US20070090601A1

US20070090601A1 - Bouncing practice net

Info

Publication number: US20070090601A1
Application number: US11/258,531
Authority: US
Inventors: Grace Liao
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2005-10-25
Filing date: 2005-10-25
Publication date: 2007-04-26

Abstract

A bouncing practice net is provided, including at least two plies of nets. The mesh size of the back ply is smaller or equal to the mesh size of the front ply, and both plies are arranged in an asymmetrical or interleaved manner, and are tightly stretched and attached inside a frame. The practice net can provide bouncing trajectory that is unpredictable to simulate the actual batting.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention generally relates to a bouncing practice net for ball games, and more specifically to a practice net providing a non-deterministic bouncing direction.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

FIG. 1 shows a conventional bouncing practice net for pitching and catching of a ball. The first user can pitch the ball to the net, and the ball is bounced by the net for the second user to catch. The first user can use the practice net to improve the precision of the pitch, while the second user can practice the skill of quick reaction to the bounced ball. Depending on the location at which the ball hits the practice net, the conventional practice net will bounce the ball in various direction and path for the user to practice the catch. For example, when the ball hits the practice net at a higher vertical surface, the ball will be bounced by the practice net as a ground ball or a line drive. On the other hand, when the ball hits the net at a lower slant surface, the ball will be bounced by the practice net as a fly ball. Therefore, the conventional practice ball is used to simulate the batting of a batter so that the fielders can practice to catch the batted ball.
However, in the actual ball game, the trajectory of the batted ball is usually more complicated than the simulated trajectory available in the conventional practice net because the force, the direction and the location of the batting on the ball. As the conventional practice net uses a single layer net, the bouncing direction is usually predicable, as aforementioned. Although the part (a) indicated in FIG. 1 is adjustable to tilting a small angle, the overall trajectory of the bounced ball is still deterministic, and fails to simulate the full range of possible trajectories of a batted ball. Therefore, it is important to provide an improved practice net to rectify the drawbacks of a conventional practice net.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention has been made to overcome the above-mentioned drawback of conventional practice net. The primary object of the present invention is to provide a practice net with a non-deterministic bouncing trajectory. The main feature of the practice net is a double-ply net so that the front ply of the net provides the force for bouncing, and the back ply of the net controls the direction of the bounce. Therefore, the trajectory of a bounced ball is sufficiently non-deterministic to simulate the actual batting for catching practice.
To achieve the above object, the present invention provides a double-ply net. The double-ply net can be made of nylon or other material with suitable elasticity and strength. The back ply of the net should have a mesh size smaller or equal to the mesh size of the front ply. In addition, the meshes of the front ply and the back ply are interleaved, instead of aligned and symmetric.
The foregoing and other objects, features, aspects and advantages of the present invention will become better understood from a careful reading of a detailed description provided herein below with appropriate reference to the accompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention can be understood in more detail by reading the subsequent detailed description in conjunction with the examples and references made to the accompanying drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 shows a schematic view of a conventional bouncing practice net;
FIG. 2 shows a schematic view of frame with a bouncing practice net of the present invention;
FIG. 3 shows a dissect view of a bouncing practice net of the present invention;
FIG. 4 shows a schematic view of a frame with a second embodiment of a bouncing practice net of the present invention;
FIG. 5 shows a schematic view of another frame with a third embodiment of a bouncing practice net of the present invention; and
FIG. 6 shows a schematic view of the bouncing practice net used in a soccer game practice net.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

