Patent Grant
9937400
This is a Non-Provisional Utility patent application for the disclosure of an “AUTOMATIC BALL PITCHING MACHINE.”
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document, including the computer program listing, contains material that is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the reproduction of the patent document or the patent disclosure, as it appears in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
Not Applicable
See Specification Appendix for computer listing program as a reduction to practice ascertainable to those skilled in the art.
The present disclosure relates generally to devices that launch or throw sports balls. More particularly, the current disclosure relates to an automatic game ball throwing machine particularly suited to throwing baseballs, softballs and batting practice balls, but can also be used with any substantially round ball include soccer, tennis and other sport balls.
There are ball throwing machines used in numerous sports that assist during the playing of a sport or enable players to practice certain aspects of a sport. One example of machines aiding in the playing and/or participation of a sport includes the use of game ball throwing machines. These machines are used to throw or launch the ball used in a particular sport.
For example, in a sport such as football, tennis, soccer, cricket, basketball, lacrosse, baseball, and softball, machines are used to launch or throw a ball toward a player to facilitate or simulate the movement of that ball as it would typically occur during the playing of that sport. For example, in tennis, tennis ball machines are used to send balls to players during practice so they can work on their game techniques. In American football, football throwing machines are used to simulate either a quarterback's throw to allow receivers to practice catching the ball. This general concept of using machines to simulate the movement of a ball permeates most sports.
One sport in particular, diamond sports such as baseball and softball, have a type of machine generally referred to as a pitching machine. This pitching machine is a game ball throwing machine that is used to simulate the throw of a ball by a pitcher. These machines are typically used in batting practice but can also be used to simulate a pitched ball for a catcher or a hit ball from a batter to assist players in the field to work on various fundamentals. While the subject claims of this application includes pitching for batting and throwing fielding practice, as well as for launching balls for other sports, for simplicity this multipurpose invention is herein defined as a pitching machine, and the location desired for the ball, whether into a batter's strike zone or into a fielder's position is defined as aimpoint, impact point and target location and type.
Typically, these pitching machines have conventionally required a person, such as another player or coach, to stand beside the machine and manually adjust the aim-point, velocity and amount and direction of curve or spin in various directions. This is time consuming, dangerous to the person operating the machine, and does not simulate the typical time required for a human pitcher to throw pitches of different types in a game situation. This practice has evolved to the implementation of automatic ball pitch programmers. These machines in prior art involve a controller which is preprogrammed by the manufacturer using a standard database lookup table of values to throw a standard-type pitch with a preprogrammed velocity and direction and amount of spin, representing a type of pitch such as a curveball, fastball or slider. The drawback to this mechanism is it assumes a generic pitch by type, rather than the real-world situation in which all human pitchers have unique nuances, speeds, locations and amounts of spin for a given type of pitch. The second drawback is there is no ability to alter any parameters and have the ball delivered to a desired location on the plate. For example, a little league pitcher may throw a 50 MPH fastball that drops eight inches from release to arrival at the front of the plate, with a curve to the right of one inch, while a high school pitcher may throw a 70 MPH fastball that drops six inches in the same interval with two inches of curve to the right. The same two pitchers may throw their respective fastballs, and other pitches, differently as a strategy, or due to fatigue as the game continues. These subtle nuances are not simulated by prior art which utilize a set table of variables for each type of pitch.
Another drawback to prior art pitching machines is they do not enhance or emphasize a critical aspect to successful batting by a player, namely for the batter to focus on the ball as it is being released. While there is prior art which uses a warning light, pointed at the batter, to signify a ball is about to be launched, this does not simulate a real game situation. Since there is no ‘wind-up’ by a typical wheeled pitching machine, there has not been a prior reliable system to encourage, enable and allow the batter to focus on the ball at or near the point of release.
All machines require a method to adjust pitch location. There are many ways to adjust the aim of the machine, including moving the base structure, moving the arm mechanism relative to the structure, and changing the release point of the ball. Methods may be manual or automated depending on the particular embodiment, but numerous methods have been established in prior art of both pitching machines and mechanisms in general, such as gear trains, stepper motors, linear actuators, sprockets, belts, etc. However, all prior art has had numerous drawbacks, particularly in their failure to simulate the variety of pitches and the speed with which they vary, in a game situation.
