I was wondering if someone could give me some good links on clocking a roulette wheel. I beleive it can be done, if you can get a number 1 in 35 trys your making money. I was wondering if it could be done with any of these electronic wheels slots without a dealer. I think its a megastar i have seen.
Do they very the spin of the inside wheel? If you learned the wheel and the speed of the ball passing a number. Its seems if you could guess which side of the wheel a little over 50% or something it would be possible. Thoughts or information thank you

I have doubts that you could clock them with enough accuracy to turn the game +EV without using illegal electronic equipment.

Because to make it worthwhile you have to know what you know with more of a margin than the standard error of your measurements.

/thread

Believe it or not, there is too much randomness in Roulette to do this.

Look closely at a roulette wheel, you will notice that there are two different shaped barbs that alternate around the wheel. You will also notice that the ball spins in the opposite direction of the wheel. The ball is also of sufficient density to bounce all over the freaking place as well as just 'stick' when it hits the wheel just right.

Also, there are different weighted balls corresponding to different sizes and dealers constantly switch balls.

In summary, there is too much randomness to do this.

Think of craps and rolling dice. What you are thinking about is similar to taking a snap shot of the dice in mid air and then being able to predict what number will turn up.

Reason this is impossible is that there is too much randomness.

When the roulette ball flies, it can literally go ANYWHERE on the wheel at any time prior to the dealer waving you off.

On the TV show "Breaking Vegas" there was a team of men who used electronics to calculate where the ball would fall (within a range, not exact number). They claimed to do pretty well. This was like 30 yrs ago though so maybe the roulette wheels weren't as good as todays.

As I said, to do it you'd have to use electronic aids, which is illegal in most jurisdictions I believe.

Yea it was definitely illegal ;-)

Eaudomon Pie or something like that was the title of the book.
And way back then (sixites?) when some scientists mentioned they were going to check the accuracy of a roulette wheel they claim to have received a message from a rival university to pipe down ... serious money was supposedly being made.

Now this was on old style wheels and the foot tapping data input fed which octet to bet on into the guy's eyeglass frame but they were academics rather than trying to make money at it.

Totally impossible nowadays but a felony if you even try it.

The_Eudaemonic_Pie

Why is it impossible nowadays?

I began in the very late 70's because that's when computers became available that could be carried on your body. At the time few people were aware of small computers or what they were capable of. Croupiers used to let bets be placed up until the ball came out of the track.

Today clubs are very aware of computers, and stop posting a lot earlier. If they're losing, they'll change up other elements of the game. On top of that, laws have been changed. It is currently illegal to use hidden devices, and the penalties are quite stiff.

There was a book about pie, that was related.

It was all about adaptation of computer technology and developing interfaces that worked. There may have been several books, but I wouldn't have given any one a second glance -- they were outdated by the fact they were printed.

So it not at all possible, to judge by the naked eye. If you can guess right one in 35 trys your making money. You could not judge the speed of the ball going by a number to give you a 1 in 35 chance no matter how much time you put in. It seems just a few percent edge in judgement of speed you could do this.

Good luck with that.

It's not just the speed of the ball, it's the counter rotating speed of the wheel PLUS the 'canoes' inside the rim of the wheel. I'd wager no-one even do even a slight bit better than 1 in 38.

Now, if you were taking 3rds or sixth of the wheel, you might have a chance to help your cause. Good luck with doing the gymnastics between looking at the speed of ball, the position it's at and the area it 'should' hit, and then placing your bets on that area of the wheel quickly.

You'd be better of trying to find patterns in the spin styles of the dealers.

I've read that there is some correlation between musical talent and an ability to visually predict a wheel. There's not a lot of information, which is often a sign that someone is making it work.

As far as how possible it is -- I'd say much more likely than precision shooting. If I was to invest any time in either of these, I'd choose the wheel.

there are a lot of sounds from the wheel and ball spinning. i could see people picking up on that. ive got no musical talent myself but my great aunt is amazing. she can hear any song and play it back perfectly on piano. i can see a person with a similar gift being able to pick up those subtle sounds from the roulette wheel.

