Plastic balls

What did the new revolution in 2014 bring? Table tennis has gone through many stages of development since its beginnings. Rule changes as well as the development of equipment have improved it, but were sometimes also seen as a hindrance to the development of our sport. Let’s revise: – Table tennis starts to be played with a celluloid ball in England in 1900 – In 1901 the era of pips rubber begins, and lasts until the beginning of the nineteen fifties – In 1926 the first world senior championship was played – In order to increase the possibility of an attacking game at the end of the nineteen thirties, the height of the net was lowered to today’s 15.25 cm – in 1938, the service rule was changed, the hand serve which enabled a very strong ball rotation using fingers was forbidden and from then on, the ball has to be thrown into the air first, and only then hit. – In 1951 sponge racket covering appears – In 1959, sponge covered rackets are banned because of harm they started to cause to table tennis development. Sponge remained in use only as a base for pips rubber. – In the early nineteen sixties, new “sandwich” rubber combining sponge and rubber with inward facing pips enabled the rapid development of the topspin game. – At the end of the nineteen seventies, the use of the so-called “gluing” technique began. Gluing the rubber with special adhesives allows extreme ball rotation and significantly speeds up the game. – In 1983, a rule stating that one side of the racket must be red and the other black, was introduced – the rule was introduced to prevent the practice of surprising the opponent by spinning the racket with two black rubber sides, each of different characteristics, because that way the opponent had no chance of distinguishing what kind of rubber surface the ball was hit with. – In 1988 table tennis became an Olympic sport – In the year 2000, the 40 mm diameter ball is introduced, replacing the previous 38 mm diameter ball. – In 2001 sets of up to 11 points are introduced with the intention of making the matches more dynamic and more interesting for the spectators – in 2005 it was forbidden to “glue” rubber and use any means that would change its original characteristics. The most significant changes that directly affected the development of table tennis are the ones listed. Most of the rule changes were aimed at preventing trends that began to threaten the development of table tennis. The 2014-2015 season introduced big new changes – balls made of plastic replaced balls made of celluloid. Plastic balls were already used during large competitions organized by the International Table Tennis Federation that season, celluloid balls would continue to be used as well, until they were completely put out of use. It was not necessary to change the rules regarding the ball to introduce plastic balls because those rules do not mention what material the ball must be made of! For a short time, thirty years ago, table tennis was played using Barna Dunlop plastic balls. Large international tournaments were played using those first plastic balls as well, but the players rejected them because they were really not good for playing, they were as hard as stone. Ever since and until recently, there were no more attempts to manufacture plastic balls. In the meantime, the situation has changed significantly – celluloid has been replaced in all areas in which it was used, except in the production of table tennis balls. According to European regulations, there are very strict and expensive measures regarding the production of celluloid in order to protect the workers producing it. Because demand for celluloid radically dropped, all celluloid factories in Europe stopped working. Celluloid is still produced, but exclusively in China and only for the production of table tennis balls, which also moved from Europe to China. In addition, celluloid is an easily flammable material, so the transport and storage of celluloid balls is difficult and relatively expensive. Due to the development of plastic materials and their increasingly widespread use in all domains of life, it is natural that an outdated material such as celluloid is replaced by plastic, which is much more modern. The possibility of producing plastic balls began to be explored in China a few years ago, initiated by The Commission for Table Tennis Equipment of the International Table Tennis Federation, which was then headed by German physicist Dr. Joachim Kuhn. A Chinese ball factory produced the first test samples of plastic balls In cooperation with the ITTF. The big innovation with these balls was that the whole ball was cast from one piece, unlike celluloid balls, where two hemispheres are joined and therefore have a seam where they are joined. This required a completely new technique and new equipment for the production of balls. There was an immediate problem with these balls – because they did not have a seam, the existing measuring instruments were not suitable for official ball measurement, which is done to check that the balls meet ITTF regulations. It was not necessary to change the basic ball rules because of it, but it was necessary to develop new measuring instruments. The first thing players who tested the new balls noticed was a significantly different sound they made, and that was really just a matter of getting used to the sound. What was much more worrying was that the players mentioned far more serious problems – the first samples were supposedly harder, they did not spin well, and they became very smooth relatively quickly, even though they did not crack. In the meantime, another Chinese factory started producing test samples of plastic balls and was reportedly ready for mass production as well. That other factory produced balls the same way as the classic celluloid balls were produced, that is, by joining two hemispheres and creating a seam. Top players who had the opportunity to test samples of plastic balls with and without seams said that they had significantly different characteristics. When current celluloid balls are added to that, it turns out that at the moment there are three types of balls with completely different playing characteristics, all of which could receive official ITTF approval. If everything remained as it is, it would be comparable to the differences in tennis in terms of playing on clay, concrete and grass surfaces. Does that mean that we could have specialists for a certain type of ball, just as there are specialists for certain surfaces in tennis?! The registered patent for the production of plastic balls presents another problem. Legally, it is not entirely clear whether the patent owner should be paid a fee for each plastic ball, and the patent owner himself has not determined what the fee would be, if it is required by law. Due to all of the above, the price at which plastic balls would be sold is not even close to being known. Connoisseurs claim that the balls will definitely be more expensive than before?! According to the ITTF, plastic balls were already supposed to be in official use during the 2013-14 season, but this did not happen because the manufacturers stated that they could not produce sufficient quantities of plastic balls for the whole world in time. Every day there is less time to solve all the technical problems related to the production of balls and their quality, and to produce sufficient quantities for the worldwide demands of table tennis until the 2014/15 season. We should hope that all problems will be resolved in time, and if not, that the ITTF will once again postpone the use of plastic balls to avoid significantly greater difficulties than those that arose when the 40 mm balls were introduced in 2000.