Re: Shaft weight

The usual reason for going with heavier shafts in fairway woods is *shocking* swingweight. Since you take 2 inches off in a stock world (45" driver, 43" 3 wood, 41" 5 wood), you take 12 swingweight points off. So to make it up, your 3w head is 16g heavier than your driver head (bringing 8 SW points back) and 3 more are brought back by having a shaft that's 20g heavier than your driver shaft.

The lighter shaft is also a thinner shaft, so it's more flexible. So there may be up to 1 extra degree in trajectory with going to the 65. Again, the big thing is the extra swingweight - you'll feel a difference.

But if it's not an issue to you (it wouldn't necessarily be to me - I'd be much more concerned with my 3 and 5 woods matching since I don't swing them like my driver anyway) then grab the shaft you like.

Re: Shaft weight

I want to cut 2inches off the grip on a graphite shaft driver.I have been told it will not only change the weight,but also the balance and flex point.I want to know if this small amount will make all that much difference? Any help would be valued.

Re: Shaft weight

It's something I've been giving thought to lately.

If I have a 30" board and we say it balances at the 17" mark (as measured from the right hand end), if I cut 5 inches off it from EITHER end, obviously the balance point is going to move towards the uncut end and the board is going to be harder to bend due to its inherently shorter beam length.

This is why shafts freq higher as you cut them - the beam is shorter. It would seem to have very little to do with anything else (and, in a clubmaking blunder involving nibbling, I've seen it firsthand that you can tip trim quite a bit, but if the beam length stays the same the shaft doesn't really freq any higher.)

To whack off 2" will move the swingweight scale 12 points or so - so from D2 to C0 ish. The club will freq higher and play 'stiffer' because the beam length is shorter. If it's over 45" and you're not taller than 6'2" with a 37" wrist to floor, I say give 'er.

Re: Shaft weight

Thankyou Lowpost we could always do with a little more stiffness
What you say makes alot of sense with the beam analogy.I have a very fast swing so it should work out ok
Regards Peter.

Re: Shaft weight

Great answer, thanks. Makes perfect sense to me.

I have just tested both shafts again, and you're right about the slightly higher launch (0.7deg according to the Trackman). The 65g shafts also resulted in slightly less spin (Not much - about 200rpm).

I did get a bit of distance more with the 65g, due to higher swing speed (not that I feel in any way certain about that not being down to coincidence).

Most importantly, the Trackman data pointed out that I had a tendency to swing the lighter shafted club smoother and more rhythmical, so my shots had higher consistency with the 65g shaft over the 85g.

The 65g shaft also "felt right" to me. Even before I saw the Trackman data, I would probably have selected the 65g. Less dispersion, more distance, smoother swing action, higher smash factor, better trajectory (or rather - I preferred carry over roll).

So I have decided to go with the 65g and have asked Mizuno to build me a new driver and 2 fairway woods, all with the 65g Aldila VS Proto shaft. Oh - and a Hybrid, but that one gets the Aldila NV Hybrid shaft (the infamous green shaft).

Can't wait. They're in my signature already! :-)

Re: Shaft weight

It was pointed out to me the reason for the NV to be green - green with envy (N V).

Then there's the NVS - envious?

I hadn't put that together before about a month ago.

Re: Shaft weight

That's funny ... especially, since they also have a model called DVS (devious ... as in "off the right path"). Not a good selling point! ;-)

I guess VS Proto falls outside the system.

Re: Shaft weight

LowPost42,

Regarding your post to golfshooter, I am aware that lopping 2" off the length would reduce the swingweight 12 points. I personally think that swingweight is too light for a strapping male hitter.

I used to have a set of Callaway tungsten titanium irons. As you know the heads were probably lighter than most, because the heads were mainly titanium, with some tungsten inserts. The shafts were the Callaway RCH96, which were not that light (80-90 gms?) and the grips were rubber. All in all, this combination made the swingweight light. I found out that the swingweight was C-7, which is really a women's specifications. I really did not like the clubs. I had no feel for the clubhead to control it, and because I sensed there was no weight at the head I had a tendency to try to swing faster and harder. You know what I'm talking about.

I've wondered if you have any ideas, as to how one could shorten the driver, and yet in a practical and aesthetic manner add weight to the head end. You could add lead tape on the head and/or wrapped around the hosel, but this is not practical because you'd have to add loads to make up for even a portion of the 16 points (2 gms at the head only moves the swingweight 1 point). More drastic measures. You could pack the bottom end of the shaft from the grip end with lead or tungsten powder and cement it in place, but the tip cavities will not take much and there will be bend and torque problems. A more effective but complicated way is to inject tungsten power and epoxy or Rattlle Stop mixture into the head cavity by boring out the plug hole at the bottom of the hosel.

