[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by GDC
It is reasonable to expect that sanding belts will damage the balls surfaces, even through incidental contact. As such, under the Parts Use Flowchart, sanding belts would not be permitted.

Urethane belts saw into belts. Plastic wheels tear chunks out. All wheels make small acceleration tears in the ball surface. Ramps that open and close pinch balls. Surgical tubing cuts balls. Anything running at high speed will damage the surface of Poof balls, but only sanding belts are singled out in the Q&A. This is one of the rare instances (IMO) of the Q&A folks not thinking through an answer thoroughly. Our first prototype launcher used two belt sanders with old 220-grit belts mounted five inches apart. The balls suffered much worse damage from our first rubber wheel prototype than from the sanders (which caused almost no visible problems).