Balls – R. Hudetz

The celluloid table tennis ball as we know it appeared in the late eighteen nineties in the USA. This is surprising because table tennis does not have much of a tradition in the USA. However, most table tennis historians agree with the story of Englishman James Gibb bringing the first celluloid balls to England from the USA in 1891. Until that time, the game was played mostly with cork balls the size of up to 5 cm in diameter, but also with balls made of solid rubber. Cork balls were usually covered with textile and had low bounce. In contrast, rubber balls were hard, heavy and had high bounce. It was precisely such balls that prevented the faster development of table tennis, only the appearance of celluloid balls in England led to a sudden increase in the popularity of table tennis. Soon after the celluloid balls first appeared, they started to be produced in Essex, England.  According to certain data, over 2 million balls were produced in the factories as early as 1902. The rapidly growing popularity of table tennis was stimulated by new equipment – balls made of celluloid and rackets with pimpled rubber covering, which enabled the development of table tennis as a sport. Celluloid balls have been an irreplaceable basic piece of table tennis equipment since the beginning of the twentieth century. “Ping-pong” – the first name for table tennis, was most likely created as an onomatopoeia of the sound of the celluloid ball bouncing against the table and the racket. The term “ping-pong” is still used today – for example the famous “ping-pong diplomacy” – the opening of Chinese-American political negotiations with the help of table tennis! The term ping-pong is still used for table tennis, but mostly as a hobby game, not a sport, except in China, where table tennis is still called ping-pong ball. Over a hundred years of celluloid ball dominance was only partially interrupted by the short-lived parallel use of the plastic ball in the early eighties of the twentieth century. In England at that time, Dunlop produced the Barna balls, which were made of plastic. These balls received an ITTF certificate and were approved for the largest international competitions. However, they did not stay in use for long because they were very hard and had a different bounce from celluloid balls. Although they were much more durable than celluloid balls, their big weakness was that after a short period of use their surface became quite smooth and actually unsuitable for play! As the factory did not manage to cure the “childhood illnesses” of the plastic balls in an adequate way, they disappeared from use after a relatively short time. Today’s ITTF rules for a ball that must be uniformly round specify a diameter of 40 mm with a tolerance of plus/minus 0.5 mm, a weight of 2.7 g with a tolerance of plus/minus 0.3 g and bounce from a height of 30.5 cm on a standardized steel plate that should be between 23.5 and 25.5 cm. In addition, the ITTF carries out regular inspections of ITTF approved balls. From all ITTF approved ball brands, 24 balls are taken from a randomly selected shop every other year. Their colour is then inspected by a spectrometer, the bounce of the ball is measured with a digital camera, the diameter is measured in various planes with a special measuring instrument. Pressure, at which tolerated ball deformation is from 0.71 to 0.87 mm, is applied with 5 kg weights! If the randomly selected and inspected balls are not within the allowed tolerance, the balls can be removed from the ITTF approved list after additional inspections. Ball colour – according to the rules, the allowed ball colours are white and orange. In 1969, research at the Technical University of Braunschweig already confirmed that yellow and orange balls had higher visibility. However, today only white balls are used in all the most important competitions. For a while, it seemed that orange would gradually succeed in replacing white, but that trend was interrupted after the European Championship in Eindhoven in 1998. What happened? The organizers in Eindhoven made an effort to ensure the best possible conditions for television broadcasts. After consultation, it was decided that the game will be played on blue tables using orange balls, which will provide maximum visibility for TV viewers and of course, the players. A big mistake was made by leaving the colour of the ITTF approved Gerflor floor out of sight. At the tournament itself, and especially during television broadcasts, the ball disappeared from sight the moment it was no longer above the table. Due to the complementary colours of the ball and the floor, the ball became “invisible” above the floor and on television it looked as if the players were moving and swinging for a shot without the ball. As the blue tables and the Gerflor floor were already widely used, the orange ball practically disappeared from major competitions and the white ball returned to the scene, even though the orange ball on the blue table proved to be a better solution! Plastic vs Celluloid – Plastic balls made a big comeback in 2013. The International Table Tennis Federation ITTF decided to