There certainly is more to it than meets the eye.
I don’t know a lot about fishing but it does seem logical that the pressure of the line causes the twisting of the rod.
I was under the impression that spine placement was done to have the strongest part of the shaft in the proper place to prevent breakage (and also for feel).
I have some old stock (tapered) True Temper DG X-stiff irons and wood shafts and they seem to have have less spine effect than the newer shafts I ordered on eBay.
Maybe the older shafts were made to meet higher standards? Having said that, it’s been my experience that all shafts have a small but noticeable spine.
Even though it may be only slightly noticeable I like to do it anyway because it minimizes manufacturing anomalies and it maximizes the placebo effect.
Paul
IOZ,
I would think that spine placement on a golf shaft can have more effect on performance than on a fishing rod. Me and a buddy of mine used to have this machine that we built, basically an 8" piece pf PVC with 2 ball bearings glued in each end…where you could insert a bare rod blank OR a finished rod by it’s handle, and hang a weight from it, and it would immediately show you that the rod was twisting because of line torque, not spine placement. We would take a bare rod blank, and a finished rod built from the exact same blank with guides and line, and hang weights from it to show people what happens when you add a load via fishing line running through a set of guides, versus just deflecting the bare blank with your hand. It was a huge eye opener for the average rod builder who had been led to believe that the spine HAD to be on top to prevent twisting. In fact, for a while there was A LOT of backlash in the rod building community because the predominant thought for so long was that the spine caused rod twist…not so!!! I would tell them “put the spine on top…put it anywhere you like, but realize you’re not affecting the tendency to twist in any measureable way unless you deal with guide placement first”. Having said all this, I ALWAYS spine my rods, because many if not most times the spine will coincide with the curvature of the rod blank (or golf shaft). With a fishing rod or golf shaft, you’re certainly not hurting anything by aligning the spine in a certain axis, and it’s an easy tell as to what’s going on in terms of construction of the blank. Also, there are many many times when a structure can actually have 2 spines, but one will always be stronger than the other, so go with the more pronounced spine.
On situations with flyrods which are almost always either a 2pc. 3pc. or 4pc. design, I have known folks who spine the tip section(s) with the spine down, and the butt section(s) with the spine up, since the tip is responsible for casting performance, and the butt is responsible for the actual fight…sort of a hybrid.
Regarding spine for other performance characteristics, it could be somewhat advantageous to have the stiff side on top for a rod that is predominately used for fighting fish, i.e. a standup boat rod or trolling rod, Tuna Rod etc… Conversely, a lot of folks feel like on a rod built for casting performance such as a flyord or a spin/cast rod built for bass, or a surf rod etc… that placing the spine on the bottom of the rod gives enhanced performance during the casting stroke. So, by all means place it where you feel like it gives you the performance characteristics you desire…whether it’s on a fishing rod or a golf club.
Tom Dorsey (Thomas & Thomas) is a really nice guy with a great sense of humor. I did an interview with him once for a magazine, and he has a very interesting story about how he and his brother-in-law (Tom Maxwell) started Thomas and Thomas. T& T builds a beautiful rod…very elegant with classic styling and looks.
I remember being on a beach in Ireland when I was a kid with my Dad who was fishing a match. He went to cast out using the pendulum technique (he could launch his sinker and bait close to 200 yards using that method) and his rod snapped and the broken end whacked him on the top of his nose. Dad being as rock hard as Dads are when you are a kid just fished on to the end of the competition like nothing had happened with a broken nose and blood everywhere. Maybe it would never have happened if they did spining back then.
Does anyone know were you can get .335 x flex irons shafts. I just pulled out a shaft from my wilson dyan powers and it measured .335. Something tells me reshafting these clubs isn’t going to be easy.
.335 is a standard wood tip. You could either rebore the hosels to a larger size or maybe tip some wood shafts down. But you are going to need a pillar drill and a shaft freq analyzer to do that. If you are in Europe, I can do that sort of thing.
Thanks NRG. I am in the States but thanks for the offer. Lag is looking for a set of classic left handed blades he can set to ABS specs. I will probably send my other set to the iron factory and get them refinished and reshafted.
Anyone else notice it always seems to be the old Wilsons that seem to have bizarre shafts that nobody’s ever seen before? I know there’s other stuff you see occasionally like the Golfcraft glass shafts, the Hogan Vectors and early graphite but it always seems to be a Wilson that’s a total head scratcher like this one that comes straight outta left field. Maybe its because they made so many clubs over the years but I don’t remember pulling nearly as many weirdo shafts out of Macs or Spaldings as I have Wilsons. What makes it stranger is I’ve never seen it in a Haig, those are Wilson but I’ve always had a pretty good idea what was in it at first look even if it was rusty with no band or anything.
