Patent Application
20230405426
The present invention relates to a pickleball paddle, and more particularly to a pickleball paddle which has a quiet sound when the ball is being struck.
Pickleball is a paddle sport (similar to a racquet sport) that combines elements of badminton, tennis, and table tennis. The pickleball court is similar to a doubles badminton court. Two or four players use solid paddles made of wood or composite materials hit a perforated polymer ball, similar to a Wiffle Ball, over a net. A pickleball paddle is shaped like a larger table tennis racket, originally made from wood. In these days, the pickleball paddle may be made from glass fiber, composite materials and graphite fiber.
A conventional pickleball paddle on the market includes a paddle body and a handle connected to the paddle body. The striking surface of the paddle is typically wood of a composite material that creates a loud niece with the pickleball paddle strikes the ball. In order to make the paddle body have a better shock-absorption effect, the paddle body has an accommodating space. Composite filler is disposed in the accommodating space, which can be quite heavy. The composite filler is usually made of EVA foam. Although it provides a better shock-absorption effect after the composite filler is used, the explosive force for hitting a ball is greatly weakened. Besides, the overall mass of the paddle is increased, which affects the user's experience.
The key performance features when using a pickleball racquet are weight, striking force and shock absorbing cores. No one to date has been concerned with the noise of the racquet. The striking power to date is created by the weight, less weight allow the racquet to be swung more forcibly, and the striking surface, which to date must be a hard surface. Racquets to date have a hard surface and a softer shock absorbing inner core, typically a composite filler of some sort.
The result is the paddle must be a compromise between striking force and the user friendly features of low weight and shock absorption built into the pickleball paddle.
A pickleball paddle that includes a paddle body and a handle connected to the paddle body, the core of the paddle is a frame, which can be made out of a variety of materials, some would be wood, aluminum, fiberglass or graphite, the frame of the pickleball paddles having a stiffness rating of between RA 45 and RA 75, and strings, which go both vertically and horizontally from the frame, forming a string pattern that produces varying sizes of string openings, the strings stretched tight similar to a tennis racquet, with a tension of 40 to 65 lbs, the strings could be made from a variety of materials, some of which would be natural gut, polyester, or nylon, and a firm flexible mat material, such as pvc (poly vinyl chloride) natural rubber, TPE (thermoplastic elastomer,), jute or cork, with the hardness of the mat material at 15 to 30 Shore C.
Another embodiment of the invention is to still use the mat material as the hitting surface but replacing the strings with solid plywood or hard plastic as an inner core. This invention has string patterns similar to a tennis racquet created by horizontal and vertical strings which cross each other attached to the frame at the at the inner core providing striking power, and a firm mat material as the striking surface, which provides shock and sound absorbing features. The mat is held on the racquet due to a lip that on the inside edges of the racquet, extending toward the middle of the racquet, that allows the mat material to be held in place after the mat material is positioned underneath the lip.