What is needed then is an improved game ball throwing machine that easily and safely alters the aspects of various pitches and human pitchers actually encountered in a game, and that teaches a player to focus on and pick up visually a pitched ball at the moment it is released toward the batter. This improved game ball thrower preferably has multiple pitch parameters and easily interpreted graphical user interface is designed to avoid restricted pitch parameter options and limited interfaces that are prevalent in prior art ball feeding machines. This needed game ball throwing machine is lacking in the art.
A major factor in wheel pitching machine inaccuracy is the variance in the size and compressibility of the balls used. Laces can also cause a wide error in mechanized pitching, because there is no way to know how the laces will be positioned when the wheels grab it. Spring loading the wheels (or the motors if directly connected to the wheels) greatly reduces the machine's sensitivity to ball variance. It effectively lowers the spring rate of the existing fixed assembly, so that minor differences in ball size have a much lower effect on the clamping force between the wheels (or wheel and pad for a one wheel machine). For two wheel machines, the motors can be mounted on common linear shafts, with the shafts forming the base structure of the machine's frame.
Low cost, commercially available microcontrollers and microprocessors are used to control the machine. The specific hardware used is not critical, but some possible selections are the Raspberry Pi, Beaglebone Black, or any similar device which supports web hosting or wireless communication either natively or with additional hardware, and provides GPIO (General Purpose Input/Output). Control signals and sensors interface to and control and sense the real-world the hardware in a traditional manner. What is novel, is the unique algorithm means within the system software which integrates the signals, sensors and hardware together with a unique and novel interface device.
The user interface is accomplished via a standard wireless touchscreen device, such as a tablet or smartphone, running a standard web browser, coupled with the novel software system of the subject invention. The invention can used with a web browser, or custom written application. The Program may be run on any wireless device and/or host device (Raspberry Pi, etc.) One can use VNC (virtual network communication) protocol to connect the wireless device to the host device.
The machine's control system includes a web server and wireless interface. The user loads the web pages hosted by the web server and controls the machine by manipulating the inputs shown on the interactive web pages. Through use of the unique software, it is also possible to create custom applications based on the touchscreen's operating system, for download from the internet.
The embodiment shown in
There are several modes for the machine to operate in, so there are several specialized pages to load. Some of these modes are: machine setup, custom pitch, help, defensive drills, one touch pitch selection, and random sequence. The one touch screen provides a grid of buttons that set the machine for a large variety of pitches with a single touch to allow the fastest possible pitch selection. The random sequence mode allows users to select from a menu of available pitches at a range of pitch speeds. Users may select as many pitches from the menu as desired. Each mode includes tools for the user to select pitch location.
The user interface can be used on any style of machine (wheeled, arm, air cannon) and is described in more detail later in this specification.
It can be difficult to make small adjustments to a typical pitching machine because they are so heavy and unbalanced, and the movements are so small. Some manufacturers have added worm gears or threaded rods to aid the user, but these are cumbersome, inaccurate and time consuming to adjust, resulting in a less than realistic simulation of a pitcher varying locations of his pitches to the batter during a game.
Two methods disclosed in the subject invention to remedy this shortcoming in the prior machines are: 1) adding geared (or ungeared) step motors to the adjustment mechanism and 2) adding a visible scale so the user has a reference to easily see how far they have moved the machine. The scale can be divided into units of distance as measured at the pitch's destination (typically home plate) as opposed to actual distance moved at the machine, for easier understanding by the user.
