A Volumetric Contact Model to Study the Effect of Lane Friction and the Radii of Gyration on the “Hook Shot” in Indoor Bowling

Bowling refers to a series of sports in which a player rolls a spherical “bowling ball” towards a set of vertical targets or “pins”; where the objective is to knock down as many pins as possible, Werner (1995). In indoor bowling the game is played on a flat wooden or synthetic surface. To increase the probability of hitting the maximum number of pins, players often impart an initial spin that makes the ball curve and hit the target at an angle. For a right-handed player, the usual curve goes from right to left and is known as a “hook shot”. In this paper, a volumetric contact model has been used to simulate the “hook shot” by modeling the interaction between the ball and the lane. The principal objective is to study the effectiveness of the modeling framework towards the study of the effects of the lane friction and the initial kinematic conditions on the trajectory of the shot. The construction of the core of the ball and the variation of its radii of gyration will also be investigated for their contributions towards the “hook”.