Powerball Ball Drop Theory

Reply #12

plnwebguy — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 13:58:12 GMT

Actually the number pattern above is incorrect for 2001. I was thinking they were using 53 balls at the time, but they were only using 49. So instead it would be 4 rows of 10 and the last row with 9.my bad -plnwebguy

Reply #11

plnwebguy — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 12:56:28 GMT

I went back and watched videos and found the new machines started the same time as the powerplay mulitplier - April 7, 2001. They also stacked the balls differently, using a pattern similiar to this:1122325310213142529203041518192940507182839496172738485162637474152536463142435452132334441123343I'm going to go back and do a frequency analysis on the draws dating back to when the machines were switched and see what the numbers look like. Also, last night's drawing had a number from each column... [ More ]

Reply #10

golotto — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 03:44:31 GMT

...just watched another Powerball draw and the machines certainly appear to have a dark colored horizontal spinning turntable surrounding the central lift shaft at the base of the mixing chamber. The turntables also appear to have shallow fins that propel the draw balls inside the mixing bowl ...as the balls roll to the bottom and get hit. I'm 99%+ sure that the machine is the Halogen . What is left to investigate is how the machine attaches to a single numbered ball prior to the lift onto the r... [ More ]

Reply #9

hypersoniq — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 01:20:07 GMT

I doubt that it would make a difference or be any help whatsoever, but it would be cool to set it up in a 3-D CAD program with the drawing date as the Z axis, plot the points and connect the dots... It would serve no practical purpose, but it sure would look cool ;-) Perhaps exported to VRML so you can cruise all around it... sort of like the DNA of powerball... 2 chains, one with 5 strands, and the other with just one...

Reply #8

hypersoniq — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 01:16:00 GMT

They still haven't answered my query... it's been months...

Reply #7

plnwebguy — Sat, 20 Mar 2004 21:38:25 GMT

golotto - it seems like I saw a date one time on the faq or a reference to a date, so I'll go back and look at it and then maybe that will give an idea of when they switched machines given their faq info about machines, maybe it was around the time Hot Lotto started because the machines they use appear to be the Criterion type and maybe they got new machines for Powerball and put the old ones in use for Hot Lottohypersoniq - I just guessed on the order too, I figured the first ball in on the fir... [ More ]

Reply #6

hypersoniq — Sat, 20 Mar 2004 20:57:38 GMT

My spin on things, including the powerball grid... Looks like we have opposite numbering but columns hold up... I just guessed, any reason you numbered the way you did?I have added row and column identifiers along X and Y axes, in case anyone has any ideas regarding vector analysis...good luck...White Ball Start GridY11**01-------22--------4310**02--12--23--33--4409**03--13--24--34--4508**04--14--25--35--4607**05--15--26--36--4706**06--16--27--37--4805**07--17--28--38--4904**08--18--29--39--5003... [ More ]

Reply #5

golotto — Sat, 20 Mar 2004 01:46:15 GMT

hi plnwebguy,To th

Reply #4

plnwebguy — Fri, 19 Mar 2004 12:25:47 GMT

I thought I'd go ahead and post Wednesday's:3/17/200424-15-20-43-71132531021314252920304151819294050718283949617273848516263747415253646314243545213233444112223343That fourth column sure isn't very popular. Going back to 2/21/04, there's only been one drawing with a ball from that column and that was the 41 ball on 3/10/04.On a side note, I was watching the Hot Lotto videos - http://www.musl.com/hotlotto/videos.asp. They use machines similar to Mega Millions instead of ones like Powerball.plnw... [ More ]

Reply #3

plnwebguy — Wed, 17 Mar 2004 04:47:19 GMT

Golotto -Thanks for the link to the manufacturer of the machine and your comments - do you have any idea when they've changed methods over the years, for example, how long they've been using the Halogen? It'd be interesting to see if previous machines had any patterns. It's hard to see from the videos because they don't show the entire machine, but I think the balls that are in the central area when the first ball is drawn tend to stay in that area. I wish there was a way I could take the v... [ More ]

Reply #2

golotto — Wed, 17 Mar 2004 01:12:15 GMT

After furthur investigati

Reply #1

golotto — Tue, 16 Mar 2004 23:03:54 GMT

with the current powerball drawing balls being made of hard celluloid instead of the traditional rubber...couldn't the bouncing factor result in a totally random draw despite the drop arrangement? i agree with the theory presented and i've wrestled with the same thoughts about the possibility of repeating drop order causing repeated favorable pickings for the center balls. if the balls were still rubber and had more elasticity when contacting one another in the drawing chamber, one could argue t... [ More ]

Powerball Ball Drop Theory

plnwebguy — Tue, 16 Mar 2004 21:35:08 GMT

I don't know if anyone has ever discussed this before, and if so, maybe it's old news. But I've never bought into the theory that all the white balls in Powerball had an equal chance of being drawn based on where the ball has to be at the time a ball is drawn (in the middle of the hopper). So I started watching videos of drawings - http://www.musl.com/pbvideos.asp - and set up what I figured was how the balls were arranged in columns prior to being dropped. I thought that order may be importa... [ More ]