About me: See my profile.
About the ball: 15 lbs, 3 1/8" Pin, 5 3/8" x 3 1/4", pin over bridge, CG strong (below and just right of ring finger)
I found this one on the close-out rack at Impact Pro Shop, Sun City, Arizona. To date, this is my best-ever “bargain ball.” The Big Bang is a medium–load particle ball that looks like just another medium RG, medium differential RG piece. But geez this piece, as drilled, matches my A-game and comfort zone perfectly. It has become my first-out-of-the-bag ball over three other very capable benchmark balls: The Conquerer, World Class Particle Pearl and Black Pearl Reactive. Each of these pieces is excellent and each get to the pocket in a different manner for me. This is by design, as I want each ball in my arsenal to exhibit a different shape in transit from the foul line to the 1-3 pocket. The Conquerer is a pin down medium-load particle ball, the WCPP is essentially a stacked-leverage light load particle pearl, and the Black Pearl Reactive is essentially a label-leverage, high differential reactive pearl. All are very capable benchmark balls, but my Big Bang, drilled 5 x 3, pin over bridge, is just a hoot to watch rolling and reacting down the lane, then it does bad things to the rack: Very bad things
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Out of the box, this ball needs conditioner in the heads and midlane (and doesn’t mind carry down in the back end). It gets better length than I expected and this continues until the mid lane fries. At that point I have three options: (1) Stay with the Big Bang and play around the dry, (2) switch to the Black Pearl Reactive and move a little left into the hold, or (3) switch to the Hornet and throw it right into the teeth of the dry. It’s nice having multiple options when this happens.
Synthetic Lanes: See above. Wood Lanes: The Big Bang is good on heavy to medium. I have better options for medium-dry to dry and short patterns. My Big Bang is also decent on sport patterns but my Conquerer (or WCPP) is usually first out on long sport patterns while my Hornet often gets first call on the short patterns at least until carrydown becomes an issue.
Summary: Another terrific ball from Lane Masters highest quality materials, great control, familiar thunderclap when the Big Bang hits the hole, messengers galore, and perhaps most importantly, a roll down lane that just makes me feel good all over
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Edited on 1/1/2011 at 10:31 AM