stiff shafts and measuring stiffness

[hooker_pusher]

The shaft of my driver was a Graphite Design YS-6+ s350 tip (stiff shaft). Unfortunately it broke. My club repair person ordered another, but because it was on back order until September he suggested he could get a regular shaft (same make) and "tip" it to make it stiff. He said that it would be exactly the same as the stiff shaft and it seemed logical since he basically is cutting the thin part of the shaft at the bottom. Upon using it, it seems a bit more whippy than my old stiff shaft. I'm wondering if "tipping" shafts is an acceptable method of stiffening up the club or am I being fed a bunch of bull.

Also, wondered what kind of measuring device can be used to see if a shaft is indeed stiff. I realize that different shafts that may be labelled as stiff can be different and possibly even almost regular (for example, a Calloway stock shaft that is labelled firm is sort of in between regular and stiff...or so I've been told).

Any advisement would be appreciated.

[hooker_pusher]

Re: stiff shafts and measuring stiffness

I may have incorrectly used the word "tipping" the shaft to make it stiff. It could be called "trimming"...not sure....but in essence, it is still cutting the shaft from the bottom.

[LowPost42]

Re: stiff shafts and measuring stiffness

Oh boy... where do I begin?

Your repair person had the right idea, however, the bend profiles of the two shafts are - surprise - a full flex apart. Tipping the R would help to stiffen the tip, bringing the ballflight down. But the 'bending feel' will still feel like the R. So, you have a shaft that flexes exactly the same as the R shaft, but with a stiffer tip section.

Long ago (well, ok, not so long ago), we simply used the 'butt frequency' method of determining shaft stiffness. The higher the cycles per minute (CPM), the stiffer the shaft. Thus, tipping the shaft (shortening) helped a shaft to cycle higher, therefore it's gotta be stiffer, right?

What we've relatively recently learned, however, is that the butt freq is a measurement of just that - the butt section. There's also a mid section and the tip section; thus, it's not uncommon to hear that a shaft is butt soft-tip stiff; in other words it feels fairly flexible but tends to be stable and have a lower ball flight. Butt stiff and tip soft would be a high-launch stiffer feeling shaft.

So, using his frequency meter (analyzer) you could do the zone profiling to find a match. Closer matches in a .350 tip would be the Aldila NVS 65 S, the Fujikura VP 70 S (a touch more butt stiff), and the Fujikura TP 26.3 S (more mid-stiff).

This profiling method is currently tops for side-by-side comparison of shafts. Sadly, there is no 'universal stiff'; so even taking a butt freq wouldn't tell you much, except how soft or firm the butt is.

As for 'stock OEM shafts', they're notorious for 'over-labelling' their shafts... somewhere on this site I've got pictures of a TaylorMade MAS2 Stiff on a deflection board - deflecting to below 'ladies' flex.

I don't think your repair guy was feeding you a line. But modern graphite shafts don't change flexes because of tipping. They change trajectory, but the bending feel remains the same.

As for those who believe that 'every R is created equal', I invite you to hit the AccuFLEX Evolution R, next to a Graphite Design YS6 R. Sure, they both butt-freq the same (237 CPM)... but the tip zone on the Evo is 895 vs the YS6 at 780... just some food for thought...