Combat bats make the most of composite technology

Combat bats are getting rave reviews by much of the baseball community as being one of the hottest and best performing bats in the industry. They are a fairly new company, who strictly focuses on making bats that use composite technology. Composite materials, as opposed to aluminum, are made up of a combination of carbon, glass, and Kevlar fibers embedded in a plastic resin.

In the adult and senior league categories the Virus (pictured below) is the main model that they put out. In the youth category there is the Virus, along with the “Da Bomb” model. There are a couple of important design factors with the Combat baseball bats that are worth taking note of.

Swingweight

The first one of these is the theory of swingweight, a term often used in golf, but not so much in baseball. There is a very good explanation of the swingweight theory here, but it has to do with weight distribution on the bat and how heavy the bat actually feels during the swing. The Combat bats were designed to have the optimal swingweight for each length.

There are a couple of factors that will determine the swingweight of the bat that are listed below.

Center of mass - the point at which all the weight is centered on the bat. The closer the center of mass to your hands, the lighter the bat will feel.
Moment of inertia – the measure of how difficult the bat is to swing. The lower the moment of inertia, the lighter the bat feels.

Look at it this way. Which way would it be easier to swing a sledgehammer? Holding it at the end with the head or the end with just the handle? Probably the end with the head, right? Yes, because the closer the weight is to the point of rotation (your hands), the easier it is to rotate (or in this case, swing) the object. This is basic weight and balance principles at work.

The bottom line is that Combat baseball bats are made to have an optimal swingweight for each length and weight. They can do this a lot easier than traditional aluminum bat manufacturers because the composite materials allows them to experiment with designs and distribute the weight to just the right spots.

Super SweetSpot Size

The Combat baseball bats are designed to have a lower barrel wall stiffness on both sides of the sweet spot, which actually in turn increases the overall size of the sweet spot. They also use something they call “Gear Technology” which somehow makes the tapered end of the barrel stronger.

Here is an interesting video I found on YouTube. Granted this guy is hitting softballs, but you can get somewhat of an idea of the hype around these bats.

Summary

According to their official website, the Combat bat company formerly supplied composite material to other brand name bat manufacturers in the 1990s. Then in 1998, out of frustration with complying with many of those company’s requirements, decided to branch off and develop their own brand of bats. This would explain why they are a fairly new and lesser known company.

As for my view of the Combat baseball bats, I have never personally used one of them, but based on what I’ve heard and through all of my research, I’d be excited to give one a try. I know that their popularity in the youth leagues are growing and youngsters are getting great results. They seem to be priced fairly close to other “brand name” manufacturers, perhaps slightly lower.

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