original analog video only has one channel per transponder, with have been used for this purpose. This technology can be found in some computerized driving ranges A driving range is an area where golfers can practice their swing. It can also be a recreational activity itself for amateur golfers or when enough time for a full game is not available. Many golf courses have a driving range attached and they are also found as stand-alone facilities, especially in urban areas. They are typically run by businesses. In this format, each ball used at the range has its own unique transponder code. When dispensed, the range registers each dispensed ball to the player, who then hits them towards targets in the range. When the player hits a ball into a target, they receive distance and accuracy information calculated by the computer.

World records

Canadian long drive champion Jason Zuback broke the world ball speed record on an episode of Sport Science with a golf ball speed of 328 km/h (204 mph). The previous record of 302 km/h (188 mph) was held by José Ramón Areitio, a Jai Alai Jai alai is a variety of Basque Pelota. The term is loosely often also applied to the fronton (the open-walled playing area) where the sport is played. It's called "Cesta punta" (the words for basket and tip) in Spanish player.^[10]

Footnotes

1. ^ http://www.golfclubatlas.com/interviewcook.html Kevin Cook, former editor-in-chief of Golf Magazine interviewed by Golf Club Atlas
2. ^ "Timeline of the history of golf". St Andrews Links Trust. http://www.standrews.org.uk/welcome/history/timeline.html.
3. ^ "Golf ball inventor dead" (PDF). The New York Times The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. Although it remains both the largest local metropolitan newspaper in the United States as well as third largest overall behind The Wall Street Journal and USA Today, the weekday circulation of the paper has fallen precipitously in. April 26, 1904. http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9C02E4DA1E3BE631A25755C2A9629C946597D6CF. Retrieved 2009-05-18.
4. ^ "gutta percha golf balls". The Antiques Bible. http://www.antiques-bible.com/ppf/term/gutta+percha+golf+balls/definition.asp.
5. ^ Hot, new solid-core balls have nearly KO'd their wound-ball rivals, Golf Digest , June 2001
6. ^ http://golf.about.com/cs/historyofgolf/p/timeline1990.htm
7. ^ Feldman, David (1989). When Do Fish Sleep? And Other Imponderables of Everyday Life. Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc.. p. 46. ISBN The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering (SBN) code created by Gordon Foster, now Emeritus Professor of Statistics at Trinity College, Dublin, for the booksellers and stationers W.H. Smith and others in 1966 0-06-016161-2.
8. ^ http://www.ruleshistory.com/clubs.html History of the rules of golf
9. ^ http://www.freepatentsonline.com/3782730.html US Patent 3782730
10. ^ "FSN Sport Science - Episode 7 - Myths - Jason Zuback". Sport Science. YouTube YouTube is a video-sharing website on which users can upload, share, and view videos. Three former PayPal employees created YouTube in February 2005. In November 2006, YouTube, LLC was bought by Google Inc. for $1.65 billion, and is now operated as a subsidiary of Google. The company is based in San Bruno, California, and uses Adobe Flash Video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ito3BSO-St8. Retrieved 2009-07-27.

External links

• Online golf ball museum with more than 1000 different golf balls
• Golf ball aerodynamics

History

• A history of the golf ball
• All about Golf Balls

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