As mentioned earlier, an unmet need in the prior art was to teach batters to focus on the ball as it is pitched, versus a light shining toward the batter as in prior art. Even when the ball is visible from a distance, it is not obvious to a hitter the exact time that ball will be thrown by a pitching machine. A localized light source at the ball's exit, illuminating the face of the ball visible to the batter, provides a visual cue to the batter that the pitch is being thrown and drawing attention to the ball. Existing machines have warning lights to indicate an imminent pitch, but the design of the subject invention results in a benefit unanticipated by those skilled in the art, in that it allows the hitter to focus on the ball itself, not an indicator off to the side. A related improvement could also entail additional lights, possibly of different colors placed along the ball's path shining on a portion of the ball, which can be used as a timing aid.
A pitching machine must have a user interface of some kind to allow a user to control the machine. Most wheeled pitching machines provide individual motor speed controls for each wheel, typically a manually turned rotary potentiometer. While flexible, this method does not make it obvious to the user how to throw each type of pitch, or even how fast it will be. Several manufacturers resort to tables of values as a guide for the user to set manually, but these are cumbersome and can't cover all available pitches. Other manufacturers have added push button control, where users select a pitch by name and a speed, and the wheel speeds are set automatically. The downfall here is that pitch names are not universal, and again, not every pitch the machine could throw is selectable.
The subject invention disclosed herein, allows users to explicitly set a pitch speed, spin direction, and spin amount. Ball spin translates into the curve or break of a pitch. All three settings can be continuous or discrete amounts. The interface shown in
Selecting a pitch by name can provide a convenient, although limited method of user input. This new system can be extended to include pitch names as an alternative input method. If a pitch is selected by name, the corresponding spin direction is still displayed for confirmation. If a direction is selected, the corresponding pitch name is displayed for confirmation. This system provides consistency between the two methods of selecting a pitch.
On one and two wheeled pitching machines, the plane of the wheel(s) defines the axis of ball spin. To change the direction of spin on these machines, the section of the machine housing the wheels must be rotated. By mounting the spin direction and/or amount displays on the rotating section, a simplified display may be used, as shown in
For one and two wheel machines, the display can also be located on the fixed portion of the machine, but the adjustable section must still be rotated either manually, or automatically by the control system, to match the selected spin direction. If the rotation is manual, the control system can feature a graphical display showing the user how to orient the machine for the selected pitch.
As an obvious variation to the disclosed novel invention, one can also add a feature to change the displayed units of velocity (miles per hour or kilometers per hour, for example) as selected by the user.
Another shortcoming in the prior art is the inability to quickly adjust for differences in balls. At a given wheel speed, a heavier ball will be thrown at a slower velocity than a lighter ball. By adding an input selection for type of ball (baseball or softball, for example), the displayed pitch speed can be corrected, based on the weight of the ball selected.
The user interface described above provides a benefit not realized before by those skilled in the art of pitching machines. The software and hardware configuration of the subject invention provides users a simple, direct method for specifying pitch parameters on any type of machine. These input parameters can easily be used to calculate the individual wheel speeds required to generate the selected pitch.
Because the user may not be familiar with amount of spin used with typical pitches, (RPM of an average curveball, for example), it is convenient to select a maximum reasonable spin amount, say 3600 RPM, and let the user select a percentage of that maximum amount. For calculation, it is also convenient to express the spin amount setting as tangential wheel speed difference. For example, a 25 mph difference on a two wheel machine set to throw a pitch of 50 mph would give tangential wheel speeds of 25 and 75 (50+/−25).
For arithmetic calculations, a frame of reference or coordinate system must be defined for spin direction. It is convenient to select the vertical direction to be 0 degrees, with angles increasing in a clockwise direction, as seen by the machine operator.
On a multiple wheel machine with inputs:
PS=pitch speed
ANG1=direction of spin measured as an angle
SPNPCT=amount of spin, a percentage of the maximum tangential wheel speed difference
MAXSPIN=maximum tangential wheel speed difference
for each wheel positioned at an angle ANG2, tangential wheel speed WS may be calculated as
WS=PS−SPNPCT*cos(ANG2−ANG1)*MAXSPIN.
