Best bat for pitching machine work

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Jun 8, 2016
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BTW, the reason the sound a bat makes (often) changes after a while is related to what I was talking about with regards to changes in the trampoline effect.
 
Jun 8, 2016
16,118
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Bats are engineered hence undergo a design process. The design process is an interplay between performance and durability. If a bat manufacturer wanted to, they could design a bat which could withstand 1000's of hits off the handle of the bat but I doubt anybody would buy that bat.

If a bat breaks due to "on design" use, e.g. a reasonable (no idea what they would consider reasonable but a lot more than a few months of travel ball player BP/games) amount of contact off the barrel, then there was more than likely a defect in the material and/or manufacturing process which cannot be incorporated during the design process (well you could..but see my comment above regarding nobody buying it..)

Designing a bat is lot closer to designing an airplane than it is to designing bridge..(not in its technical difficulty per se but in the interplay I mentioned above..)
 
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radness

Possibilities & Opportunities!
Dec 13, 2019
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I always have to trust you on the e=mc2 stuff.

We did always have a spare but dd tended to use the same one in games and practice until it went south.

I kind of wish all this was on the recent thread Rad started about machine use.

And one of the problems with my hillbilly science is @CoreSoftball20 is not a fan of machine balls and he has been around a lot of bats for a long time.

My other oft used point is that college kids hit machine balls constantly. No itty bitty bat breaker in 14u is swinging harder than a college kid who is in the weight room constantly and can legally order a Margarita after practice.
😁Does a legal Margarita help better
than a non-legal margarita?

Never considered if Margarita's help batting averages but I do think they may have helped team camaraderie 🎉
 
Dec 11, 2010
4,713
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I would say it's the sheer volume of swings off that machine and some miss hits that destroy.
Sheer volume of front toss is not much different.

Here is the thing: if you are a softball player for long, you will have to hit machine. If your game bat has a warranty, you might as well swing the one that has a warranty. I tracked bats carefully. More than once when a bat came out of warranty, that became a bat only used in games I.e. as few swings as possible.

I tried going the route of a cheap bat off of eBay. What ended up happening is it would break, it would have no warranty and I would be out the full amount I paid instead of shipping on a warranty claim.

The Rocketechs always come up in these discussions. Great bats. Very durable. A very *different* bat for a kid to swing than most gamers are going to be. That’s the prob if you want to practice with a similar bat.

I know I seem like I’m arguing but I am guessing there are parents here struggling with this and maybe my approach will work for them.
 

radness

Possibilities & Opportunities!
Dec 13, 2019
7,270
113
Yes degraded over time. Because of that would be hard to determine the exact reason at one moment of perceived damage causing the bat to fail.
( Miss hit or otherwise)

Was in manufacturing for many years involved with all different types of metals, aluminum extrusions, composite materials and such.
At the level of producing parts for military fighter jets. And medical equipment devices.
Then office equiptment level like chairs.

My comment would be pending the accuracy of quality control over materials used could have a substantial impact on failure.
ie:good batch vs bad batch of materials.
 

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