Source for Orbit Ball

[maltz1881]

When I went to Blip Toys website it stated that there products are also sold at a few other stores such as Target. I went to 2 different Walmarts and was able to grab 6 total in the different colors in the game. I found it strange that Blip Toys doesn't mention these balls on thier website at all. Wonder if it was taken down for the kickoff and be put back up on Monday?

[Alan Anderson]

I heard from a reliable source that Blip has discontinued these balls. Wal-Mart said they won't be getting any more. FIRST has enough for the season, but teams (and offseason competitions) are likely to find them hard to come by for a while.

[cbudrecki]

I think FIRST needs to start finding it's own manufacturer to stock-pile game pieces!

[dtengineering]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

I heard from a reliable source that Blip has discontinued these balls. Wal-Mart said they won't be getting any more. FIRST has enough for the season, but teams (and offseason competitions) are likely to find them hard to come by for a while.

That would explain why they didn't show up on the Blip Toys website when I went there to look for a source.

I'm withholding a few choice comments in the hope that FIRST has realized that teams will need at least a half-dozen orbit balls each in order to get some decent shooting practice in and refine their robots to make them work and has made sure that a reliable source is available.

Jason

[Mike Martus]

Wal Mart ( I as tell my students Wal Martus) has them just wiped out the Auburn Hills, MI store that had 13 of them $9.99 each.

[bobwrit]

I think that sometime FIRST will provide them on their website for purchase eventualy, once they switch out the trackballs(yes, they are still selling them)

[Joe J.]

Just cleaned out the Canton Walmart of their last 8. $9.97 a piece.

[jgannon]

Originally Posted by tb222

I think FIRST needs to start finding it's own manufacturer to stock-pile game pieces!

This seems to have become an annual ritual, an introduction to the concept of Unobtainium.

[Chris_Elston]

We got 12 of them at our local walmart:

http://twitpic.com/zevd

$10 each

[Cory]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

I heard from a reliable source that Blip has discontinued these balls. Wal-Mart said they won't be getting any more. FIRST has enough for the season, but teams (and offseason competitions) are likely to find them hard to come by for a while.

That's unfortunate if true.

So much for buying 150 of them and making a competition legal playing field.

[sayso_411]

well that kind of stinks...i was hoping that it would be easy to find; its going to be like trying to find pool noodles in February

[Lodyev]

Sayso: Check ebay for the noodles, we've gotten em from there before because they're hard to come by. And good luck finding the balls in Richmond... we're having trouble...

[artdutra04]

To anyone who has already broken one of these: can you find out what plastic material they are made of? I'm looking for an exact answer (such as acetal, PET, etc), not just something like "Its plastic, duh".

The reason I ask, is that after finding only four of them between two local Wal-Marts, the engineering and New England frugality instincts inside of me rang out. The orbit balls don't look very hard to [re]produce!

Using calipers, the interior plastic material is about 1" wide by about 0.1" thick (cannot tell for sure due to felt thickness), and the material they are coated with seems to be identical to the material used on stretchable Book Socks. The plastic (depending on the actual material) should be easily source-able through McMaster, and book socks aren't that difficult to find.

If someone can get me an [exact] answer within the next few days, I'll immediately place an order into McMaster to make about twenty or thirty of these balls, and then I'll raid the school supply sections of every store in the area like a loaded refrigerator.

[McGurky]

We got 4 of them from our local Wal-Mart, making it 5 total that we have. but we should pick up some more if they have discontinued them

As far as noodles go, well we where waiting for them to go on sale, and when they did, they where gone, well it looks like we will need to buy them online

EDIT, we bought one of ours, wrote our team number on them, and then flipped it around, and guess what, the plastic was broken, but the "silkish" outside is still intact, so still useable. once fully broken, i will post it up!

[Lodyev]

Has anyone found them anywhere other then Walmart?