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Why does our mini-dog have problems at the box? |
Your Present Box
I am assuming your box has an opening that accommodates a regular tennis ball (not the kind where the hole is much smaller and most of the ball sticks out). A ball that is smaller than a normal tennis ball will not come out of this type of box properly all of the time. It might be struck off-center, it might be rolling in the opening, it may get pinched by the hammer. If the ball is too soft, it will be slow coming out of the box (ie. the throw is not the same every time). Plus a mini-ball will travel further than a regular ball and the throw might be too quick or too hard.
Our Former Box
We had a one-hole "regular" box and when we started to get mini-dogs on our team we were forced to load the mini-balls in the regular size hole. This led to many errors.
Our Solution
We purchased a three hole box (2 regular holes,1 mini hole) and the problem has gone away (touch wood!).
We were trying to accommodate all of our dogs on a box that was made to accept one size of ball thrown at one speed. We were not getting consistent results from all of our dogs (most of our dogs were fine with the one-hole box). The mini-ball was not be coming out of the box the same way 100% of the time and/or it was coming out too fast or too hard for the mini-dogs.
The throw from the middle hole was adjusted to suit the mini-balls, plus the mini-hole was positioned lower than the regular outside holes. See What type of box do you use? for more information.
A Temporary Solution
Modify your present box by cutting a groove at the bottom of your hole, and lessen the force by which the ball comes out by putting in a different spring or dampen the trigger