Bridgestone's New Dimples (e12 Contact)

[Missouri Swede]

29 minutes ago, Zippo said:

I'll stand by my earlier comments about the dimples and impact compression until I can find data that tells me differently.

Impact Analysis of a Golf Ball (comsol.com)

This one is interesting:

Microsoft Word - scc12_liu.doc (simulia.com)

From the "interesting" one:

Quote

the role of the dimples cannot be ignored the more complex interaction between the ball and the grooved club faces and it could have a significant effect on behaviors like spin generation.

 

[saevel25]

36 minutes ago, Zippo said:

I'll stand by my earlier comments about the dimples and impact compression until I can find data that tells me differently.

Dimples improve aerodynamics of the golf ball in flight and keep the ball in the air. 

The cover is a uniform material and really wouldn’t increase or decrease compression that much. When it comes to strikes with the driver, the cover is the least influential layer compared to the core and the intermediate layers. 

 

[boogielicious]

9 hours ago, Zippo said:

I'll stand by my earlier comments about the dimples and impact compression until I can find data that tells me differently.

Impact Analysis of a Golf Ball (comsol.com)

This one is interesting:

Microsoft Word - scc12_liu.doc (simulia.com)

 

 

It’s an interesting claim, but how does it really translate to performance? It can be confirmed there is more contact surface area, but the effect on backspin, side spin and flight need to be demonstrated. 

[IowaGreg]

Golf ball compression is important because it affects the distance and control that you will gain on a golf shot. Your ability level will determine which kind of golf ball you will get the best feel and distances with.

Firstly, on the low end of the spectrum it is possible to find low compression balls that create long distance if you have a slower swing speed. On the compression chart, these balls would often be rated between 30-70 and are ideal for beginner golfers or senior golfers. An example of a low compression golf ball in this category would be the Callaway Supersoft.

Yet at the other end of the spectrum, you have high compression balls which mean you would have to strike the ball with more speed to achieve the same kind of distance.

These types of balls, however, give the golfer more control over their shot, especially with their faster club head speeds that they are generating. These balls may be rated greater than 70 on the compression chart and are ideal for more experienced golfers. An example of a higher compression golf ball is the Callaway Chrome Soft and offers a direct comparison to the Supersoft. You can view more about the differences and similarities between these golf balls here.

A good rule of thumb which can be applied to knowing your compression level, is that golfers with a club head speed of 70mph should use a 70 Compression Ball. A golfer with a club head speed of 80mph should use an 80 Compression Ball and those with speeds of 90mph should use a 90 Compression ball with 100mph swing speeds indicating the use of a 100 Compression golf ball. By using a suitable golf ball you can make sure that you increase your average golf ball speed.

In order to get the maximum distance possible out of a golf ball, it must be fully compressed. This is when the ball will be half flattened upon impact due to enough force being applied to maximize the compression.

Golf Ball Compression: What Is It? [Complete 2020 Guide & Chart] (reachpar.com)

12 hours ago, iacas said:

Time for my regularly scheduled announcement of facts:

• A firmer ball will basically always rebound with higher ball speed.
• What a softer ball can sometimes do is spin a bit more. For some golfers, this can keep the ball in the air a bit longer.

Is that based on the wide variety of swing speeds?

Edited January 27, 2021 by iacas
fixed formatting, removed links

[iacas]

10 hours ago, Zippo said:

I'll stand by my earlier comments about the dimples and impact compression until I can find data that tells me differently.

Your earlier statements included this:

On 1/25/2021 at 10:48 PM, iacas said:

Here's Titleist's ball test lab showing what looks to me like elastic deformation of the ball on impact:

It’s false. And that video is ridiculous.

The ball is basically smeared against the face, but it’s less so with wedges, and so I believe there’s more contact with wedges with these dimples.

1 hour ago, IowaGreg said:

Is that based on the wide variety of swing speeds? 

It’s based on physics.

What you quoted (without quoting - please attribute material and quote it) -  says little about the basic physics, and what it does say it gets wrong.

Like:

Quote

Yet at the other end of the spectrum, you have high compression balls which mean you would have to strike the ball with more speed to achieve the same kind of distance.

This is not true most of the time.

Again, given the same impact parameters, a firmer ball will have a higher ball speed and a bit less spin. Until the spin gets too low, that ball will likely fly farther.

Softer balls are appealing because for some they generate a bit more spin to keep the ball in the air longer.

[IowaGreg]

28 minutes ago, iacas said:

Softer balls are appealing because for some they generate a bit more spin to keep the ball in the air longer.

 

 

33 minutes ago, iacas said:

Again, given the same impact parameters, a firmer ball will have a higher ball speed and a bit less spin. Until the spin gets too low, that ball will likely fly farther.

