The maximum amount of the surface that can be covered with dimples is about 80 percent, he explained. Generally, deeper dimples produce lower, flatter trajectories, while shallow dimples produce higher, ballooning trajectories. The key, Thurman said, is to create a dimple with enough depth to produce air turbulence around the ball as it rotates in flight. Thurman, along with technicians Susan Beachum and Donna Haynes and fellow engineer Ron Borecki, test a variety of ball designs at Wilson's research and testing laboratory, which sits at one end of a 13-acre driving range about a mile from the company's golf ball manufacturing plant. Computers link the driving machine to sensors along the fairway to record the performance of each ball.
Most companies come out with one or two new golf ball designs each year.
Ball designs that were in production four years ago are no longer being produced. Thurman said he's designed a 500-dimple ball that's been very successful. The 500-dimple design is used in Wilson's Staff Titanium and Ultra 500 lines. It just took 500 to properly define the pattern. There are a lot of options when it comes to dimple patterns for golf balls.