FIG. 2 shows a frame with a bouncing practice net of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 2, frame 1 is a rectangle, and the back of the frame includes a support stand 11 so that frame 1 stands with a tilting angle. A bouncing practice net 2 of the present invention is attached to frame 1. The four sides of practice net 2 include a plurality of buckle elements for engaging with frame 1 so that practice net 2 is tightly stretched within the boundary of frame 1. Frame 1 and buckle elements 3 are similar to those used in conventional practice net.
Practice net 2 of the present invention includes at least two plies of nets. The embodiment in FIG. 3 shows a double-ply structure, including a net 21, and a net 22. Net 21 is placed at the front as the first ply to touch the ball, and net 22 is placed behind net 21. The four sides 221, 222 of nets 21, 22 are stitched or glued together. In addition, the meshes of nets 21, 22 are not aligned or symmetrically arranged, for example, nets 21 and 22 can be interleaved. The mesh size of net 22 is smaller or equal to the mesh size of net 21. The preferred embodiment of the present invention is that net 22 has a smaller mesh size and is interleaved with net 21. Practice net 2 can be made of nylon or other material with suitable elasticity and strength so that a ball will bounce when the ball hits tightly stretched practice net 2.
FIG. 2 shows bouncing practice net 2 is tightly stretched inside frame 1. Net 21 and net 22 are pressed against each other due to the stretch. Because net 22 is smaller in size, net 22 is more tightly stretched when attached to frame 1. As a result, net 22 provides stronger bouncing force than net 21. When a ball hits practice net 2, net 21 touches and bounces the ball. In the process, net 22 also touches the ball and the reaction force from net 22 is applied to a point or a line on the ball to change the bouncing trajectory of the ball. Therefore, the trajectory becomes unpredictable due to the effect of net 22. Furthermore, nets 21, 22 are stitched together along four sides with the center parts pressing against each other. Therefore, the effect of net 22 may be different even when the ball hits the same location of the net. This further simulates the trajectory range of the batting of a batter.
The meshes of nets 21, 22 are regularly shaped and arranged, as the square mesh shown in FIG. 1. But the mesh is not limited to those shown in FIG. 1, the shape can be irregular and the arrangement of the meshes can also be irregular. FIG. 4 shows a second embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, a practice net 2 a has the diamond shape mesh. Furthermore, both nets 21, 22 may include different meshes at different part of the net; alternatively, net 21 and net 22 may include different meshes so that the combination of the shapes and the arrangement of the meshes of net 21 and net 22 can vary to create further non-determinism.
FIG. 5 shows a third embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, a frame 4 has the shape of a reverse Y. A practice net 2 b of the present invention is also stretched in the reverse Y shape. All the sides of reverse-Y practice net 2 b are attached to frame 4 by buckles 3. The upper part 41 of frame 4 is adjustable to tilt an angle to generate more variety of trajectories. In addition, frame 4 can be used on both sides. Therefore, the present invention is not limited to a two-dimensional design. A three-dimensional frame with the bouncing practice net of the present invention can be used to meet different practice demands.
FIG. 6 shows an embodiment of using the present invention in a soccer game practice. The embodiment includes a frame 5, a practice net 6 and a plurality of buckles 3. Because the embodiment is for soccer practice, the mesh size is slightly larger, but remains smaller than the size of the soccer ball. At the center of the net, an auxiliary net 65 having a smaller mesh size is included to increase the bouncing force. Practice net 6 still includes two nets 61, 62 to provide the non-deterministic bouncing trajectory for practice.
In summary, the practice net of the present invention includes at least two plies of nets. The back ply of the net applies the reaction force to a point or a line on the ball to change the bouncing trajectory of the ball. The prevent invention can be applied in a variety of ball games for bouncing practice, and can be used with a variety of frame shapes.
Although the present invention has been described with reference to the preferred embodiments, it will be understood that the invention is not limited to the details described thereof. Various substitutions and modifications have been suggested in the foregoing description, and others will occur to those of ordinary skill in the art. Therefore, all such substitutions and modifications are intended to be embraced within the scope of the invention as defined in the appended claims.

Claims

1. A bouncing practice net, comprising at least two plies of nets, a back ply of two said plies having mesh size no larger than mesh size of a front ply of two said plies, and said two plies of nets being arranged in an asymmetrical manner.

2. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said mesh size of said back ply of net is equal to said mesh size of said front ply of net and said both plies of nets are arranged in an interleaved manner.

3. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said mesh size of said back ply of net is smaller said mesh size of said front ply of net.

4. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said both plies of nets are arranged in an interleaved manner.

5. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net comprises two plies of nets.

6. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said mesh of said practice net has a regular shape and is arranged in a regular manner.

7. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 6, wherein said mesh shape is rectangular.

8. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 6, wherein said mesh shape is diamond.

9. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said mesh of said practice net has irregular shape and are arranged in an irregular manner.

10. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is a two-dimensional structure.

11. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is a three-dimensional structure.

12. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 11, wherein said practice net is a reverse-Y shape three-dimensional structure.

13. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is applied to a frame for baseball game practice.

14. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is applied to a frame for softball game practice.

15. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is applied to a frame for soccer game practice.

16. The bouncing practice net as claimed in claim 1, wherein said practice net is attached to a frame using a plurality of buckles.