Softer balls are appealing because for some they generate a bit more spin to keep the ball in the air longer.

So, what happens when the impact parameters are different, like, 115mph swing speed at impact and 85mph swing speed at impact.  Which ball would be better to use?   Terms like fly further and stay in the air longer seem to be the same outcome, just worded differently.

[iacas]

1 hour ago, IowaGreg said:

So, what happens when the impact parameters are different, like, 115mph swing speed at impact and 85mph swing speed at impact.  Which ball would be better to use?   Terms like fly further and stay in the air longer seem to be the same outcome, just worded differently.

They are basically the same.

Firmer balls generate more ball speed. A ball with more ball speed goes farther than a ball with lower ball speed. So, for most golfers who generate enough spin, the firmer ball goes farther.

For some golfers who generate less spin than they need, a softer ball can help them generate more spin to make up a little distance.

Think about this: the “distance” balls of the 90s? The Pinnacles and Top-Flites? They weren’t nicknamed “rock-flites” for nothing.

A firmer ball will go farther for the majority of golfers, even if they have a lower swing speed. Two final points:

• We’re talking about literally a yard or two or three. A ball is not going to add ten yards Other things - like the short game control - matter more.
• You don’t swing your 5I at the same speed you swing your driver, so it’s not like a Pro V1 or some other firmer ball doesn’t perform once you get to slower swing speeds or ball speeds. This is more true now than ever.

[Vinsk]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

Firmer balls generate more swing speed.

I assume you meant ‘ball’ speed.

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, Vinsk said:

I assume you meant ‘ball’ speed.

Yes, sorry, I’ll fix above.

Think of it this way, @IowaGreg: the more a ball compresses, or deforms, the more energy is lost in that transaction.

Would a cotton ball go farther at any speed than a golf ball (or a golf ball that weighed as much as a cotton ball)?

[boogielicious]

@IowaGreg,

In the GIF below, Newton’s Cradle, the steel balls have almost no kinetic energy loss due to deformation. This demonstrates an elastic collision. A perfect elastic collision with no energy loss would go on forever. If the balls could deform slightly, as in plastic balls, the energy transfer would be less. The cradle would stop rather quickly. A cradle with say Playdoh on it would have complete deformation. They stop almost immediately. This is called an inelastic or “plastic” collision.

If we put golf balls in the cradle of different “compression”, which is really deformation, you could theoretically measure the energy loss. Soft golf balls that deform more, would lose more energy at impact and slow down sooner. OEM ball manufacturers measure deformation with various tools. 

 

But deformation is only one part of golf ball aerodynamics. Spin and lift due to spin with various dimple patterns also contribute. Deformation characteristics and cover softness can also affect spin. 

The end result is to find the ball that best fits your game and budget. Try different ones out and see. 

[bweiss711]

3 hours ago, IowaGreg said:

So, what happens when the impact parameters are different, like, 115mph swing speed at impact and 85mph swing speed at impact.  Which ball would be better to use?   Terms like fly further and stay in the air longer seem to be the same outcome, just worded differently.

 

I've posted this link in a few other places in the forum, but it keeps coming up as relevant for a lot of different discussions surrounding golf balls.  Its about the most objective data you can find about golf ball compression at different swing speeds.  The actual data can be found near the end of the article (middle of the page, the comments at the end take up a lot of space) if you'd like to try to draw different conclusions than the author does in the main article.

But long story, short, the data shows that a ball that is long off the driver for a 115 mph swing speed is also long off the driver for a 85 mph swing speed.  And those balls are higher compression balls.

 

The Best Golf Balls | Golf Ball Buyer's Guide | MyGolfSpy

---

Always play your best game. Read the Golf Ball Buyer's Guide from MyGolf Spy to always get the best golf balls. Read more so you can improve your game!

 

19 hours ago, dennyjones said:

I thought I saw that dimple pattern somewhere last year.  

I think the Top Flight Gamer ball has a similar pattern.  Not sure if that's what you're thinking.

[IowaGreg]

Well, my swing speed is about 95 + - a few........  So far I've liked the Pinnacle and the E12 the best......  I'll have to experiment a little more with the ProV1s....   

Thanks.........

[DaveP043]

2 hours ago, IowaGreg said:

Well, my swing speed is about 95 + - a few........  So far I've liked the Pinnacle and the E12 the best......  I'll have to experiment a little more with the ProV1s....   

Thanks.........

You might also want to check out the Snell MTB line, the Black with a bit less spin for shorter irons, the X for a little more in the short irons.  I switched from ProV1 a few years ago, I basically couldn't tell the difference.

[Zippo]

On 1/26/2021 at 5:33 PM, iacas said:

Time for my regularly scheduled announcement of facts:

• A firmer ball will basically always rebound with higher ball speed.
• What a softer ball can sometimes do is spin a bit more. For some golfers, this can keep the ball in the air a bit longer.

