The present invention provides golf balls having a pattern of stellated polygon shaped dimples and grooves on the outer surface thereof.

A mixed-reality golf simulation system includes a ball-tracking sub-system to generate ball-tracking data when a golf ball is hit by a user, a near-eye display, a storage device to store images of a hole of a golf course associated with location coordinates of a plurality of locations along the hole, and a controller. The controller may direct the near-eye display to display a mixed-reality environment from the perspective of a location on the hole based on images associated with the location, receive ball-tracking data including a landing location of a ball hit by the user, alert the user if the landing location is a target pin, and direct the near-eye display to display a mixed-reality environment from the perspective of the landing location based on images associated with the landing location if the landing location is not the target pin.

Method of making golf ball comprising aligning thermoformed depressions with dimpled mold cups and applying sufficient heat and suction to the thermoformed depressions without exposing any preselected subassembly to the heat and suction to soften the polymeric material of each thermoformed depression and draw air outward from a volume located between an inner surface of the dimpled mold cup and an outer surface of the thermoformed depression to form a thermoformed pre-form half-shell having an outer surface with the size, shape and contour of the inner surface of the dimpled mold cup(s) and an inner surface with the size, shape and contour of the outer surface of a preselected subassembly. Afterwards, a preselected subassembly is loaded between a pair of thermoformed pre-form half-shells and molded under sufficient short-term heat and suction to form the golf ball. The thickness of each thermoformed depression and thermoformed pre-form half-shell may be tapered.

The present invention provides a method for arranging dimples on a golf ball surface in which the dimples are arranged in a pattern derived from at least one irregular domain generated from a regular or non-regular polyhedron. The method includes choosing control points of a polyhedron, generating an irregular domain based on those control points, packing the irregular domain with dimples, and tessellating the irregular domain to cover the surface of the golf ball. The control points include the center of a polyhedral face, a vertex of the polyhedron, a midpoint or other point on an edge of the polyhedron and others. The method ensures that the symmetry of the underlying polyhedron is preserved while minimizing or eliminating great circles due to parting lines.

Golf balls having a dimple pattern arranged in a tetrahedral layout are disclosed. The dimple pattern has four substantially identical dimple sections, where each dimple section is defined by a spherical triangle. The dimples in each of the four dimple sections have at least three different dimple diameters including a minimum dimple diameter, a maximum dimple diameter, and at least one additional dimple diameter. The resulting dimple pattern has a surface coverage of about 70 percent or less. The reduced surface coverage helps to reduce the flight of the golf balls.

Golf balls include dimples for generating a turbulent boundary layer. At least some of the dimples include a fan-shape. The fan-shaped dimple has a plurality of blades. Each blade has a trailing edge flush with a land area of a spherical surface of the golf ball, a leading edge, and a side wall connected to the leading edge. The dimple also has a sloped floor extending from the trailing edge to the leading edge, a blade tip connecting the leading edge to the trailing edge at a distal end of the blade, and a blade root connecting the leading edge to the trailing edge at a proximal end of the blade.

The present invention provides a method for arranging dimples on a golf ball surface in which the dimples are arranged in a pattern derived from at least one irregular domain generated from a regular or non-regular polyhedron. The method includes choosing control points of a polyhedron, generating an irregular domain based on those control points, packing the irregular domain with dimples, and tessellating the irregular domain to cover the surface of the golf ball. The control points include the center of a polyhedral face, a vertex of the polyhedron, a midpoint or other point on an edge of the polyhedron and others. The method ensures that the symmetry of the underlying polyhedron is preserved while minimizing or eliminating great circles due to parting lines.

A golf ball has a first hemisphere and a second hemisphere and a plurality of dimples arranged in a pattern divided into dimple segments separated by n longitudinal lines. Within each hemisphere, the plurality of dimples consists of shared dimples that are intersected by the longitudinal lines and segment dimples that are each wholly within one of the n number of dimple segments. The arrangement of the shared dimples on each of the longitudinal lines is identical. The n number of dimple segments comprise at least two segments, S1 and S2, in each hemisphere that have a different longitudinal angle from each other. The S1 segment has a first value for a segment parameter and the S2 segment has a second value for the segment parameter. The first value is different than the second value.

Golf balls according to the present invention achieve flight symmetry and overall satisfactory flight performance due to a dimple surface volume ratio that is equivalent between opposing hemispheres despite the use of different dimple geometries, different dimple arrangements, and/or different dimple counts on the opposing hemispheres.

A golf ball dimple pattern based on a square dipyramid is disclosed. In one specific aspect, the present disclosure provides for a square dipyramid dimple configuration including dimples having a catenary cross-sectional profile, and a combination of dimples having a circular plan shape and dimples having an elliptical plan shape.