I looked into this myself a few years ago. I worked at a bowling alley for a few years when I started my business.
First of all, I know that a brand new pinsetter from AMF costs about $10,000. You pretty much need a pair since the ball return is shared by the two machines in the pair. So you’re looking at $20,000 for just that.
I have no idea what a new lane costs, but the way to go would be to find a shut-down bowling alley or one that’s putting in new lanes and get a pair of the old ones. Sometimes, they’re up for grabs when they’re changing the lanes out.
A wooden bowling lane consists of hard maple on the approach and for the first 20 feet. Then there’s 40 feet of pine and then the pindeck is usually maple. On top of the wood is a solid resin coating that’s redone every few years. They cut down the old resin coating and a little bit of the wood to make it flat and then recoat. So even if the lane’s a little torn up, you can make it usable again by recoating it. This costs money to get a company to come out and do this.
No clue about the scoring, but it’s a lot more expensive to get scoring for 2 lanes than it is for 40. Big bowling alleys get a bigger discount for buying in bulk since AMF or Brunswick is going to have to fly a crew out there to install it.
Another thing is that you have to keep oil on the lanes whenever you bowl. If you don’t oil them regularly, you’ll tear up the coating on the lanes not to mention you’ll damage your balls. A new machine that strips and oils the lanes runs about $25,000 and requires maintenance. You have to buy the oil and stripping solution for the machine.
You have to have 2 sets of pins per lane (every pinsetter I’ve seen requires 20 pins). A set of pins was $200 last time I checked. You’ll probably need an extra set to replace cracked pins…but 5 sets of pins should last years in a personal bowling alley.
You also have to know how to work on the pinsetters. They require regular maintenance. There are also “stops” that occur, even on a brand new pinsetter. You have to know how to get them going again when that happens. There are pins flying all over the place and when a pin goes somewhere it’s not supposed to, you have a “stop”.
My idea on building a bowling alley was to get all old equipment and put it all together myself. I probably could’ve gotten everything I needed including spare parts for next to nothing. The problem is that you need a building that’s roughly 90 feet long by 20 feet wide to accommodate a 2 lane bowling alley and I just don’t have that kind of space.
