Bowling ball Bowling ball A bowling ball is a piece of sporting equipment used to hit bowling pins in the sport of bowling. Balls used in ten-pin bowling are typically hard spheres with three holes drilled in them, one each for the ring and middle fingers, and one for the thumb. Regulating bodies such as the USBC maintain requirements for the properties of bowling balls, including size, hardness, and number of holes, as well as maintaining a list of bowling balls approved for competitive play. Other bowling balls, such as those used in five-pin bowling, candlepin bowling, and duckpin bowling are smaller,
Ten-pin bowling set by human pinsetters or "pin boys", but with the invention of the semi-automatic pinspotter in 1936 (usually just the "spotting table" component), the process became much easier. In 1946 AMF Bowling launched the first commercial fully automatic pinspotter, the AMF Model 82-10, followed closely by the more developed 82–30 model (still in common use in the 21st century) to replace the earlier Brunswick semi-automatic and fully manual bowling establishments. Brunswick itself introduced its own "Model A" automatic pinspotter design to bowling centers in 1955, and along with its successors (A2 and "JetBack", both with quicker delivery of returned balls