A study has been undertaken to develop techniques for assessing baseball bat durability and performance. Experimental investigations were conducted by constructing a testing device to simulate the ball-bat interaction occurring in play. A sensitivity study of the machine's inertia and forces on the bat were found to have a small effect on hit ball speed, and a much larger effect on bat stress. A dynamic finite element analysis was employed to simulate the ball-bat interaction. The ball was modeled asa linear viscoelastic material. This provided a mechanism of energy loss during impact (coefficient of restitution) and accounted for its observed speed dependence. The model has found favorable correlation with experimental results of bat durability and performance. A bat reinforcement scheme was shown to significantly reduce bat stress with minimal accompanying changes in bat performance.
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