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Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball

Received: 18 August 2014     Accepted: 29 August 2014     Published: 20 September 2014
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Abstract

Recent advances in the computing power of modern computers have made computational fluid dynamics studies particularly interesting and feasible. We used the computational fluid dynamics method to solve the physical governing equations of the air flow around balls of popular sports in typical game conditions and investigated their aerodynamics and the flight characteristics. The work presented here describes the construction of the computational fluid dynamics models for a baseball, volleyball and two soccer balls, and the use of these models to analyze the effects of spin rate, surface pattern, and size for their respective sports. The computational results show significant correlations between ball spin rate and the aerodynamics forces, including drag and lift, for soccer ball, baseball and volleyball. For the baseball, the lift and lateral forces are shown to have also been influenced by the lace orientation.

Published in American Journal of Sports Science (Volume 2, Issue 5)
DOI 10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12
Page(s) 115-121
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2014. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

CFD, Baseball, Soccer Ball, Volleyball

References
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[4] Alam, F., Ho, H., Smith, L., Subic, A., Chowdhury, H., & Kumar, A. (2012). A study of baseball and softball aerodynamics. Procedia Engineering, 34, 86-91.
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[8] Barber, S., Chin, S. B., & Carré, M. J. (2009). Sports ball aerodynamics: a numerical study of the erratic motion of soccer balls. Computers & Fluids,38(6), 1091-1100.
[9] Barber, S., & Carré, M. J. (2010). The effect of surface geometry on soccer ball trajectories. Sports Engineering, 13(1), 47-55.
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[11] Goff, J. E., & Carré, M. J. (2009). Trajectory analysis of a soccer ball. American Journal of Physics, 77(11), 1020-1027.
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[18] Oggiano, L., & Sætran, L. (2010). Aerodynamics of modern soccer balls.Procedia Engineering, 2(2), 2473-2479.
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Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    Pouya Jalilian, Patrick K. Kreun, MohammadHady M. Makhmalbaf, William W. Liou. (2014). Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball. American Journal of Sports Science, 2(5), 115-121. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12

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    ACS Style

    Pouya Jalilian; Patrick K. Kreun; MohammadHady M. Makhmalbaf; William W. Liou. Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball. Am. J. Sports Sci. 2014, 2(5), 115-121. doi: 10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12

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    AMA Style

    Pouya Jalilian, Patrick K. Kreun, MohammadHady M. Makhmalbaf, William W. Liou. Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball. Am J Sports Sci. 2014;2(5):115-121. doi: 10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12,
      author = {Pouya Jalilian and Patrick K. Kreun and MohammadHady M. Makhmalbaf and William W. Liou},
      title = {Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball},
      journal = {American Journal of Sports Science},
      volume = {2},
      number = {5},
      pages = {115-121},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajss.20140205.12},
      abstract = {Recent advances in the computing power of modern computers have made computational fluid dynamics studies particularly interesting and feasible. We used the computational fluid dynamics method to solve the physical governing equations of the air flow around balls of popular sports in typical game conditions and investigated their aerodynamics and the flight characteristics. The work presented here describes the construction of the computational fluid dynamics models for a baseball, volleyball and two soccer balls, and the use of these models to analyze the effects of spin rate, surface pattern, and size for their respective sports. The computational results show significant correlations between ball spin rate and the aerodynamics forces, including drag and lift, for soccer ball, baseball and volleyball. For the baseball, the lift and lateral forces are shown to have also been influenced by the lace orientation.},
     year = {2014}
    }
    

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  • TY  - JOUR
    T1  - Computational Aerodynamics of Baseball, Soccer Ball and Volleyball
    AU  - Pouya Jalilian
    AU  - Patrick K. Kreun
    AU  - MohammadHady M. Makhmalbaf
    AU  - William W. Liou
    Y1  - 2014/09/20
    PY  - 2014
    N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12
    DO  - 10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12
    T2  - American Journal of Sports Science
    JF  - American Journal of Sports Science
    JO  - American Journal of Sports Science
    SP  - 115
    EP  - 121
    PB  - Science Publishing Group
    SN  - 2330-8540
    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajss.20140205.12
    AB  - Recent advances in the computing power of modern computers have made computational fluid dynamics studies particularly interesting and feasible. We used the computational fluid dynamics method to solve the physical governing equations of the air flow around balls of popular sports in typical game conditions and investigated their aerodynamics and the flight characteristics. The work presented here describes the construction of the computational fluid dynamics models for a baseball, volleyball and two soccer balls, and the use of these models to analyze the effects of spin rate, surface pattern, and size for their respective sports. The computational results show significant correlations between ball spin rate and the aerodynamics forces, including drag and lift, for soccer ball, baseball and volleyball. For the baseball, the lift and lateral forces are shown to have also been influenced by the lace orientation.
    VL  - 2
    IS  - 5
    ER  - 

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Author Information
  • Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA

  • Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA

  • Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA

  • Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA

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