I respectfully disagree with your first statement. If you have data proving it I would love to see it so that I might better educate myowndarnself.

All the data (and yes, some of it is manufacturer's data,) leads me to believe that your blanket statement is not accurate. And yes, the golf ball does indeed deform against the face of the club. I can not speak to the accuracy of the video and the clip I posted above but all of the high speed images I can find show essentially the same thing - the golf ball deforming against the club face to greater or lesser degree. Here is another clip from the USGA showing ball deformation at impact:

 

 

I cannot explain the data as well or as easily as many of the websites I've found but most of them talk about  the "coefficient of restitution" - a greater coefficient of restitution for a given golf ball at a given velocity will result in more distance. The greater coefficient of restitution is usually achieve by a larger core. Here are a couple of sites from Wilson explaining this better than I am able to do:

Dx2_GolfBall_Compression_SS.pdf (retailtribe.com)

Myth vs. Fact - Soft Golf Balls | MyGolfSpy

And another:

Myths busted: low compression balls (northerngolfshop.com.au)

[iacas]

9 minutes ago, Zippo said:

I respectfully disagree with your first statement.

You're disagreeing with facts here, then. With physics.

9 minutes ago, Zippo said:

I can not speak to the accuracy of the video and the clip I posted above but all of the high speed images I can find show essentially the same thing - the golf ball deforming against the club face to greater or lesser degree

The video you posted above shows this:

That's not a golf ball. This video's been debunked multiple times. That's like a rubber ball with some dimple-like molding.

I posted a video from Titleist. Look at it. The golf ball doesn't deform anywhere near as much as that rubber ball does.

Again, this just falls down to physics: a ball that deforms more will rebound with less speed, because energy is wasted "re-forming" the shape of the ball.

Also again, we're talking about a few yards difference here.

[Shorty]

Revolutionary!!!!!!!

Uniroyal Plus 6 from the 1970s.

 

Edited January 29, 2021 by Shorty

[Darkfrog]

39 minutes ago, iacas said:

That's not a golf ball. This video's been debunked multiple times. That's like a rubber ball with some dimple-like molding.

There was a video on a YouTube channel that showed a real ball deforming similar to that, but the ball was being shot out of a specially designed golf ball cannon into an anvil or something. No way someone swinging a club could deform a ball like that. 

[boogielicious]

8 hours ago, Zippo said:

I respectfully disagree with your first statement. If you have data proving it I would love to see it so that I might better educate myowndarnself.

All the data (and yes, some of it is manufacturer's data,) leads me to believe that your blanket statement is not accurate. And yes, the golf ball does indeed deform against the face of the club. I can not speak to the accuracy of the video and the clip I posted above but all of the high speed images I can find show essentially the same thing - the golf ball deforming against the club face to greater or lesser degree. Here is another clip from the USGA showing ball deformation at impact:

 

 

I cannot explain the data as well or as easily as many of the websites I've found but most of them talk about  the "coefficient of restitution" - a greater coefficient of restitution for a given golf ball at a given velocity will result in more distance. The greater coefficient of restitution is usually achieve by a larger core. Here are a couple of sites from Wilson explaining this better than I am able to do:

Dx2_GolfBall_Compression_SS.pdf (retailtribe.com)

Myth vs. Fact - Soft Golf Balls | MyGolfSpy

And another:

Myths busted: low compression balls (northerngolfshop.com.au)

@Zippo

We have to sift through the articles and pull out all the data. None of those links address the basic question of whether a firmer ball will have a higher ball speed keeping every other parameter equal. 

The first link shows the higher compression balls being slightly longer and only compares lower tier balls. It also does not compare dimple patterns and spin, but does do a COR measurement.

The second link doesn’t include ball speed data for firmer balls.

The last link doesn’t have any data.

There a a lot of factors in ball flight and static compression is only one factor. How compression is created is another factor. Multi-layer balls can have a soft core, but harder mantle, so they compress slightly more in static tests, but react differently during impact. Other balls have just a large firm core. Spin rates and launch angle can affect flight a lot. 

Without getting too technical I hope, the cores of golf balls have a property call visco-elasticity. Visco-elasticity is the measure of deformation or flow under a force per a time length. If you slowly squish silly putty, it permanently deforms. If you bounce it quickly off the floor, it hardly deforms at all.

Golf ball cores are similar to that. In slow compression tests, the deform a lot and give us the compression number. But a higher speeds, they deform less. Silly putty’s COR is certainly velocity dependent. Golf balls have that variable too.

But then we have to add in launch angle (for which they do differ by design), spin rate and ball speed to determine flight characteristics. It is actually pretty complicated.

But the reality is the difference in total distance between the longest and shortest balls is really not that much.