City will have a ball

White lights and an iridescent cover will enhance the ball's glow.
By ROGER G. SMITH
CITY HALL REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Out with the old and in with the new, indeed.
Out is the little disco ball that needed a police spotlight just to be seen dropping from the top of the Home Savings and Loan building downtown on New Year's Eve.
In is the specially built, 4-foot in diameter, self-lighted aluminum ball that will debut Dec. 31, just before midnight.
Two dozen students in the precision machining program at Choffin Career Center showed off their creation Friday.
"We intend for this to be around a long time," said Bob Barko, events coordinator for First Night Youngstown, the family-oriented, alcohol-free entertainment event downtown New Year's Eve.
First Night used an 18-inch disco ball dropped down the bank building's flagpole the past three years. The Mahoning County Sheriff's Department trained a spotlight on the ball so it would shimmer.
The Choffin sphere is a whole new, well, ballgame.
The making of it
Students used a pencil sketch that Barko, an artist, drew on a sheet of notebook paper. From that they created blueprints, measured and cut rolled aluminum rods to exact 12-foot lengths and drilled precision holes in support rings for the rods.
The ball weighs about 40 pounds.
Each of the juniors and seniors in the class had a hand in the production and engraved their name on the top when they were done.
The hardest part was creating the two ring-shape supports on the top and bottom, which hold the rods together, said Julius Williams, a junior. Drilling the holes for the rods and the dropping mechanism had to be just right, he said.
"It's got to be precise," Williams said.
James Watson, a senior, quickly had to build an extension on one of the rods when it became apparent the fit was too tight.
The class spent about two weeks making the ball.
First Night volunteers will string the structure with white lights and use an iridescent cover to enhance the glow. The city will build a plastic pipe and a device to lower the ball so it isn't limited to sliding down the flagpole.
Their legacy
The students already are thinking about the ball and their legacy.
"We can look at our children and say, 'We built this,'" said Cory Flemming, a junior.
Indeed, the ball should last at least 20 years, said Bob Morrell, the machining class instructor.
The class was excited when First Night commissioned the project and all the students got involved, he said.
"It really showed off 100 percent teamwork. That was all worth it," he said. The chance to build an item that will be seen on local TV every year easily could persuade a student to stick with the program and make machining a career, Morrell said. Graduates of the two-year program have solid entry level skills to work at one of more than 300 machine shops in a 50-mile radius, he said.
"It might change over a kid," he said of the project.
First Night asked Choffin students to build the ball when they learned the school made another item.
Choffin students built the cart that displays the bell cast this summer for Mahoning County to celebrate Ohio's Bicentennial.
rgsmith@vindy.com