Lately, maple bats have been under much scrutiny for being unsafe. The fact is, any wood bat is dangerous. Maple bats however pose an immediate high level risk to players, fans, coaches and umpires. Players want maple because the wood is hard throughout unlike ash which has distinctive hard and soft layers (see wood). Soft layers absorb more energy and tend to dent or splinter over time; however, a crack propagating through the bat can be disrupted by these layers. Since maple bats only have hard layers, cracks propagate through them much more readily. The result is a clean fracture. When a bat fractures in this manner, only a small percentage of the bats kinetic energy is absorbed resulting in large projectiles with sharp ends spinning violently through the air.
SpiderBats has developed a technology called WebWrap™ that holds the bat together and prevents large pieces of wood from becoming dangerous projectiles. WebWrap is an ultra lightweight winding of high strength fibers often used in bullet proof vest applications. The mass of the fiber reinforcement is less than 0.1% the mass of the wood bat; essentially a spider’s web.
Below are two tests conducted to show the performance of the WebWrap. To the left, a maple bat without WebWrap and to the right, a maple bat with WebWrap. You can really see the difference. |
