Ministry Research Labs
In our never ending quest to find the best equipment. We made and tested another ball.
The experiment: Will putting water inside balls help for juggling or contact?
The quick answer: No. This ball sucked and sucked hard.
Experiment #1 - Ball partly filled with water: Forget it, what you get is the slosh factor. The ball wobbles when it rolls or flies, water sloshing around inside. Failed.
Experiment #2 - Ball completely filled with water: Quick answer - it’s no good.
Long answer: Here the difference is more subtle. To throw and catch it is very similar to a solid ball, good weight for contact. It can be arm rolled and butterflied, but its much harder than a regular ball. the significant difference is that while the ball has linear inertia, it has almost zero effective rotational inertia. What this means for a contact juggler: when you roll it down your arm, it’s far more difficult to control, it has less stability. It’s a bit like having a very slippery ball, and slippery tights covering your arms. A solid ball must both rotate sideways and translate sideways in order to fall of your arm, a water filled ball has only to translate sideways, the water inside does not need to rotate. no rotation requires less energy, and so in feeling the ball is more skittish. It can be arm rolled and butterflied, but its much harder than a regular ball.
Conclusion: Don’t fill your balls with water, it won’t help. It reduces rotational inertia and so reduces stability. and what we need for hand rolling, arm rolling and body rolling is a bit more stability/ Coming soon, balls that are better not worse!
June 5th, 2007 at 5:41 am
OMG drew you’re a geek.
Good research, though.
June 5th, 2007 at 11:55 am
lol! that’s exactly what I did when I was waiting for my first acrylic…
I did my first palmcircle exercises with an old stage ball filled with water; My problem at the time was to close the opening…Palmcircles with wet hands!!
^^
June 7th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
I seen and tried balls filled with silicone-oil.
The Play make these balls from Italy..
Its was nice, bit like russian style balls, but the rolling was easier than russians, but much stable than a stage ball.
My friends father use this oil for something.
He gave me some, i think i search it, and try to fill a stage ball if i have enough…
August 9th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
I have used water filled ball for very long time because I can’t find normal acrylic ball in Bulgaria. I have learned the butterfly, arm rolls, reverse arm rolls, the circle, back to back… But it is true that it is very hard.