So for the 3 wheel machine shown in
WS1=PS−SPNPCT*cos(60−ANG1)*MAXSPIN
WS2=PS−SPNPCT*cos(180−ANG1)*MAXSPIN
WS3=PS−SPNPCT*cos(300−ANG1)*MAXSPIN
For a two wheel machine, the wheel angles are 0 and 180 degrees, simplifying the equations to:
WS1=PS−SPNPCT*MAXSPIN
WS2=PS+SPNPCT*MAXSPIN
where the ball spins towards the slower wheel.
A computer program written in C for a 3 wheel machine was included in a separate attachment to the provisional application incorporated herein by reference, and also a part of the file wrapper for this non-provisional application as an appendix. This program takes digital inputs from the switches shown in
Other machines have used tables of values obtained by trial and error to aim their machines. These values are programmed by either the manufacturer or the user, but always by trial and error. This limits the available number of pitches. The inventive system disclosed herein is different. The achieved goal by this invention, lacking in the prior art, is to modify the aim of the machine automatically so that no matter how the pitch is changed by the user (speed, curve direction, or curve amount), the ball ends up in the same place when it crosses the plate. Whenever a pitch is changed:
1) the pitch trajectory is calculated, giving data for the theoretical impact point, X and Y.
2) the impact point is compared to the impact point of the previous pitch, X and Y.
3) the machine's aim is adjusted by the difference, so that each pitch will impact the same point
Impact point may be adjusted manually, but it will affect all pitches. Impact point, or aimpoint, is the horizontal and vertical location of a pitch as it crosses the plate. The following includes all variables used, their definition, units, and how they were derived—hard numbers defined by the hardware, user inputs, and calculated values. The variables and formulae disclosed herein all are resident within the unique nonobvious software program used in the subject invention, and are herein referred to as arithmetic formulae for simplicity, and serve as full disclosure of the claimed software. Further explanation is below:
Calculations
spinamountRPM=(spinamount/100)*maxspin
acc-x=sin(radians(spinangle))*spinamountRPM*CDrag*pitchspeed^2
acc-y=cos(radians(spinangle))*spinamountRPM*CDrag*pitchspeed^2
t=z/1.4667*v)
x=0.5*acc-x*t^2
y=0.5*acc-x*t^2
ang-x=degrees(arctan(x/(z*12)))
ang-y=degrees(arctan(y/(z*12)))
xstep=−int(ang-x/stepsize+0.5)
ystep=−int(ang-y/stepsize+0.5)
Manual Slider Adjustments
Slider Calculations
ang-xm=degrees(arctan(xslide/(z*12)))
ang-ym=degrees(arctan(yslide/(z*12)))
xstepm=−int(ang-xm/stepsize+0.5)
ystepm=−int(ang-ym/stepsize+0.5)
maxspin—The maximum wheel speed difference used to spin the ball, measured in RPM. Ball spin is created by spinning the throwing wheels at different speeds. It is an arbitrary value used to ease pitch specification by allowing users to specify spin by percentage instead of RPM.
stepsize—the step angle of the aiming stepper motor, including any gears
pitchspeed—pitch speed
z—distance from machine to plate
spinangle—direction of ball spin
spinamount—amount of ball spin as a percentage of maxspin
CLift—coefficient of lift, a value used to calculate the ball's acceleration perpendicular to its travel from spinning. Based on ball spin and velocity. Not the same as the general engineering term. Can be user adjusted to account for air density and ball condition.
spinamountRPM—calculated value of ball spin in RPM
acc-x—horizontal acceleration
acc-y—vertical acceleration, includes gravity
t—calculated time in flight
x—calculated distance ball moves horizontally during flight
y—calculated distance ball moves vertically during flight
ang-x—angle ball moves horizontally during flight
ang-y—angle ball moves vertically during flight
xstep—number of stepper motor steps to sweep ang-x
ystep—number of stepper motor steps to sweep ang-y
xslide—horizontal distance adjustment measured at impact point
yslide—vertical distance adjustment measured at impact point
ang-xm—angle adjustment to cause xslide distance adjustment
ang-ym—angle adjustment to cause yslide distance adjustment
xstepm—number of stepper motor steps to sweep ang-xm
ystepm—number of stepper motor steps to sweep ang-ym
Disclosed herein is a game ball throwing machine which is automatically programmed to accept a variety of inputs, calculate the required aim-point based on the inputs, and adjust the various electromechanical systems to deliver the game ball to an input desired target location, regardless of amount of spin, direction of spin, intensity of amount of spin input by the user. This represents a major departure from prior art, which historically has required the user to rely on trial and error to vary these parameters to deliver a ball to a specified spot above the batter's home plate.