Haig/Hagen had a few unusual shafts too. I’ve got a set of Ultradynes (forged) that have fluted steel shafts with the fluting near the clubhead (like the fluting on Wilson putter shafts - 8802, 8813 etc). Also I believe the Ultradyne 2s (cast) had steel shafts with a spiral twisted 6" section just above the clubhead (and also an overhosel fitting).
Why do you suppose iron shafts since early in the steel age have been designed so much differently than wood shafts?
Understood that the thinner wood shafts are going to be lighter and taper tipping them will add stiffness… but if you were designing a driver for the sole purpose of accuracy, why not just use a longer 1 iron shaft so that you could keep the feel the same right through the set. I have been pondering this as of late.
I cannot hook a 1 iron. I can’t do it unless I do something extreme like close the face and regrip the club.
But I can hook a driver on occasion… and I attribute that to the shaft. I wouldn’t think twice about giving up 10 or 15 yards if I felt like I could go weeks without missing a fairway. I can’t think of the last time I have missed a fairway with a 1 iron.
Not absolutely sure where you’re going here but I think I get it. At first I would guess it was a try it and see what happens thing with steel shafts. The benefits they found I’m thinking pretty quickly were close to zero torque which is probably the biggest thing, and then cost efficiency and also QC. I don’t think it was until pretty late in the game that they even thought about flex and flex options, and I would also guess most of the early shafts by today’s standards would be about 10X boards like those Pyratones. If I am following you correctly I don’t think it would work well matching the specs of the one iron shaft and plugging it out to driver length because of the gap in length that happens between the woods and the irons. That’s my understanding at least why tapered wood shafts have a smaller tip than iron shafts, because the woods are so much longer they have to be a lot stiffer and especially so in the tip. You know this but not many others will that the smaller the tip at least by basic design the stiffer it is. Most Ams would go the other way, think a large diameter is stiffer and more stable but it isn’t. I’m just stating this so that the concept is clear to all, that a smaller tip will naturally be thicker,stiffer and more stable with less torque. I’m not sure how to stiffen a tapered wood shaft to be honest, the last thing I would want to do is chop the tip off because that’s the best, stiffest part. I don’t know if any of this jazz is any help at all but again I’m not entirely sure where you’re going.
Shaft stiffness traditionally is relative to the heavier weight in the short irons and the shorter shaft makes it stiffer also. So typically we see the step pattern on the steel shafts moving down toward the head about a half an inch per club. I think those ratios are very good. My set of early Dynas with the X green band rocket shafts move a total of 3 inches in step from 9 iron to 2 iron while the shaft lengths increase a total of 4 1/2 inches. And of course that stiffening is working down toward the head progressively into the short irons to offset the additional weight of the heads themselves. Short iron heads are heavier than long iron heads… at least all my sets are.
As I go from 2 iron to Driver, I increase shaft length about 3 inches, but the dead weight is only changing about 1/2 an ounce. So my two iron is 14.8 total deadweight and my Mac Keyhole sits nicely at about 14.3 ounces. So I don’t really need to be stiffening the shaft to accommodate a bit increase in head mass. However, I do need to compensate some to stiffen it up to accommodate the extra length. So in my mind, if I were to use the same shafts throughout my set from wedge to driver, and I were truly interested in working the ratios correctly I might be wiser to take a 1 iron rocket shaft and not move the step upward, but reverse that trend as I get into the woods so the step would then start working back down toward the head in my 4 wood, then 3 wood finally finishing closest down with the driver. Of course I would have to add a bit of length to the butt end to get it into driver length.
Another element is bulge and roll… which in my opinion has been designed for poor golf swings. And finally removing as much face progression as possible. While I like face progression in my short irons and wedges, I don’t like to see a lot of it in the longer clubs… but persimmons have some built in by design… but with the greater pressures on the clubhead with the woods especially for a hitter holding shaft flex, then this may in fact be justified.
It’s fun messing with this stuff for sure. Everyone needs a proper workshop to dial in their madness!
