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Slow bowls

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Strong magnets moving past a non-magnetic conductor such as aluminium or copper experience a significant slowing force, due to the creation of eddy currents in the conductor. The classic experiment is a neodymium magnet dropped down a length of copper pipe, wherein it falls very, very slowly.

This clearly leads us to bowls. Bowls is an incredibly dull game to watch, with only a flicker of excitement to be had in the last few moments of the ball's roll. Sometimes, in televised bowls, they replay these last moments in slow motion, to make the most of this brief moment of non-dullness.

The solution, clearly, is to place a heavy copper sheet under the area around the jack (which, I think, is the name for the ball you're aiming for). Player's bowls would, of course, contain a large and powerful rare-earth magnet.

With this set-up, the bowl would have to be launched with tremendous speed, toward the jack and the underlying copper disc. As it rolled over the copper disc, the bowl would slow as if it had run into treacle and, thereafter, everything would happen in magical slow-mo.

MaxwellBuchanan, May 10 2019


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       The opposite would also be attractive - fast-mo. Slow mo could be acheived with instantaneous recording and screen projection play-back.
xenzag, May 10 2019
  

       A more technically interesting variant might be a form of curling, where the ice sheet covers multiple superconducting loops cooled by LN2 and the lumps of rock are themselves superconductors filled with LN2. They are launched off a non-magnetic ice ramp into the field, and will promptly hover their way down the pitch (course ? run ? slide ? rink ?) and end up orbiting gently arond the target until their coolant boils away and they crash to the ground.
8th of 7, May 10 2019
  

       There are different types of bowls? I thought it was just pre- and post-mortem.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 10 2019
  

       It's widely acknowledged that bowls of any form is a type of practice for being dead, only less interesting.
8th of 7, May 10 2019
  

       Would it really continue to happen in slow motion? Or would the bowl merely de-accellerate to a halt? Surely the magnet falling very slowly continues to be attracted to the Earth, which provides a continuous force to keep it moving. What force keeps the bowl moving against the retardation force of the eddy currents?
pocmloc, May 11 2019
  

       Ah, but that is why the //bowl would have to be launched with tremendous speed//. It will then //slow as if it had run into treacle//. And then, as is the nature of things, it will indeed stop.   

       The eddy currents will act very much like treacle: the faster the bowl is moving, the stronger the eddies and hence the more it will be slowed. When it is moving very slowly, the eddies will be very small. So, the ball will go fast-fast-fast- slow- slower-veryslow- stillveryslow- evenslower-stop.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 11 2019
  

       So eddy currents are a component of friction and could be included at the molecular scale for treacle?
wjt, May 11 2019
  

       No.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 11 2019
  

       Sorry I thought Van der Waal forces were just tiny tiny eddy currents.
wjt, May 12 2019
  

       Wouldn't vertical bowls be a better solution?
pocmloc, May 12 2019
  

       //Van der Waal forces were just tiny tiny eddy currents// I don't think so. I mean, everything comes down to electrons, but I don't think VdW forces come down to eddy currents.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 12 2019
  

       Ah yes, that gap where all the magic happens.
wjt, May 13 2019
  

       Read this as slow bowels, made even less sense.
whatrock, May 13 2019
  

       Actually, it makes perfect sense - bowls for people who don't give a shit.
8th of 7, May 13 2019
  

       Hmm, vertical bowls...
Jack sits in the middle of a (very large) open field. Bowlsers drop their balls from an aeroplane at ~2km altitude, with appropriate spin and alignment to either land near the jack, or "knock off" (ie. mutual disintegration on impact) an opponents ball. Beginners use a (possibly tethered) hot air balloon instead of an aeroplane.
(Aside: Google Chrome didn't know how to spell "aeroplane".)
neutrinos_shadow, May 15 2019
  

       Will there be a choice of Norden or S.A.B.S. bombsighr ?   

       Given the high terminal velocity of the bowls, the greenskeeper is going to need a mechanical excavator to recover the embedded balls from the playing area.
8th of 7, May 15 2019
  

       //high terminal velocity// has already been addressed in the body, nay, title, of the above idea.
pocmloc, May 15 2019
  

       Aerogel bowls, Nice
wjt, May 17 2019
  

       //bombsighr// Wasn't he one of the dwarves in The Hobbit?
MaxwellBuchanan, May 18 2019
  


 

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