Are you ready for some NFL Football? 2014 Edition.

[club ho]

After hearing Belichick's interview I think I know how the air pressure deflated:

Belichick described making playing conditions as bad as possible which includes soaking the balls smearing them with mud, etc. The equipment managers after the practice have to wash and clean these soiled balls. I am sure there is an equipment room in Gillette stadium that is heated in order to dry out the equipment for the next days practice. Lets say the room is kept at 90 degrees in order to insure that the balls and gear dry out for the next day. Now if the ball pump is located in this room then an equipment manager would be filling the game balls with air that is at an ambient room temperature of 90 degrees. The air coming out of a air compressor is warmer them the air that went in so lets add another 10 to the ambient 90 degrees. making the internal ball air temp at 100 degrees. Now the equipment manager takes the balls from the equipment room down the hall  to the referees room for inspection. The balls are checked before they had time to cool down and are found to have 12.5 degrees pressure in them the way Brady likes it.

Now the ball are taken outside last Sunday it was rainy and about 45 at game time. That is 55 degrees colder than when they were inspected. After three hours in this environment the balls are reinspected and found to be missing air. No big surprise the air had time to contract.

Another example now with the new automobile technology I notice the tires on my pickup truck drops a couple of degrees on nights when the temp drops  from 60 to 20 degrees. a 40 degree drop.

[newtogolf]

After hearing Belichick's interview I think I know how the air pressure deflated:

Belichick described making playing conditions as bad as possible which includes soaking the balls smearing them with mud, etc. The equipment managers after the practice have to wash and clean these soiled balls. I am sure there is an equipment room in Gillette stadium that is heated in order to dry out the equipment for the next days practice. Lets say the room is kept at 90 degrees in order to insure that the balls and gear dry out for the next day. Now if the ball pump is located in this room then an equipment manager would be filling the game balls with air that is at an ambient room temperature of 90 degrees. The air coming out of a air compressor is warmer them the air that went in so lets add another 10 to the ambient 90 degrees. making the internal ball air temp at 100 degrees. Now the equipment manager takes the balls from the equipment room down the hall  to the referees room for inspection. The balls are checked before they had time to cool down and are found to have 12.5 degrees pressure in them the way Brady likes it.

Now the ball are taken outside last Sunday it was rainy and about 45 at game time. That is 55 degrees colder than when they were inspected. After three hours in this environment the balls are reinspected and found to be missing air. No big surprise the air had time to contract.

Another example now with the new automobile technology I notice the tires on my pickup truck drops a couple of degrees on nights when the temp drops  from 60 to 20 degrees. a 40 degree drop.

Read the stories, that theory has already been considered and dismissed.  Just accept your team cheated (not the first time) and enjoy the Super Bowl.

[trickyputt]

After hearing Belichick's interview I think I know how the air pressure deflated:  Belichick described making playing conditions as bad as possible which includes soaking the balls smearing them with mud, etc. The equipment managers after the practice have to wash and clean these soiled balls. I am sure there is an equipment room in Gillette stadium that is heated in order to dry out the equipment for the next days practice. Lets say the room is kept at 90 degrees in order to insure that the balls and gear dry out for the next day. Now if the ball pump is located in this room then an equipment manager would be filling the game balls with air that is at an ambient room temperature of 90 degrees. The air coming out of a air compressor is warmer them the air that went in so lets add another 10 to the ambient 90 degrees. making the internal ball air temp at 100 degrees. Now the equipment manager takes the balls from the equipment room down the hall  to the referees room for inspection. The balls are checked before they had time to cool down and are found to have 12.5 degrees pressure in them the way Brady likes it.   Now the ball are taken outside last Sunday it was rainy and about 45 at game time. That is 55 degrees colder than when they were inspected. After three hours in this environment the balls are reinspected and found to be missing air. No big surprise the air had time to contract.  Another example now with the new automobile technology I notice the tires on my pickup truck drops a couple of PSI on nights when the temp drops  from 60 to 20 degrees. a 40 degree drop.

FiFY

[ghalfaire]

So the college players had a fifty percent chance of getting it right. When I was a young college student I was sure of everything even though I was wrong just as often as right. Theisman's opinion is far more telling then a couple of young college players. In the heat of a championship game I am sure that the last thing on BRADY's mind is the ball pressure.

Just for drill here if the probability of the individual college guys getting it right is 50% then the probability of both getting it right is 25%.  Theisman's opinion would certainly be more meaningful in the sense he is more skilled and more experienced than the college players.   However he does have a dog in the fight so to speak and maybe isn't as objective as he might be.  No I am not calling Joe a liar, just involved in the game with an interest in seeing the game continue.  That is were his paycheck comes from after all.  Another comment is that anyone as good as Brady or Manning is involved and concerned with everything relating to their ability to perform at their peak capabilities.  Tom Brady already says he picks out the 12 game balls that are submitted for approval in the game.  I am not accusing him of knowing the balls were under inflated but the comment "I wasn't worried about the balls" just doesn't pass the smell test with me.

