I was curious to know what it means when the shaft is tipped and the purpose of it. On Lag’s specs he shows tipped 1/2 inch.
Thanks!
Brandon
Brandon,
When you re-shaft your clubs, you have a choices to make on how much you’d like to trim the the butt and/or the tip of the shaft. So if the shaft comes 40 inches long and you need a shaft that’s cut to 38 inches, you need to follow the guidlines of the shaft manuf. for the standard amount of trimming which would be no tipping. If the shaft is tipped a half inch, then Lag trimmed the shaft’s tip one half inch shorter than standard to give it more stiffness in the tip…He most likely added a half inch on the butt end to get the overall desired length.
For me this is a good starting point before you epoxy the club. After I cut them, I put the club together using tape to hold the head on the shaft and measure the frequency…I like to have 5 CPM between clubs…Maybe it will tell me that I need to tip it some more or add lead tape later to soften it…But as Lag says we might not need to be as fine with the fitting with ABS hitting…
Do you know if he tips the Hogan shafts? I have a stock hogan set and the shaft length is the same.
Also when weighting a club with tungsten or lead powder. Whats the most you can fill in the shaft before its to much…is there a certain height you dont pass on the shaft tip when filling it with powder?
I have some junk clubs that i want to practice on club making.
Thanks,
Brandon
I’d guess you’d have to ask the man himself how/if he tipped your clubs…It’s quite possible he pulled the shafts, tipped them, added a shaft extender in the butt end…(CC should be all over this)…
I’ve heard of adding sugar/sand in the shaft all the way to the grip’s end…Also just for fun I filled my entire sand wedge’s shaft with sand to see what would happen…I saw no real benefit except for plowing through some really thick rough…
You can do what you want with adding weights in the shaft but I’d stick with just adding weight right behind the sweetspot for irons
I see…so its all preference when it comes to adding weight then? Also how do they save the ferrels when removing the shaft?
Thanks for your help.
Yes that’s the fun of custom clubs to me…Try it and if you don’t like it, tweak it again…
Some people can save the ferrule. But I don’t with the shaft extractor that I use…I got a whole drawer full of ferrules so I don’t try to save the old ones.
We don’t like to put more than 3/4 of an ounce of tungsten powder down the shaft. Anything more it’s best to weight with tape behind the sweetspot.
I’m not big on heavy toe weighted sets, so a little weight in the heel is ok… but not too much. Ideally you have a set that needs no weight and was simply designed correctly right from start… but those are hard to find. You really have to look into 50’s and 60’s gear because they had better shafts back then in my opinion. Thicker walls and just a really solid response.
We can see a lot of the greatest ball strikers coming out of that era, so we can be assured they were not too far off the mark.
Better your velocity come from technique than lightweight gear that gives you very little feel. I rely upon feel… whether I am swinging good or bad. If I am swinging good, I can articulate my shots better. If I am off, I can feel what is going on and drill my way out of it quickly.
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Lag,
What modern shafts would you recommend if the older shafts are not available or simply can not be found?
Sometimes it’s possible to save the ferrules, sometimes it’s not. You just can’t tell till you try.
I try to slide them up the shaft out of the way before applying the heat to melt the epoxy. Use a pen knife to try to gently force a gap between the ferrule and the iron head. Once the gap is big enough, insert 2 slotted screwdrivers into the gap, one on either side then slowly turn them both 90 degrees at the same time to widen the gap and hopefully not damage the ferrule. Once the gap is big enough so you can get a spanner head into it, put the shaft in a vice and hit the spanner with a hammer to force the ferrule even further up the shaft, an inch or so so its not damaged when you apply the heat. Once you remove the head, you kindof reverse the process and use the spanner to hold the ferrule in place and hit the shaft with the hammer to remove the shaft from the ferrule.
Or you can buy some new ones.
If you want to get labor intensive with the ferrules here’s another way to do it…although some of the real old ferrules have multiple color rings adhered together and might make a rough go of things but…
Take a heat gun and lightly apply just the smallest amount of heat to the ferrule. This will soften the material just enough to take an exacto knife and make a staight cut from top to bottom all the way through the ferrule to the shaft. Once cut, let the ferrule cool to original condition.
Now the cut line can be used to gently expand and open the ferrule just enough to remove it from the shaft before doing anything with the head. When reinstalling the ferrule simply open the gap just enough to let the ferrule clamp back down around the shaft.
But before you do that put some super glue on the cuts and push the ferrule together and let it dry.
After that, apply some acetone to the ferrule cut line with a cue tip and the acetone will melt the plastic together for a seamless product. Now that the ferrule is bound together lightly sand the entire ferrule with some steel wool and finally, put some acetone on a clean rag and wipe it on liberally for a real clean glossy look.
If the color rings come apart during the process, the acetone can melt them together. Too much work for me though…just put some black ones on an go golfing… 
Nice one Rat as always, will give that one a shot next time.
Well worth the effort imo, some of those old tricolour ferrules look great.
I have quite adept at saving ferrules; Do afew twirls in my gas range; and then twist them up like NRG to recover later after the head comes off. With some old clubs you can have quite a project at hand trying to take the shaft off.