introduce plastic balls in 2013. These would initially be used simultaneously with celluloid balls and then completely replace them. The first plastic balls of the new generation have already been tested by top players and the ratings are positive. The technical possibilities of making adequate plastic balls are much greater today compared to thirty years ago. The main reason why table tennis is once again turning to plastic balls is celluloid! Today, celluloid is used in table tennis ball production, otherwise it has been replaced everywhere by more modern materials with better technical characteristics. The production of celluloid around the world has almost died out. Due to the complex production process of celluloid balls, the rigorous health protection of workers, the relatively large amount of manual labour needed and hence, low return on production assets, all European ball factories closed their doors a long time ago. Today, quality balls are, with one exception, produced exclusively in China. The production of balls was restarted only in one factory in Japan, which now produces balls of the highest quality but at a proportionally high price. All other ball factories, about fifteen of them, are located in China, so in that segment, table tennis is directly dependent on Chinese production. Round tiles are cut from celluloid sheets, which are then heated to 100 °C and formed into hemispheres, and then joined into a ball. It is important that both hemispheres are exactly the same weight and hardness, and that the seam used to join them is perfect. This is even more difficult to achieve with 40 mm diameter balls than it used to be with 38 mm diameter balls. After the balls are produced and after the mandatory sanding to make the surface of the ball rough, selection is done. For a long time, the standard selections were three-star balls, which were of the highest quality, then came two-star balls and finally, one-star balls. Today, the best quality balls are those that have an ITTF certificate (ITTF approved) for all international competitions. In addition, there are so-called practice balls, and the star marks have actually disappeared. Back when 38 mm diameter balls were still being produced, only fifteen percent of all the balls produced were selected as the highest quality category, which was also the most expensive category, while the remaining balls were categorized in two-star and one-star categories, and the lowest quality balls were sold to hobby players under another name. That worst part of the selection was sold below the cost of production, and the loss was covered by the profit from the sale of the best quality balls. After the introduction of 40 mm diameter balls, the production problems got worse. Because of the larger diameter and the weight limit, the balls became softer and any irregularity is much more pronounced with the larger ball diameter. Therefore, the percentage of the selected highest quality balls has also dropped. Table tennis ball factories today classify the first few selections which fit into the ITTF standards, into A 1, A 2, and similar categories, so even among the ITTF approved balls there are differences in quality. The selection in the factories is done automatically with the help of a convenient device. During tournaments, players pick the ball they want to play with by hand before the match. For a long time, this selection was done on the table, before the match – both players tried a few balls and then agreed which of the selected balls they would play with. Such a procedure was surely not propaganda by the manufacturer that sponsored the event, because when players throw away balls that have the ITTF approved mark, it is bad marketing. Another thing that used to happen was that the players could not agree for a long time which ball they would play with, because one player wanted one and the other player wanted another! Due to all of the above, a rule that states the players have to choose the ball with which they will play, as well as spare balls, before the match and in front of the referee, was introduced. The ball selection process no longer takes place on the table or in front of the spectators. In addition to other disadvantages, the problem with celluloid is that it is a highly flammable material, so there are special precautions for the storage and transport of balls, which also causes considerable costs. There was a well- known case where a container with 500,000 balls exploded in Hong Kong at a temperature of 34 °C. In the EU, stored table tennis balls must be separated from other parts of the warehouse by a fire wall and all fire safety regulations must be strictly followed. The plastic balls that would soon replace celluloid balls would have significant advantages. Firstly, their production would not require celluloid, a material that has completely fallen out of use in the rest of the industry due to its technical characteristics, rather they would be made out of widely available plastic. Plastic balls would be noticeably more durable and their quality much more uniform. Technically, two celluloid hemispheres would no longer be joined