Okay first question that comes to mind even though it doesn’t really matter dynamically is what’s the difference in the raw head weight between the longest iron and the driver? Morbid curiosity I suppose. Next I think the only way to get a wood shaft stiffer would be to take the longest heaviest one available, a 45" X500 is the longest I’ve seen because they made them to length and butt trimming it down. I don’t have any reason to stop thinking that tip trimming these actually weakens them. The only other thing I can think of is filling the shaft and that’s a little extreme for my taste. I don’t think there’s any other way of strengthening the dynamic properties of a shaft that long in any other fashion. It is what it is at the end of the day.
With the one iron you were talking about I think part of it is a really strong shaft but another part of it is the confidence you have with it. A big part of this move is confidence no matter how good the mechanics are. The point of it is to come into the ball like a hooker, exit like a slicer, get the transition point as close to the ball as possible and never ever get the clubface shut to the body line. In fact the only time the face is even square is at impact, its open everywhere else. And the sidespin on the ball is really caused by the relation of the path to the face angle, not just where the face is pointed. So with all that, when you’ve got a lot of confidence with a good strong shaft that you just know you go after it’s going to breed a better move. Confidence begets confidence. Even though it feels strong it isn’t as strong as the one in the driver that acts weaker because of the extra length. If you replicated the iron shaft and plugged it it’d be terrible in the driver, weaker than what’s in there now. I just don’t know if its possible to get stronger than the strongest thing that’s available stock.
With the bulge & roll the bulge is right but the roll should be inverted. It would look awful though, totally wacko. I’m surprised you say you don’t like the face prog in the woods. Keep in mind how deep the COG is front to back, that’s why its there, if you lose it the launch angle gets too high, then you have to compensate by lowering the loft, raising the COG, and everything starts getting complicated like losing a ton of hang time. Plus the more face progression the harder it is to hit it left. I agree with the long irons, I like the little offset to get the leading edge in line with the shaft line to get it up in the air better but I also like the face prog in the woods for that piercing flight, I like as much as possible with a four wood to get “that flight”, the one that sizzles and still lands soft. Finding a good four wood head is next to impossible, to find one with the face prog that doesn’t sit dead shut and isn’t upright. I’ve seem maybe three ever that were actually really good.
If we stick with parallel tips… then tipping from the bottom will of course stiffen the shafts. Since the step patterns are much higher up the shaft with the long irons, it would be easy to tip and drop the step back down with a longer club.
It would be easy enough to just take a 1 iron and set it up 43 inches, and stiffen it up because long iron shafts are typically not as stiff as short iron shafts. The reason for the reversal would be because I would not be going down into 12 ounce heads. I like more mass in the head and am slowly working toward increasing mass rather than decreasing mass as is with modern thinking. High mass, high thrust lower velocity.
It would be an interesting experiment to set up both a 1 iron and a driver with the exact same specs and test ball flight. Having a loft and lie angle machine would make this a snap. Set up a 1 iron at 9 degrees. How much farther would I hit a driver vs a 1 iron with the same basic length, shaft and dead weight? What would the accuracy differences be? Trajectory differences? Increase or decrease workability?
Obviously all this stuff was pondered and explored a long time ago… but one thing I know is that hitters and swingers are very different animals, and how the gear is set up should also be very different.
The goal for me is to be able to use the same golf swing from wedge to driver because I don’t practice or hit balls. I’m pretty shocked at how much better I putt now by taking a putter out of my bag and just replacing it with a golf club.
I mean it’s not like you can just go down to your local golf store or pro shop and ask someone and get a proper answer.
But the parallel tips are crap. You can tip a parallel to the grip and it still won’t be as stiff as a stock taper. That’s the problem. I don’t know why anybody, hitter, swinger, wife swapper would bother with parallel tips in the first place. Maybe if you want to loosey goosey sling it all over the lot maybe but who wants to do that?
I also think you got it backwards with the short iron shafts. Personally I always thought they were set softer than the long irons because of the shorter length & clubhead speed that ensues and the heavier head weight won’t make enough of a dynamic difference to make up for it. That’s why I don’t think the one iron shaft would work in the driver. This is how tapers work, with parallel they’re all the same and you just chop em.
If you figure out how to make the same move with the driver & the wedges that’d be pretty interesting. How’s that going to work when you take a divot with one and the other is an inch up on a tee? There’s similarities in intentions but not all that many & address is totally different.
I have taper tipped X100’s in quite a few of my drivers, and if I press on the butt end with the clubhead against the ground I can flex it a lot easier than I can my 1 iron shaft which is a parallel tip. The older shafts had much thicker steel walls… and of course were a lot heavier… but if I am holding shaft flex, then the shaft becomes part of the club’s hit… it’s mass and the whole thing… it’s a different animal.
