Bowling Machines - the good, the bad and the ugly

[limb]

Hello cricket lovers,
Our club is considering investing in a bowling machine and would like to get some feedback on positive and negative experiences others have had. Once upon a time the only product on the market was the Jugs machine which costs upwards of $3K but more recently some other products have become available at much more competitive prices.
We've been looking at the "Paceman Strike Cricket Bowling Machine" which retails at about $850 but we weren't sure whether the cheaper products were as reliable or fit for purpose. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Tony Clifton]

From my experience the best one I reckon is the BOLA machine.

Second best is the Jugs one.

Those paceman ones are ok for kids but not much value for seniors in my opinion.

Unfortunately it's one of those 'you get what you pay for' things. Clubs can get grants to help with this though. Presumably the office for sport and recreation still offers them.

Cheaper alternative is to get a couple of those plastic slingers (like dog owners use to throw tennis balls) and teach your batters to learn how to throw with them. They can pair up and get their volume that way. You can use bowling machine balls with them too which are ultra cheap compared to cricket balls and means you don't wear out all your training balls.

The batters at our club actually prefer facing the slingers to the ball machine because it's a bit more realistic - random, have to pick up line/length.

[limb]

From my experience the best one I reckon is the BOLA machine.

Second best is the Jugs one.

Those paceman ones are ok for kids but not much value for seniors in my opinion.

Unfortunately it's one of those 'you get what you pay for' things. Clubs can get grants to help with this though. Presumably the office for sport and recreation still offers them.

Cheaper alternative is to get a couple of those plastic slingers (like dog owners use to throw tennis balls) and teach your batters to learn how to throw with them. They can pair up and get their volume that way. You can use bowling machine balls with them too which are ultra cheap compared to cricket balls and means you don't wear out all your training balls.

The batters at our club actually prefer facing the slingers to the ball machine because it's a bit more realistic - random, have to pick up line/length.

Thanks Tony - appreciate the insights.

[heater31]

From my experience the best one I reckon is the BOLA machine.

Hope you are right Tony. My club just spent $7000 on one

[Corona Man]

We have an old jugs at our club. It works ok.

For me the key is the effective use of the machine, to replicate game conditions.

It's too easy to just bang away at a length over and over.... Even the best bowlers err a little bit. Otherwise you have batsmen playing (more or less) the same shot their entire net. By the same token, no point feeding up 15 or 20 minutes of "half bangers" either!

Somewhere in between.

Then you get the dickheads who want to wind it up to 160 clicks to the 3rd graders....just for the Lol's!

[saintal]

We have a BOLA. $4K or so. Does the trick, although bit of a pain to set up and pack away. Cant comment on the other machines.

[Stumps]

Bola 4k or 7k? which is it

[heater31]

Bola 4k or 7k? which is it

$7000. Definitely with the power pack and stand included.

[Tony Clifton]

I'm sure ours wasn't $7k

[heater31]

I'm sure ours wasn't $7k

I might be rounding up but it was certainly over $6000 with power pack and stand.

[saintal]

Bola 4k or 7k? which is it

Checked the club's records- a quote for $4875 for "pro machine with legs" with power pack, autofeeder and a dozen balls.

We didn't bother with the autofeeder ($750) so saved some $ there, but did end up buying another 4 dozen balls @ about $8 each. So all up came to about $4.5K

Quote was from 2012- "select sports" in melbourne.