into one ball, which created a problem in terms of the quality of the seam that joins the two halves, but also the need for both halves to be of exactly the same weight and hardness. Plastic balls would be made using a completely different technology, where there will be no such joining of two halves. In the end, the fact that the balls would no longer be made of easily flammable material, which caused many problems during transport and storage, would also come as a great advantage. For plastic balls, the rules would define significantly smaller tolerances for volume and weight, which means that the balls will be of more uniform quality. By the way, the rules that state that balls can be made from celluloid or other material do not have to be changed for the transition from celluloid to plastic, the ball only has to have a specific diameter, weight and bounce on a standardized board! Did you know? – In the years after World War II there was a considerable shortage of balls – there were not enough balls on the market, and they were very expensive. The players managed by “patching up” broken balls, among other things. Parachute silk or similar materials were used for “patching” or an already completely unusable ball was cut open and a piece of that celluloid was dissolved with acetone and used to patch the crack on the ball! Of course, the ball was afterwards no longer evenly round, but even that was better than having no ball at all! Ball factories in Europe started closing their doors as early as the seventies and in a relatively short period of time, production moved from Europe to China. While the ball factories were previously mainly connected to a well-known table tennis brand, with the production moving to China, all European table tennis companies were forced to start buying from Chinese factories. It is estimated that over 90% of table tennis balls in the world are now produced in China! – When it comes to the most powerful shots, the ball is deformed by as much as 25% of its volume during the game. – In Japan, 550,000 table tennis balls were used to study and simulate avalanches. – There are quite a few collectors of table tennis balls around the world. One of the most famous is German Dieter Lippelt, who has a collection of over 5,800 different balls! – Ukrainian table tennis enthusiast Sergei Korkin assembled a team with which he climbed to the highest European peak on Mount Elbrus in the Caucasus, set up a table there and played a game of table tennis on 31 July 2009 at an altitude of 5585 m and a temperature of -11 °C. It was recorded in the Guinness Book of Records as the table tennis match played at the highest altitude. The problem during the game was that the balls flew much further at that altitude due to the air being thinner than it is in the lowlands! – In preparation for changing the ball diameter from 38 mm to 40 mm, an invitational test tournament was played in Copenhagen with the new 40 mm ball. It was expected that the new, bigger and slower ball would be an advantage for defensive players, but it was already clear on that first occasion that these predictions were unfounded. The great English defender Syed had much more problems with this new ball than his fellow attackers, and the difficulties for the defenders would not disappear later either. The basic problem was still the ball’s strong defensive rotations. – Numbered table tennis balls are used in many lotteries to draw lottery numbers – for example, the German lotto uses 49 lacquered table tennis balls that are drawn from a drum. – Various coloured and colourful balls are produced for hobby playing. Additionally, balls with several differently coloured segments are used in player education to make it easier to see the ball’s rotation. There were several experiments where the balls were marked with various lines, which should have allowed for easier “reading” of the ball’s rotation. Although the experiments were successful in practice, such balls did not end up being used in the game because the industry was not interested in making their mass production technically possible. – Nowadays, no one would even think about training players who play serious competitive table tennis without so-called “many balls” practice, that is, intensive training with continuous introduction of new balls into the game. That kind of practice, as well as training with table tennis robots, requires numerous balls. This is not a problem because there are relatively cheap quality training balls. Surely, this way of training has led to the fact that players are no longer so sensitive when choosing or changing the ball. Contrary to modern training with many balls, once upon a time a new ball was considered a real treasure! When I won the junior national doubles championship in 1952 and second place in the individual competition, upon returning from the championship, the then president of my club, the legendary Lovro Ratković, called me, congratulated me on my success and gave me 3 new Barna balls as a reward! I was really happy with that unexpected award. Can you imagine a junior champion today who would be delighted by such an award?!