My short irons are much stiffer. The closer the step is to the head the stiffer the shaft in the parallel tips. There is nearly a four ounce difference between my 2 iron and PW. So the shaft has to be much stiffer to offset the extra weight so that when I swing them… I get about the same dynamic action out of them. But my driver with a taper in it… is a totally different feeling shaft. Tapers play very different. If you’re playing all the time and hitting balls… it’s not a big issue. But the more I can feel a sameness from tee shot to wedge shot… the better.
Dead weight is the key for me… not swing weight. If I had a 30 inch club that weighed 10 ounces or a 50 inch club that weighed 10 ounces… I would not be able to feel either of them… regardless of swing weight. The pull of the club through transition is more of a pull against the overall weight of the club in it’s vertical dimension (referring to the shaft not the ground) then the horizontal pressure happens down near the bottom of the swing (horizontal shaft flexing). So those pressures go from centripetal to centrifugal, to tangential.
Fairways should be easier to hit than greens because you rarely have to worry about distance control.
I just feel the need for a club that takes off on a 1 iron trajectory, but goes about 25 yards farther… and has about as much chance of going left as my 1 iron does… which is close to zero.
The mass distribution quite far behind the clubface on a persimmon driver I suppose has a stabilizing effect like the fuselage of an airplane. Running a perfect lead cylinder from just behind the face to the back of the club might be a better way to design a persimmon, rather than the traditional big chunk under the sole plate. I think Hogan was onto something with Speed-Slot design.
Historically I have favored drivers with a lot of face progression. For me… face progression helps me draw the ball which is much more critical for me with the shorter irons. I like to be able to spin it in right to left sometimes. I can always cut them in as a stock shot… but having the ability to turn it when needed is a big advantage. That is why I hate offset on irons.
I guess I might be best to start with a 43 inch 9 degree driving iron with a 48 degree lie angle and a 1 iron shaft tipped 3 inches… which would be a terribly unforgiving club to hit. Then figure out how to best retrofit a persimmon head onto that which would be a bit more forgiving but still offer that low piercing ball flight that never ever has a left look to it.
As far as it being on a tee… no big difference… I am a sweeper anyway… and I hit 1 irons off tees all the time.
The idea here is to create a club that may not go as far as a driver but would have basically the accuracy dynamics of a 1 iron.
Okay I got three drivers set up now, a Ti 975J with an X300, that Cleveland with X4 & Bud’s driver, a Tommy Armour and I put an X5 in it. Bud’s is a sunken bore & the other two are bore thru andthey’re all 44". I don’t know what the dead weights are but Bud’s is heaviest, that’s why I put the heaviest shaft in it (that doesn’t bend AT ALL & that’s the only one without any trim on the tip, total phone pole) & the others feel about the same weight. The Titleist I had a parallel X3 in first and it was like a rubber band even tipped all the way to the step and hit nothing but moonball slices. Changed shafts to the tapered, shimmed it in open and bingo, frozen rope. Now I haven’t hit a parallel iron shaft in probably 15 years, I think the last time was in some old TMs, but there’s no way they are stronger than the tapers, I don’t care how much you screw with them and it isn’t “timing dependent”. If those X1s aren’t it get some heavier ones. leaderboardgolf.com $7.99 a piece. The only way to get stiffer than that is to fill them with concrete. This is the same conversation as the last time, I’m sure in some old club there’s something like a pyratone that’s like 10X but that & 10€ will get a small Starbucks. I’m sure those X1s aren’t that good, besides if the shaft is deflected that far back at impact it’d make it go right straight out the chute instead of left wouldn’t it? And now that I think about it if I was so “timing dependent” wouldn’t I be the one going mad scientist? It took me a while to dial the clubs in, I did it & they’re fine. Like I said I’m always looking for the perfect four wood, don’t currently have one, the two I’ve got I don’t really like very much but such is life… That Hogan sand iron I’d like to grind a little off the heel but I went back to the Wilson middle wedge & lob wedge. I can’t play these crazy green complexes without an L wedge. I never practice and they’re too severe without it.
Out of curiosity what’s the huge difference in trajectory between a one iron and a driver anyway? Everything I hit takes off pretty much the same but then again I spent years with that string in front of me. I can hit full L wedge under it from 8 feet if I want to without taking a divot. I haven’t seen a whole lot of other guys who can do that. My buddy Dave Hill can do it at almost ten but he’s a freak he’s so pure.
Just cut straight to the chase, stick a brick on the end of a lead pipe and call it a day. That’s what this is going towards anyway. There’s your perfect golf club.
