The Force Plate (FP-BTA), like any sensor, has a limit to how quickly it can respond to a change. If a very short impulse is applied to the force plate, it will vibrate, or ring, for a short while.

For the original version (those shipped before November 10, 2023) of the Force Plate, that ringing frequency is in the neighborhood of 250 Hz, with a period of about 4 ms. Any impulse with a duration shorter than 4 ms will only produce the ringing; there is no way to resolve anything shorter than that. Even an impulse with a time of 10 or 20 ms will be distorted by the finite response time of the force place. In order to really see the structure of an impulse, it would have be longer than 20 ms or so–ten times that would be a reasonable limit to get useful data.

This means that you could bounce a soft, squishy ball (if it is heavy enough – most nerf balls, for example, aren’t) off of the plate and see the details of the impulse, but you can’t possibly get useful data for the impulse of a baseball or a golf ball on the plate.

The current version of the Force Plate (FP-BTA) and the Go Direct® Force Plate (GDX-FP) have a different set of load cells that allow you to sample at rates up to 1,000 Hz without noticeable interference from the ring frequency.

Force Plate Troubleshooting and FAQs
Go Direct Force Plate Troubleshooting and FAQs