A bad ball

[RC]

Today, standards for golf balls are pretty impressive. If you use a $4 ball, you can be pretty confident it will be uniform and perform well. Just for comparison, years ago you carried a ring and passed balls through it, spinning them around to check for consistency. Some even put a dot on their ball and would spin it in a fluid to make sure it was "balanced." After 3 to 6 holes almost no balata ball was still round.

For the first time in the modern ball era, I noticed a funny flight on a drive during today's round. I hit a very good slight draw to left center, and it stops drawing and slides to the right edge of the fairway, veering right in flight. The distance was good, but I was puzzled. I left it in play for the iron approach (the ball looked new and perfectly round.) The iron was hit well, straight at the middle of the green, and suddenly it makes a major turn left and dives into the trap -- I know I did not pull hook it. After playing out the hole, I took the ball out of play. Later in the round we got to a place where I could hit the ball safely out into the forrest so after my tee shot, I teed up the bad ball and hit it very well out over the trees... it was cork-screwing in the air.

So my question... what in the world could have been wrong with this ball? It is one of the top balls on tour, and it had to be very unbalanced. Anyone else encounter a new, top of the line ball, that is more than cosmetically defective?

[enduro]

So my question... what in the world could have been wrong with this ball? It is one of the top balls on tour, and it had to be very unbalanced. Anyone else encounter a new, top of the line ball, that is more than cosmetically defective?

It could be defective but they tend to put them through a tolerance test.

I've heard from others that modern high performance balls do in fact warp. Because they compress so much they can in fact lose their form slightly. I've also heard that if they are older they tend to fail as well since they have chemical half lives, etc that don't do well in that time. Can't verify any of this! Did it putt fine?

[Msokol13]

That is weird.

[microcrayfish]

You should have kept it and sent it away to Titleist (assuming it was the ball in your sig). They could have told you what was wrong with it and probably would have sent you a sleeve as compensation.

[RC]

It was a new ball, right out of the sleeve, a Pro V1X. Neither of the other two balls in that sleeve had any issues at all. It had been played a hole or two before I noticed it, but later, after thinking about it, on the previous hole, an iron to the center of the green kicked hard left and into a collection area for no good reason -- I was pretty upset about that but the rub of the green and all, well, it could have happened, just seems abnormal. Balls seldom kick 20 yards to the side on straightish shots into the green. It was a 150 yard 9 iron, with wind help, and it flew normally until it landed.

Yeah, should have kept it. But I was curious and whatever was going on was getting worse each shot. Maybe a crack in one of the inner layers? Doesn't seem feasible. The cover was new looking and the ball sure seemed round. It just flew very strangely.

If you were old enough to play balata balls, sometimes in a range bucket you would get one with a cut on it, a lip of cover sticking out to the side. As I kid I would hit these just to watch the strange ball flight. The more I hit this new defective ball, the stranger the flight pattern was, and come to think of it, I missed a putt that did not break normally. Wish I could blame all my mistakes on a bad ball, but seriously, this one was bad.

Probably one of those one-in-a-billion coincidences. No big deal, just weird.

[David in FL]

I imagine it's possible to have gotten a bad ball. Nothing made by man is 100% perfect every time.

Beyond that, the only thing I would think is that a bad scuff, especially the "hairy" kind, either from a hard wedge or an encounter with a cartpath can really affect the flight.....but I'm guessing you would have noticed that and changed the ball before the tee shot.

Gotta admit, modern balls beat the heck out of the old balatas though!

[Saig55]

I found a Pro V1X and thought this is great. After the first hit I knew why someone left it. It wobbled thru the air. I hit it twice because I didn't believe it the first time. DUH!!

[RC]

Come to think of it, I did hit my bad ball in the direction of Tennessee... maybe you found it -- it was hit pretty hard, just flew in funny ways. Sorry, did not mean any disrespect (from a transplanted Texan.)

Since having this happen, someone else mentioned they had gotten a truly bad ball from another manufacturer -- a ball also played on tour by several pros. Quality control is likely not an issue with any of the good brands, but on occasion, there are bad ones.

[iacas]

I hit a ball the other day... a rock had gotten buried in it (a small rock, like a little larger than some sand). I hit the ball off one tee and the thing ballooned so much it looked like I'd popped the ball up.

On the next tee I cleaned the driver face and hit it and it did the same thing - it went about 200 yards out, 200 yards up, and looked like a popup. I'd hit the ball in the middle of the face - and I don't remember the last time I popped up a tee shot. I don't tee the ball high enough and I hadn't even brushed the grass with the driver.

So I hit it off a cliff on the 18th tee and the ball drew and then faded really, really hard. Joe (ERC7.5) witnessed all of this. My only theory is that the little rock either worked into the golf ball and maybe cracked the core or something. I don't know, but the ball behaved even more bizarrely than the one in your story.

I had been playing the ball for the previous 15 holes without any problems. Only after it got the little rock inside it did it start acting VERY funny.

[jamo]

I actually did a science fair report on golf ball dimples (top flite D2, Callaway HX, DT Roll vs. DT Carry) and the science behind the dimples is a creation of turbulence encasing the ball, rather than a smooth ball , which has all of the turbulence behind it. The dimpled balls create a smooth "coating" of air that essentially makes it smooth and hugs the golf ball in th back, which limits bad turbulence. Its hard to explain (maybe thats why i got an 88) but i can scan a diagram from a book i used as a source if you want.

The point is, even a small blemish in the cover will destroy the aerodynamic properties of the ball.

[mirv]

i've had several balls pull that corkscrew effect in the air - most of mine start right and curve left in a draw, and then as the ball is coming down, it spins back right again and lands, essentially, as if i'd hit a dead straight shot. though, i've never had a ball right out of the box do that to me - every time i've had it happen, it's just been some random ball i found in the woods or something. not a crap ball, necessarily, but not brand new.