You could use a combination of ways. Replace the shaft with a lighter shaft and install a lighter grip, and add lead tape. But the existing shaft and grip may already be at the low end of weights, and the trade-offs would have to be a huge differential in weights to compensate. The shortening effect is the major influence on swingweight.

Ted

Re: Shaft weight

Hi Ted
have you seen what ping have been doing for a few years now. that have diffrent weighted shafts for each iron so the long irons is about 70g graphite to about a 9 iron of 86g. with the steel shaft its about 93g for the long irons to about 114 for the 9 iron. the weights in the head are adjusted too to give a swing weight off D0 up to the p-wedge.
the shaft plays a bigger part in the swing weight.
cheers
bill

Re: Shaft weight

As Bill has stated, the components "are what they are", making the shaft the main player in the swingweight equation.

As you identifed, Ted, you can go to a lighter grip to increase SW, but this is where I much prefer MOI to SW. Really, taking 10g off at the grip end (and shifting the balance point) isn't a strong enough indicator of a heft change. A 10g grip end change barely changes the MOI of a club, whereas it's a 2 SW point change (detectable by the average golfer).

The problem with a ton of powder down the shaft is that once it gets above the level of the top of the hosel it creates a shear point in a graphite shaft, dramatically increasing the likelihood of breakage.

As you've stated, you can use a tungsten slurry/hotmelt mix and inject it into the head, or you can use tip pins (I believe there are 9g pins for graphite). This will move the head CoG 1/8" towards the hosel.

However, if you're going to add back a ton of weight to the head, you need to realise that it's going to dramatically change the flex of the shaft. So the real answer to combatting the swingweight loss (if you really need it back - my advice is always to cut it down and try it out first - adjust for SW as necessary thereafter); is to go to a heavier shaft that is also stiffer. Then you can add some headweight to get your desired flex back, and the added shaft weight will help bring the SW back up. Conversely, you could find a shaft with a higher balance point to fool the SW scale.

Re: Shaft weight

Hi Bill,

That's interesting about Ping.

I don't know this, but it seems their intention is to make their clubs much lighter overall than the traditional overall weights for those clubs, and yet retain the same "traditional" swingweights of say D0? I believe for instance that the Rapture is overall a significantly lighter driver than the competition, presumably for more speed and ease of control.

With the traditional clubmaking of clubs, you start with the same raw length of shaft which has a certain weight, which is trimmed to length for the club in question, which blended with the traditional weight of the head for that club and a traditional grip gives you the traditional range of swingweight.

For example, look at a 2 iron. The 2 iron head head has a traditional weight of about 237 gms +/-. Say the grip has a weight of 50 gms. So you take a steel shaft which has a raw weight of 123 gms., which is trimmed to the traditional length of 39" for a 2 iron. This combination would give you a swingweight of around D0.

As you go through each club, as compensation for trimming the shaft to length, say for a 9 iron the overall length is traditionally 35.5", the weight of that head is made a traditional weight of around 286 gms, which will give you the same D0 swingweight as for the 2 iron.

But the overall weight of the traditional 2 iron would be 410 gms, whereas the overall weight of the Ping 2 iron would be less?

Ted

Re: Shaft weight

Hi LowPost42,

As you say, it's tricky.

I've used tip pins to adjust weights for steel shafted clubs, but did not realize they had them for graphite, mainly because I assumed the opening of the tube at the tip of graphite shafts was too tight to take a significantly sized/weighted pin.

Thanks for your thoughts on this.

Ted

Re: Shaft weight

hi Ted
what i have managed to get from ping is there Rapture graphite shaft off say a 2 iron should be 79 g on there TFC 939I shaft giving you a toque of 2.2 on a stiff flex. 4.2 toque on there s/flex shaft but the same weight.
with there steel shaft the weight goes up to 114 g. and only 1.5 toque on the stiff and 2.1 on the s/flex.
the thing with ping club heads is you can add weight to the toe and behind the face so it is easer to adjust the head weight. putting in a 5g tungsten weight on the toe and a 2g weight behind the face is easy. (easy for ping not us). if you want to change the toe to 3g then you just change the weight. the titanium face helps with the weight drop in the head and the lighter shaft makes the club feel lighter but still has a D0 swing weight. it also gives you a few mph in your swing speed.
the ping rapture driver with a reg/shaft weighs 52g and gives you a swing weight of D3. a stiff shaft 58g and x/still at 62g. all still D3. but they have a very light head.
its amazing how you lose 5 to 8 mph by going form a graphite to steel shaft.
I'm sure lowpost would love to have club heads he could change the weights off easily and shafts of diffrent weights but still matching shafts of the same type. i think he would be able to put together some amazing clubs.
cheers
bill

Re: Shaft weight

Tip pins for graphite are long, skinny sticks, not fat ones (to slip up into graphite shafts). The trick with them is to wrap the stem in masking tape to ensure a snug fit (and to avoid having them break off and rattle in the shaft).