Process and apparatus for buffing golf balls

A method for automatically buffing flash off a golf ball comprising the steps of:

• providing the golf ball from a supply hopper to an orientation device;
• orienting the ball to a specific plane position;
• identifying a location, a length and a thickness of the flash in relation to the profile of the ball by using a mapping device;
• picking the golf ball and placing the ball into a rotating spindle cup without any change in the orientation;
• providing a computer system having coordinated motion logic to capture the information from the mapping device and produce a mapped contour of the flash in relationship to a profile of the ball;
• removing the flash by an adjustable cutter that responds to commands from the computer's coordinated motion logic and removes only flash along the ball profile;
• buffing the golf ball with a flexible profiled sanding belt whose motion is controlled by the coordinated motion logic of the computer;
• and
• removing the buffed ball from the spindle cup and forwarding it for further processing.