I just noticed while looking over your specs that the sandwedge is not is as “flat” as everything else. i am sure I am not the first to notice the difference, and you have probably already addressed the question, but I am curious as to why you have a relatively upright sand wedge. Does it have something to do with manipulating the clubface open i.e. flat lies tend to point the face right, upright lies tend to point left. So the sandwedge is upright to begin with because you like to open th face?
Bob - I’ll let others more familar with the technique explain it but some brief pointers and a pic of Lags fairways and sand wedge in this thread - about 3/4 posts from the end:
The old addage of “what you do not know IS hurting you” rings true…again! I am almost embarrassed by my lack of knowledge pertaining to equipment. I have spent a lot of time looking into mechanics, psychology but what I know about the sticks you can put in a thimble with room to spare. This is a good place to remedy that. I think I have to allow the mad scientist in me, out! What Lag does with his sandwedge makes sense. I almost guessed correctly. Please help me understand why the club plays flatter when the face is opened. Also (there will be many alsos in the weeks to comes, please indulge me) I was curious about a couple of things:
How about bounce? I know that Hogan did not like to have any (apart from the sandwedge I am guessing.) This has always been why blades are called blades, to me, minimal bounce. Bounce is obviously for people that tend to “drop-kick” their irons even if just slightly. Lag, do you have specs for bounce?
ALSO, even though it is cheeky of me to ask this question here what is the flattest modern driver on the market? I was curious to see how flat I can get one of those frying pans with one of those gadgety ferrules (can flatten by 2 degrees) As long as one you guys do not outbid me I should have some persimmon heading my way shortly!
Just curious of what Lag’s thoughts on shaft lengths are. The 38" shaft on a 5-iron is the standard shaft length today, but many clubs of the past were shorter in length like 37.75" or even 37.5" 5-iron shafts.
I think the 38" is a good length and shouldn’t be fooled around with too much. Making it longer can make the swing more upright. Making them shorter hurts distance and even though iron play is an accuracy game, if I can hit one less club, usually the better for me.
My gamers are a set of G40’s and I play my 5i at 35.5"… but it has 3* less loft than my new set of '68 Dyna’s where the 5 iron is 38" in length. (27* loft G40 vs 30* loft Dyna) So basically with the G40’s I’m hitting a 6i length iron with a 4 1/2 iron loft when compaired to my set from yesteryear…
Helps me with dispersion and keeps the ball flight a little lower. But the lower CoG on the newer head gets the ball in the air just as well as the older Dyna’s (for me!), and no lack of distance from the shorter club, either… due to the lower loft. That’s if you strictly compare 5i to 5i. Apples and Oranges really.
I wish I could remove the numbers on the bottom and do what Ryan Moore did… just put the lofts. Who care if it’s a 5i, 6i, 7i whatever. I play my clubs 1/2" shorter than standard, but a 27* iron of today is the same as a 27* iron of yesterday… just a different number on the bottom. It only gets confusing/frustrating when comparing iron names and numbers, but loft is loft and length is length, that’s how I think of it anyhow.
LAG, YOU SHOULD STICKY THIS THREAD… I FIND MYSELF REFERENCING YOUR SETUP AND THIS THREAD ALOT!!!
I’ll bump this up from time to time…
Not sure should “Sticky” this thread, as these are my own specs, but not necessarily set in stone for anyone even me.
I do tend to refine and change things over time. I have been moving toward more progressive heavier overall dead weights
and swing weights into the shorter irons and wedges.
Lag, I recently increased the swingweight of my Mizuno TP-11s from D1 to D6 by adding lead tape to the heads. I’ve read in another thread that this is perhaps not a very good approach as perhaps we need to keep the swing weight in synch with the dead weight, so perhaps my clubs are somewhat unbalanced? I’m not sure if I understand what we need to do to get our irons at the right swingweight, but perhaps irons that are lighter due to shaft and head weights are not good candidates for adding weight?
Within the scheme of things, does it have any bearing on matters that the shafts are regular rather than stiff?
Adding that much tape to the head only will tend to weaken the flex. Not sure you’ll want to weaken “R” flex to anything less than “R,” and it can certainly effect the balance. I’ve found the best results when I place a single long strip of tape on the underside of the shaft itself, starting at the hosel. It’s under the shaft so you can’t see it from address. It’s still on the bottom half of the club so it increases the swingweight, but doesn’t effect the overall balance as much.
Most everyone here should be into stiff shafts. No doubt that weighting heavy heads onto loose shafts will create more shaft flex issues than we would want.
I’ll probably bring them back to D3 or D4, and will consider Pinzer’s idea.
I have a set of Hogans with Apex 4 shafts but I still need to get them flattened - when I address the ball with them upright I feel dizzy looking at them!