Final comments are when 11 of the 12 game balls were not to NFL specifications someone(s) surely knew and it was a deliberate act.  The only other explanation is the equipment used by the Patriots to inflate the balls and the equipment used by the NFL to check inflation both failed to operate correctly and in such a was so as both gave the same incorrect reading on pressure .  The latter event is so unlikely that no one who thinks could believe it.  So someone cheated in my opinion.  Who I don't know.

[club ho]

Read the stories, that theory has already been considered and dismissed.  Just accept your team cheated (not the first time) and enjoy the Super Bowl.

So explain to me why the tires in my pickup truck lose a couple of degrees pressure on nights when the temp drops 50 degrees? Who dismissed the theory?

[club ho]

Here is a very enlightening link that supports my theory. Good Year experts claim a 1-2 degree change in tire pressure for every 10 degree change in temperature.

http://www.goodyear.com/cfmx/web/corporate/media/news/story.cfm?a_id=371

[ghalfaire]

After hearing Belichick's interview I think I know how the air pressure deflated:

Belichick described making playing conditions as bad as possible which includes soaking the balls smearing them with mud, etc. The equipment managers after the practice have to wash and clean these soiled balls. I am sure there is an equipment room in Gillette stadium that is heated in order to dry out the equipment for the next days practice. Lets say the room is kept at 90 degrees in order to insure that the balls and gear dry out for the next day. Now if the ball pump is located in this room then an equipment manager would be filling the game balls with air that is at an ambient room temperature of 90 degrees. The air coming out of a air compressor is warmer them the air that went in so lets add another 10 to the ambient 90 degrees. making the internal ball air temp at 100 degrees. Now the equipment manager takes the balls from the equipment room down the hall  to the referees room for inspection. The balls are checked before they had time to cool down and are found to have 12.5 degrees pressure in them the way Brady likes it.

Now the ball are taken outside last Sunday it was rainy and about 45 at game time. That is 55 degrees colder than when they were inspected. After three hours in this environment the balls are reinspected and found to be missing air. No big surprise the air had time to contract.

Another example now with the new automobile technology I notice the tires on my pickup truck drops a couple of degrees on nights when the temp drops  from 60 to 20 degrees. a 40 degree drop.

Nice try but you should do a Google search on "Amontons Law" (a derivation of the Ideal Gas Law) to see what kind of temperature change it takes to get the pressure of 12.5 psi to drop to 10.5 psi making the assumption that 12.5 psi is at 100 degrees F.  If I did the arithmetic correct if the balls are inflated to 12.5 psi at a temp of 100 deg F it would take a temperature drop to 10 deg. F to reduce the pressure to 10.5 psi.  Don't you just hate physics?   It was cold that day but not that cold and I don't want to hear about wind chill factor as that only affects heat generating things.

[ghalfaire]

So explain to me why the tires in my pickup truck lose a couple of degrees pressure on nights when the temp drops 50 degrees? Who dismissed the theory?

Losing a couple of pounds of pressure in a tire inflated to 30-35 psi is a lot different than losing a couple of pounds of pressure in a football inflated to 12.5 psi.

[saevel25]

Here is a very enlightening link that supports my theory. Good Year experts claim a 1-2 degree change in tire pressure for every 10 degree change in temperature.

http://www.goodyear.com/cfmx/web/corporate/media/news/story.cfm?a_id=371

Tires are a bit different then footballs. Also a car has about 4000-5000 lbs on its tires. So there is constant pressure on the tire.

For simplicity lets say that the amount of air in the ball stays constant.

Pressure 2 = Pressure 1 * (Volume 1 / Temp 1) * (Temp 2 / Volume 2)

Lets assume the volume doesn't change. A ball can deform and still have the same volume. The math to find the volume just becomes more complex.

If that is true, then the Pressure 2 = Pressure 1 * (Ratio of Temps)

So lets say the Patriots filled the ball at 72 degrees, with a initial pressure of 12.5 (league minimum), and lets say the balls get down to 45 degrees. To save the steps and conversion to correct units, the answer would be

Pressure 2 = 11.1 psi

So the ball loses about 1.4 psi.

Now here's the tricky part, lets assume that the ball gains volume if it is fully inflated. Leather is flexible and stretches. This is more of a intrinsic analysis. If you look at the equation. Temp 2 is less than Temp 1, so Pressure 2 decreases. If volume is the same the it decreases by about 1.4 psi. Volume 1 is when at full PSI, so that would be larger than Volume 2 when it has less pressure. So really if the ball stretches out when it is at 12.5 psi and contracts at a colder temp then I would say the final psi would be slightly less than 1.4 psi because the ball is losing volume.

That being said, I do not think the volume changes that much on 2 psi. Heck it might be negligible, which I think it is. Meaning I think in the end if you round to 1 or 2 significant digits the would end up at 1.4 or 1.3 psi.

