Hey this is BR with pickle ball effect since the vulcan v Pro flight ball was announced as the official ball for PPA tournaments there’s been some debate on how it compares to other popular outdoor balls there’s been a wide range of varying opinions but no one has gathered any objective data to compare their performance so that’s what I set out to.
Do with this test I put together I wanted to better understand how each ball Compares with each other and to help folks decide what ball they want to play with so for this test I measured the power pop Spin and bounce of the Vulcan vpro flight Franklin x40 Onyx Dura cker S1 and the Yola helius the Vulcan Franklin and Dura retail for.
About $4 a ball while the selker S1 is 375 and the Yola helius is 325 a ball but it’s worth noting that all ball options other than the Vulcan redu in price when you buy in bulk so if you get a 100 pack rather than a three pack then it’s cheaper per ball if you do decide to purchase any of these balls I have links to them in the description of the.
Video to conduct the test I utilized two brand new balls for each brand I was testing in an indoor setting to eliminate the influence of wind and temperature on the results using my stalker Pro 2s radar gun I measured the power of each ball in miles per hour by taking the 10 measurements of my hardest serve and calculating the average.
Likewise to measure Pop I use the radar gun to measure the miles per hour behind a stationary punch volley by again taking 10 measurements additionally I used the same radar gun to collect 10 measurements of the ball’s spin RPMs and took the average finally I determined the bounce high of the ball by measuring the average height attained during 10.
Bounces by dropping the ball from the same height each time I know these tests aren’t perfect but I did my best to produce the most accurate results so with that out of the way here’s what I got starting with power the dura was the clear winner here and the Yola not being too far behind and then we had a steady decrease in speed until we got to the.
Franklin which was quite a bit slower than the others looking at Pop now the results followed nearly the same ranking as it did for power though the celer and Frank swap spots we saw a small decrease between each ball other than the dura which blew the rest of the balls out of the water the results for spin shook things up though we had the dura at the.
Top again but Franklin jumped up to number two and Yola fell to the bottom I will say that we should put an aster on these results because I did the spin test while the balls were fairly new and they weren’t super scuffed up yet I performed the spin test after I did the others like the power and pop test they were somewhat scuffed up but not.
Completely so the difference in spin here May be more of a result of how quickly the ball gets scuffed versus how much spin they can actually produce but it still gives us an idea but take that for what it’s worth lastly we have the bounce test which put things back into a similar ranking as Pop and power though the Yola jump to the number one spot and.
The dura drop to the second spot for a final comparison you can see all the categories lined up next to each other here in this table if you want to play with a fash ball then the dura and the Yola are the way to go if you want something in the middle then the Vulcan is a good choice and if you want something softer and slower than the.
Celk and Franklin are your best options there to conclude I’ll add some of my thoughts about the balls outside of just looking purely at performance so the dura is fast but is also the least durable ball in the bunch and will crack on you quicker than the others I personally prefer playing with the dura while Outdoors during the hot summer.
Months because it doesn’t get too mushy and still plays with some speed I imagine the Yola is similar in that regard as well likewise in cooler temperatures I prefer the Franklin because the cooler temps firm up the ball and it plays faster without cracking too quickly like the dura would in colder temperatures additionally I’ll.
Say that though the Frankin may be the slowest ball in this group it also holds its shape the best and gives you the most predictable bounce which is worth something the other four tend to get out of round quicker and can give you more erratic bounces on hard serves and just generally when the ball is moving faster I can’t say one ball is necessarily.
Better than all the others it just depends on what you’re looking for so I hope this data helps if you’re interested in picking up any of these balls I included links in the descrip deson to purchase them I do get a small Kickback from these purchases so I appreciate anyone that uses them thanks for watching and I hope that helped.
Objective data comparing the five most prominent outdoor balls (Onix Dura, Franklin X-40, JOOLA Heleus, Vulcan VPro Flight, & Selkirk S1) to see which ones have the most power, pop, spin, and bounce.
TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 Intro
00:24 What I tested
00:35 Ball prices
00:55 Testing methodology
01:42 Power results
01:54 Pop results
02:06 Spin results
02:38 Bounce results
02:48 All results
03:05 Personal thoughts on ball performance
LINKS TO PURCHASE BALLS:
Franklin X-40: https://franklinsports.sjv.io/Qy3d93
Selkirk S1: https://www.selkirk.com/collections/balls/products/pro-s1-12?sca_ref=1945879.KgYa6r1ANw&sca_source=yt
JOOLA Heleus: https://joolausa.com/heleus-pickleball-balls/?ref=8190
Onix Dura: https://fromuthpickleball.com/product/47527/durafast-40-outdoor-pickleball-box-of-4?rfsn=5939069.07b17a&variantid=47213
Vulcan Vpro Flight: https://vulcansportinggoods.com/products/vulcan-pro-flight-outdoor-pickleball
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Website version: https://pickleballeffect.com/pickleball-paddle-database/
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@pickleballeffect You might want to test the Owl ball which the APP will be using.
FINALLY someone who does stats on the balls
Im a 5.0 player and by far out of all the balls diadem is by far the best ive played with the same 3 balls for the last 2 weeks and not one of them has yet to crack or have a weird bounce
I play in Florida so cold weather is not an issue. That should reduce the cracking issue, wondering about the out of round issues. Will hot weather affect that at all? And will speed be more equalized in hot weather or will the Dura be even faster relative to the Franklin, which is used almost universally here? I prefer faster balls so may start bringing Duras.
Thanks Braydon. Would like to see these test done on other options like OSO, Vega40, GB, Diadem etc.I've noticed that a few of the off brand balls have hundreds of tiny tiny bubbles in them. Those bubbles eventually turn to small "pits" that hold on to dirt.
Appreciate the comparison…very thorough. Wish Komodo's K-40 had been part of the test group…I really like them, but only know how they compare to Franklin X-40
Spin is dictated by dwell time on the paddle and surface of said paddle. A Selkirk or Joola has half the dwell and spin rate of a Legacy, 6.0 or Volair. The only thing that should be tested when it comes to ball longevity is density.
Bottom line the Dura fast forty, The true original game ball …a true skill level players ball. Any tournament that doesn't use a dura is a waste of time.
Franklin ball is terrible the last thing this game needs is longer points with no put aways
If you want to be a great player, use a great ball. The dura fast 40!!! All others are garbage.
I appreciate the work that went into this. Would you be able to produce a separate video on deformity issues and cracking? There have been many stories about some of the balls going out of round etc. These are issues that affect me more than a slight variance in pop and power.
Any chance you can test the Gear Box ball?