Surface Maintenance Of Your Bowling Balls

bowlingball.com, Originally Posted: 7/3/14; Updated: 4/23/21

If you are getting more involved in bowling than ever before or returning to the game after a layoff, it is important to keep your bowling balls in good shape and ready for use.

Surface maintenance of your bowling balls is the one sure way to stretch the life span of usefulness and get the specific reaction you want from your equipment, both with older equipment and with new bowling balls.

There are several things you can do to keep the ball surfaces ready for use. Here is a short list of maintenance actions you can take to keep your equipment prepared for competition:

1. clean the surfaces of your bowling balls between frames or after each session of use. Wipe away unneeded lane conditioner from the coverstock of each of your bowling balls to help you gain a consistent ball reaction.

2. after bowling about 30 games, bring your balls back to the pro shop for routine surface maintenance.

The pro shop professional will use a high speed ball spinner with select grit pads to screen and texture the ball surface to restore its reaction capabilities.

3. after 60 to 80 games of use, your bowling balls should be resurfaced to clear any blemishes, scratches, or nicks on the surfaces developed from normal use.

Your pro shop has the capability of resurfacing your ball and restoring a like-new finish to the coverstock.

4. between resurfacing cycles of your equipment, use grit pads to alter the surface texture of each ball to either extend or reduce the skid length and back end reaction.

You can tweak your ball reaction by adding or reducing surface texture and corresponding traction each ball yields while traveling down the lane.




Routine maintenance and cleaning of each bowling ball in your arsenal serves to protect the surface of your equipment and prolong the life of your bowling balls.

Since you invest good money in getting bowling balls to combat the lane conditions where you bowl, it only makes sense to protect your investment by maintaining the ball surfaces to prolong the life expectancy and reaction capability of each of your bowling balls.

If you have any questions about the steps you can take to preserve the surfaces of your equipment, consult your local pro shop professional.

Schedule routine maintenance with the pro shop so you can count on getting the ball reactions you seek.