Also think about this, the average error for a pressure gauge is around +/- 0.5 psi. So lets say that the the NEP used a gauge that says 12.5 psi, but it is actually around 12.0 psi. Lets say the Ref used a gauge that was also over-reading the values. You can easily see a -1.0 psi difference. No one said they use the same gauge.

So you got 1.4 psi, and if both gauges were over-reading you could easily see 2.4 psi under pressure.

People see 12.5 and assume that that is what is actually being measured.

[club ho]

Tires are a bit different then footballs. Also a car has about 4000-5000 lbs on its tires. So there is constant pressure on the tire.

For simplicity lets say that the amount of air in the ball stays constant.

Pressure 2 = Pressure 1 * (Volume 1 / Temp 1) * (Temp 2 / Volume 2)

Lets assume the volume doesn't change. A ball can deform and still have the same volume. The math to find the volume just becomes more complex.

If that is true, then the Pressure 2 = Pressure 1 * (Ratio of Temps)

So lets say the Patriots filled the ball at 72 degrees, with a initial pressure of 12.5 (league minimum), and lets say the balls get down to 45 degrees. To save the steps and conversion to correct units, the answer would be

Pressure 2 = 11.1 psi

So the ball loses about 1.4 psi.

Now here's the tricky part, lets assume that the ball gains volume if it is fully inflated. Leather is flexible and stretches. This is more of a intrinsic analysis. If you look at the equation. Temp 2 is less than Temp 1, so Pressure 2 decreases. If volume is the same the it decreases by about 1.4 psi. Volume 1 is when at full PSI, so that would be larger than Volume 2 when it has less pressure. So really if the ball stretches out when it is at 12.5 psi and contracts at a colder temp then I would say the final psi would be slightly less than 1.4 psi because the ball is losing volume.

That being said, I do not think the volume changes that much on 2 psi. Heck it might be negligible, which I think it is. Meaning I think in the end if you round to 1 or 2 significant digits the would end up at 1.4 or 1.3 psi.

Also think about this, the average error for a pressure gauge is around +/- 0.5 psi. So lets say that the the NEP used a gauge that says 12.5 psi, but it is actually around 12.0 psi. Lets say the Ref used a gauge that was also over-reading the values. You can easily see a -1.0 psi difference. No one said they use the same gauge.

So you got 1.4 psi, and if both gauges were over-reading you could easily see 2.4 psi under pressure.

People see 12.5 and assume that that is what is actually being measured.

Having grown up in New England I can remember noticing balls that we left in the back yard over night were considerably softer on a cold day. Obviously just an anecdotal observation but I am sure many people can remember this. This should be very easy to prove and there must be a Utube showing what happens when a ball is put under these conditions.

[ghalfaire]

Here is a URL for all that would like to have some knowledge of the Ideal Gas Law.

http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Physical_Chemistry/Physical_Properties_of_Matter/Phases_of_Matter/Gases/The_Ideal_Gas_Law

I am sure there will be a bunch of you that just can wait to see this.   You might pay special attention to the fact that the units used in the equation have to be consistent, otherwise you get an incorrect answer.  I won't bore 99% of you that don't care about the physics of gases, but I'll tell you it is highly improbable that temperature change is what caused the problem.  It just takes too large of a temperature change to deflate the ball 2 psi from 12.5 psi to make any sense at all.

[club ho]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9snXobeCC78

This Utube validates my theory

[newtogolf]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9snXobeCC78

This Utube validates my theory

Why didn't Indy's footballs lose the same amount of pressure?

[dsc123]

Why didn't Indy's footballs lose the same amount of pressure?

It was 50 degrees warmer on the Colt's sideline and in the spot on the Patriots sideline where the 12th ball was kept.

[Gunther]

Having grown up in New England I can remember noticing balls that we left in the back yard over night were considerably softer on a cold day. Obviously just an anecdotal observation but I am sure many people can remember this. This should be very easy to prove and there must be a Utube showing what happens when a ball is put under these conditions.

Are you for real or just messin with us?

[Golfingdad]

It was 50 degrees warmer on the Colt's sideline and in the spot on the Patriots sideline where the 12th ball was kept.

Light bulb!! The ball boys on that sideline (surely Indy doesn't bring their own?) were smart enough to store the balls on the heated bench whenever possible

[dsc123]

Light bulb!! The ball boys on that sideline (surely Indy doesn't bring their own?) were smart enough to store the balls on the heated bench whenever possible

Dan

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[trickyputt]

[QUOTE name="club ho" url="/t/76052/are-you-ready-for-some-nfl-football-2014-edition/1242#post_1097791"]   So explain to me why the tires in my pickup truck lose a couple of degrees pressure on nights when the temp drops 50 degrees? Who dismissed the theory?  [/QUOTE] Losing a couple of pounds of pressure in a tire inflated to 30-35 psi is a lot different than losing a couple of pounds of pressure in a football inflated to 12.5 psi.

So if its so simple express the change in volume. I imagine the worker bee inflated the balls inside where it was warm, and it wasnt their money so they had the heat up to 72F. What is the volume of the pro ball anyway?