I'm not sure how musical talent would help pick a roulette number, but I heard years ago about a casino employee who had such a great ear that he could somewhat accurately (I don't know to what extent) predict where the Wheel of Fortune (this was even before the TV show) would end up. I don't know how true the story was - but it was told by a professor who was really into gambling, and he seemed to believe it. So maybe anything is possible.

If you can find a game that lets you place bets after the ball is released and build an illegal hidden computer then you can beat roulette. Keep us posted.

I thought some more about this and have changed my opinion some.

If you bought a wheel, had some talent (musical and visual acuity), and practiced your ass off (probably about 20+ hrs), then you could build up enough of an edge to be mathematically viable. You'd have to have a really big bank roll though.

Also, you'd have to find a few 'soft' roulette games. Most dealers will let you place bets about 5 seconds after the initial spin and some dealers don't spin the wheel as fast as others, and some balls will 'stick' relatively well in some wheels (wheels that are cheaper and have the deeper groove slots).

You'd also have to vary your betting, some bets you bet before the dealer spins and some during.

For the average person though, no, not really possible. But if you were willing to do the above and put some serious work in AND you had the talent then yes, it is possible.

You think it would only take 20 hours or so to aquire enough skill. It seems if you judge the speed of a ball past a number you may be able to go 1 in 33 or something. You have to memorize the wheel and the layout to bet fast enough. I have seen machines without a dealer that has an actual wheel. The inner wheel spins at different speeds at the start but i dont think it speeds up during a spin. I also dont think it slow down any more than it should. If you broke down the wheel into 6 sections and could guess a section
1 in 5 that would be enough. It spins a few seconds before it say no more bets. The balls look the same also. Thoughts.

Well, I have both wheels memorized, isn't that hard, and you'd bet in sections, just split the wheel into 4 sections, betting 9-10 numbers for each section.

As for the practice, you'd be amazed how well you can pick up 'beat frequencies' if you have the talent for it.

I am prior Air Force and some of us could listen and tell you what jet/plane was flying based on the beat frequency (constructive destructive interference from soundwaves coming off the engines/props). For me and a few others, it was easy, for most people, they just can't hear the difference.

There would/could be sometihng similar with the roulette wheel. When the ball spins it has a certain noise with its velocity. You can 'hear' when it is slowing down. Match this up with the 'rate' the wheel is counterspinning and eventually you will be able to tell 'when' the ball will hit and in what section. But like I said, it would take some practice. Other factors involve the wheel in question. The more expensive wheels spin really really smooth (which is what you'd want, less variables). Also, the ball density comes into play. The heavier balls tend to 'stick' while the lighter balls bounce all over the place.

Lastly, their is the dealer. Some dealers spin the hell out of the ball and then wave off all bets relatively shortly after the spin. Other dealers are a little more lax, spin, and give you almost all the way until the ball drops before they wave you off.

Even with all this, the little metal barbs within the wheel add another variable of randomness, they may the ball drop immediately or skip a little bit further. But even still, I think with the above you could significantly reduce the variance such that you have a mathematical edge over the house.

In fact, this is making me want to buy a roulette wheel and practice

Holy shtt, just looked on ebay, roulette wheels are around $200 - $700.

I might actually give this a try next year, LOL, of course, if I make it work, I can't tell you about it

You don't want to think of the wheel in "sections" -- it's continuous. When we played with computers, we had the wheel order memorized both backwards and forwards. The computer would provide a single number as the prediction, we would bet that number first -- then start placing bets to both sides of that number until cut off.

Wow. Really? I didn't know that.

I haven't played a lot but I'm pretty sure the local Roulette dealers don't say "no more bets" until the ball is about to fall or has already fallen and is bouncing around.
Most of the betting action is done after the ball is first spun.