It is therefore a general object of the present invention to provide a game ball thrower for delivering balls to a batter in a customized random pattern of spins, velocities and directions. Another object of the present disclosure is to provide an improved game ball pitching machine that enhances batter focus on the ball as it is pitched. Still another object of the present disclosure is to provide an automated game ball pitching machine interface that provides an easy to understand visual representation of the area above the home plate. Yet still another object of the present disclosure is to provide an automated game ball feeder that adjusts for differences in ball diameter, weight and seam location. Other and further objects, features and advantages of the present disclosure will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading of the following disclosure when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
As shown in the Figures referred to above, the game ball throwing machine is a diamond sport ball throwing machine, such as for baseball or softball. Other throwing machines can be utilized, such as those for soccer, football, lacrosse, cricket, basketball, and the like, and are contemplated by this disclosure. Turning now to
In diamond sports, the game ball throwing machine is generally described as a pitching machine. For simplicity's sake that term will be used forward. The pitching machine generally includes wheels 4 that spin and are used to impart force to the ball to project the ball towards a target. The wheels are driven by motors 8 which are adjusted and controlled by a series of controls 9. The pitching machine has an intake opening 6 positioned and sized to receive a ball and deliver that ball to the wheels 4 for the pitching machine. The game balls (not shown) typically have two hemispheres wherein each hemisphere is engaged by one or more of the wheels 4 to impart the force to propel the ball to its target.
Around each wheel 4 is preferably a wheel guard 5. Located generally equidistant between the wheels is a ball feeder tube 6 for delivering the ball forward into the pinch point of the wheels 4.
Preferably attached to the motor mounting plate is an interchangeable, removable handle 7 which may be used to manually adjust the vertical and horizontal primary aimpoint of the two-wheeled pitching machine. Attached mechanically to the mounting plate 3, wheel 4 and guard 5 is a motor 8, control panel 9, motor clamping knob 10, two-wheeled system twist adjustment clamp 11, and rotating top frame 12.
As indicated in the description of
Generally, the pitching machine includes a base 1, a support frame 12 attached to the base, a drive mechanism attached to the support frame, and a control panel 9 that can be attached to the support frame or can have a wireless connection such as through a tablet computer or smart phone screen as described above. The base can be a base as known in the art that allows for height adjustment of the pitching machine with the game ball feeder. The drive mechanism can be those drive mechanisms known in the art, including various types of motors 8 that can run off AC power, DC power, or both, as desired.
Thus, although there have been described particular embodiments of the present disclosure of a new and useful AUTOMATIC GAME BALL PITCHING MACHINE it is not intended that such references be construed as limitations upon the scope of this disclosure except as set forth in the following claims.
This application claims benefit of the following patent application(s) which is/are hereby incorporated by reference: Automatic Ball Pitching Machine, Application No. 62/098,698 filed 31 Dec. 2014
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4352348 | Griffith | Oct 1982 | A |
| 4423717 | Kahelin | Jan 1984 | A |
| 5125653 | Kovacs | Jun 1992 | A |
| 5464208 | Pierce | Nov 1995 | A |
| 6182649 | Battersby | Feb 2001 | B1 |
| 6470873 | Battersby | Oct 2002 | B2 |
| 6539931 | Trajkovic | Apr 2003 | B2 |
| 6546924 | Battersby | Apr 2003 | B2 |
| 7082938 | Wilmot | Aug 2006 | B2 |
| 8550063 | Alger | Oct 2013 | B2 |
| 9010309 | Lewis | Apr 2015 | B2 |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20160193520 A1 | Jul 2016 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62098698 | Dec 2014 | US |
