Had an interesting talk with our center manager today about lane shield.  Surprisingly ABC is dictating the oil patterns that can be used with this product, of course legislation without enforcement means the houses can do whatever they want.

Initial costs are about 50% higher than a normal resurfacing, going to run the house (20 lanes) about $45,000 to install the lane shield compared to their normal resurfacing costs of $30,000.  The lanes still have to be resurfaced and recoated the first time.  I had seen some posts that states the life span of the lane shield is 2 years, another that stated 5 years.

Any either case, the big saving come from saving the lanes.  Tests indicate resurfacing only needs to be done every 5-6 years.  In our case, this will probably give us another 15 years out of the lanes.

If the lane shield only holds up for 2 years, his normal refinish cycle, he saves about $15,000.  Lane shield runs about $750 a lane to install.  Payoff in extending the life of the lanes is sure worth the gamble.

He is also going to put in black lights since he has glow bowl on the weekends.  With the UV additive in the oil, the oil patterns will show up on the lanes.  Going to be nice to finish the league, turn on the black lights and see just where the oil/carrydown really was.

Another nice feature of the lane shield is you can peel back the front part of the lane covering and install a transparent overlay under the lane shield.  He thinks he might possibly get corporate sponsors to pay to have their logo displayed in the heads.  

He’s also planning on having an overlay made up with the name and highest score put on the lane.  

He showed me a sample of the product.  Nothing at all like guardian.  This does come in rolls like the guardian but is extremely stiff.

Initial reports from a house in Ohio that has installed it indicates a good scoring condition for every style and line.  Some averages are up over 25 pins.  Just what the game needs L.

Bottom line, guess I’m just going to have to adapt to the new surface.  If it catches on though, the other houses will have to have it installed to stay competitive.  Good opportunity for ABC to start regulating again.  This might just be the answer to standardizing lane conditions.

Time will tell.  Ours is being installed the last of this month.  The house is then going to try out all 4 patterns authorized by the ABC and then let a group of us shoot on it.  I’ll try and give a detailed perspective on my thoughts about it.

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~~~SrK - Have balls, will travel

Lefty:  Wish I had more time to talk to the manager.  The main selling point for him was he estimated he only had about 3 more cuts available on the lanes.  According to the propaganda, he shouldn't have to resurface until the 6-7 year mark.  That will extend the life of the lanes another 20 years.  Lane shield cost about $375 per lane, even replacing every other year, he'll see a substantial savings.

Supposedly the surface is so consistent special patterns are required to hold the scores down.  He "thinks" there is 4 patterns available that are allowed to be used.  Here again though, how is ABC going to enforce it.

Right now all I really have is hearsay.  We're going to shoot the different patterns 1st of Aug, will update when I have some hard data.
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~~~SrK - Have balls, will travel