Interesting stuff. My irons usually come around D-1 or so when I get them off of eBay. Then I lead tape them to D-6 and keep the wedges at D-9. All of my irons either have a Hogan Apex Shafts in them or a True Temper Dynamic Gold shaft in them.
I’ve virtually had no issues with lead taping the crap out of these irons. I suppose having a clubmaker put the weight in the hosel would be better, but I still haven’t had an issue and I struggle with getting any consistency with clubs that are D-1 swingweights. I just can’t consistently use my pivot and instead get real armsy.
I have a new Nickent LW that I got brand new for $25 on a liquidation sale. I needed something forged to bend flat. But it came with a Nippon shaft. For those not familiar, Nippon makes super duper light shafts. I think this shaft is at 90 grams. The swingweight was D-5 when I got it, so I lead taped it to D-9 and it still doesn’t feel all that good.
I did find that the KBS shafts are actually heavier than I thought if you get the parallel tip. Stiff is 130 grams (same as X100 in True Temper) and X-Stiff is 133 grams. With the taper tip the KBS STiff is 120 grams and X-Stiff is 130 grams.
All my sets are pretty heavy… I think my 59 Dynas are the heaviest set I own… with my MacGregor M85’s a close second.
The dead weights vary some, and I certainly move toward a heavier set for a days round if I haven’t played in a while…to make sure I can feel something out there.
For example… my Hogan Bounce Sole is 15.5 ounces but my 59 Dyna is 16.4 which is really heavy. But some of my best ball striking rounds have been with the Dyna… I like having a couple of sets… and before I go out I usually pick up a couple, and see which set feels the best in my hands for that day.
The club never feels exactly the same in my hands from day to day… so I find it much easier to work a differing set into my feel, than try to fight my body’s mysterious ways! I just give it what it seems to want to feel.
here as of Sept 2010…
Slowly dialing more sets, flattening lies, removing offset, and flattening persimmons.
Right now I am trying to finish up a set of 60’s MacGregor Split Soles with #1 propel shafts in them.
Three of the shafts were replaced with different shafts that don’t have the right step patterns in them.
So I am on the hunt.
I got a set of MP-33´s today in the mail - by a poor guy who seemed to have a hard time finding the sweetspot according to the impact marks .
Lag - you talked about getting rid of Offset, since they seem to have quite a bit esp. on the higher irons? How do you do that - can a guy with a bending machine do this? I also want to make them heavy - they have TrueTemper S300 shafts installed - so switching to heavier shafts probably wont give me more weight - so my best bet would be to put more weight into the shaft? Does the clubmaker need to pull the shafts for that to insert weights?
Other than that i will just go with your specs you posted on the first page.
Removing the offset is really an art… it takes multiple bends on different places on the neck to do it… and it would simply be too hard to describe. I usually spend about 15 minutes on each club… sometimes more tweaking them, and setting them down for a look, then back in the vice over and over until I get it right.
but in the end it’s worth it…
The 50’s stuff is much easier to do… the irons with the longer necks, because there is so much more room to crank around on.
I wish I had a better answer…
Modern club makers, if you ever read this… quit making over-sized lightweight perimeter weighted off set junk that’s way too upright with wide flanges! Stop it!
Ever since I have started bending my own clubs flat I have noticed that when I bend them improperly, I sometimes get offset. I am not sure why, but I think I have to be extremely careful when doing the bend not to add offset when going 5-6 degrees flat. If I do accidentally add offset then it requires multiple bends and re-bends to get it out. I completely understand what Lag is saying about describing it, I get the feeling sometimes it can appear to be an art. If you were watching me, I would bend it multiple ways take it out, look, bend again, look, bend again, etc. My equilizer in one of my sets almost looks like a gooseneck now. That was my first try.
I think an experienced club guy would know what he is doing.
I have bent MP-33 before, they are pretty durable. Meaning you can bend them a bunch with no problem. Older clubs are often much better, but MP-33’s are not bad.
I dont bend my iron but recently bent a set of MacGregor M75 and the 9 iron seems to have a lot of offset. I suspect it might be related to where on the hosel (distance from the club head) you put the bending bar. can someone test that and post it here so I can give my club guy clearer instructions.
Basically the offset has to do with bending lofts mostly.
To remove offset, bend the club very weak up high on the neck, then when you bend it back strong from there, do that bend with the tool right in the bottom of the neck. The rest is all tweeking and tinkering.
I have spent a lot of time looking into mechanics, psychology but what I know about the sticks you can put in a thimble with room to spare. This is a good place to remedy that. I think I have to allow the mad scientist in me, out! 
What Lag does with his sandwedge makes sense. I almost guessed correctly. Please help me understand why the club plays flatter when the face is opened. Also (there will be many alsos in the weeks to comes, please indulge me) I was curious about a couple of things:
.