Cutting Shaft at Grip End Question

All,

I'm considering cutting down stock shaft in my Machspeed driver from 45.75 to 44.5. Anyone notice any big difference in stiffness?

Also, by shorting your shaft did you notice your balls dispersion was tighter?

Thanks for the info!

Juan

You only increase stiffness by cutting on tip end.Easier to hit sweet spot with shorter length club!

Have you ever tried a shorter driver? When I tried a 44" driver from a 45.5" it felt too short and made me very uncomfortable at address. Why not shorten to maybe a 45" and go from there. Cutting the shaft from the butt end supposedly has negligible effects on stiffness. Shorter shaft will make it easier to hit the center but will not hide swing flaws so don't expect it to go straighter right away.

Keep in mind that cutting down the shaft that much will affect the weight of the driver. Do you know what the current weight of the driver is?

The shorter shaft should absolutely help with accuracy but as wrx_junki said, chopping off 1.25" is a lot. Maybe only cut it down .75" to start and see how it works for you.

you could try just gripping down the club, i do this and get much more control over the driver.

i have played with 44.5, 44.75 and 45" driver the past year
44.5" just felt too light and short
44.75 was nice, only slightly noticed a weight difference from 45"

i alwasy choke down like an 1" on the driver, so i kept my 909D3 at 45" and am going to give that the ol college try for the 2011 season

as mentioned above, cutting the shaft at the butt (grip end) will have zero effect on the overall stiffness of the shaft

as also mentioned above, start small and work your way down
if you cut that much off, and dont like it you will be stuck jamming an extention in your shaft after or worse a new shaft

Did you ever do it? To what effect?

What, if any, is the difference in weight and effect between gripping down and cutting down the shaft? I'm wishing I'd ordered both my driver and 3-wood a little shorter.

Comparing choking down 1 inch to cutting off 1 inch.  Cutting 1 inch off your driver will lower the actual overall weight by about 1 to 1.5 grams, (the weight of the piece of graphite you cut off) and you won't feel that tiny amount.  The difference in the weight you feel when you swing will be zero.  You will notice a difference in feel in that when you choke down you're holding onto a smaller part of the grip then you will be if you shorten the club.

The weight the club will measure on a swing weight scale will be about 6 points lighter, but that's what the scale "feels" not what you will feel.

Thanks dbwood. Let me sure I got this right: What I feel as swing weight when I choke up is the same as I'll feel if I cut the club down. So if I like the feel of the club when I chi=oke up, I'll get the same if I cut it down. Cutting down allows for gripping the in it's "normal" taper. Other than that, not much difference between choking up and cutting down. Is that correct?

That's correct.

I never choke down on the driver or chop the length any more (all things being equal).  But alas, all things are not equal (namely clubhead speed) between a shorter and longer shaft.  I have both butt and tip cut driver shafts before.  My results were a clubhead that I couldn't feel during the swing and thus hit all over the face (with the later scenario resulting in something that felt like a 2x4 during the swing).  My personal advice from someone that has been there, done that and ultimately ruined the trade in value on a driver is this......find a dedicated fitter that is willing to adjust the swing weight loss when shortening the shaft, as opposed to selling you a NEW club (good luck with that).  OR just trade around until you find a driver that fits you better.  As a brief aside, I don't really think a 1" longer shaft is that much of a difference for today's drivers.  Suppose you miss the center by a 1/2" inch, you may only loose 20 yard with high MOI heads and high swing speed shafts.  But your dead, solid, perfect shots will be monster long.  JMHO, good luck!  YMMV

I trust many of you more than the guy at Golfsmith. But here's what he said this afternoon: butt cutting 1" off my PX 6.0 fairway wood or driver shaft will dramatically increase the stiffness to at least 6.5 and it will change the swing weight very noticeably compared to just choking up -- could totally mess up the feel. He also said to check with Titleist in case he's wrong. I'm barely man enough to play those PX shafts as it is. I don't want to mess up my nice boring ball flight. But I sure would like to hit them a bit more solidly and I think an inch may help that a lot.

So I ask again...Other than swing speed being slower, will I notice any change in the shaft characteristics by cutting 1" off?

The stiffness shouldn't change.  The swingweight will go down 6 points per inch of length, which is substantial.  If your driver is currently D4, for example, it will drop to C8.  You may lose some of the feel of your driver head, but choking up an inch would do the same thing, except for the thinner diameter of the grip.

Would you change the club head weight? I play a 910D3 so it has adjustable weights (I'd need to buy the weight kit). Would adding or subtracting weight to the head bring the swing weight back?

I'm not familiar with the new adjustable heads and their weighting system.  But to gain back the 6 swingweights, you would need to add 12 grams to the head.

Project X shafts are designed to not be TIPPED but rather butt trimmed. So yes, if you do chop 1" off your driver shaft at the butt end of a Project X shaft you will notice an increase of shaft stiffness, what that will be and how it relates to FCM I don't know. One thing I would do (I have just about everything you would need in my garage to mess with a club and do it very frequently) is to start in small increments. Take half an inch off put the grip on and play with it. Once you go to far you are gone and can only put a shaft extender in after you have made to short of a cut.

There are a lot of videos on YouTube that demonstrate how to blow a grip off your club with an air compressor so you would not have to lose grips doing this.

One last thing I will say the path you are taking is a rabbit hole that leads to spending insane amounts of money because you need these tools to work on clubs. Not a bad thing but when you start chaning the frequency of a shaft along with swing weight it changes the whole dynamic of the shaft. Don't be overwhelmed though, it is really easy, just read some...

Thanks for the advise.

Choking up will be my solution for a while. You guys are freighting me. :)

This is not true.