building a short shafted high loft driver

[clearwaterms]

I am thinking of trying to build a short shafted 12 degree loft square head driver. I want it to swing weight out close to what my irons swing weight at (d2~d3). I have a few questions.

#1 - how short should I go? 45 inches is the standard length. 44 is the old standard. Can I go to 43? 42.5?

#2 - can I use a steel shaft? The heavier shaft will allow me to shorten the club to almost the size of a 3 wood without having a swing weight issue. Obviously as this is something that I am trying, I steel shaft is a great value

#3 - if I do go graphite and add weight to the head, will that effect the shaft stiffness?

#4 - if I build a short driver, should I build a short 3 wood to match?

any other thoughts or considerations?

[beachbreak]

Have you tried hitting a Tour Edge Bazooka Driver? 460cc, shorter shaft, 16 degree loft. Incredibly easy to hit and control. You could probably pick one up cheap on E-Bay.

[clearwaterms]

Have you tried hitting a Tour Edge Bazooka Driver? 460cc, shorter shaft, 16 degree loft. Incredibly easy to hit and control. You could probably pick one up cheap on E-Bay.

i did a quick ebay search - it looks like the only left handed bazooka driver I could find was this one

http://cgi.ebay.com/Tour-Edge-Bazook...3A1%7C294%3A50 and it's only 10.5 loft. I found a few others that were 10.5 loft. but nothing taller. I have found ping rapture drivers in the 12 range.

[Bump-n-MI]

Instead of building you may want to check out the Nike Sumo 4950 Lucky 13 or 16* drivers (SQ or traditional). I was able to hit a friends 13* last month in Florida and the stock Mitsubishi Diamana shaft appeared to be less then 44 1/2". Without a doubt the easiest driver to find the fairway that I have ever hit. They can be had for under $100 new.

[Zeph]

Can't you just choke down on the club like Anthony Kim?

What is the purpose for this by the way? Less weight and shorter club?

[glebert]

If you go to myostrichgolf.com Tim has a swingweight spreadsheet (lower right on the main page) where you can plug in the head weight, shaft weight and length, etc. and estimate what the swingweight would be.

If you add weight to the head you will usually soften the flex a little. You might want to trim the shaft as if you were building a 3w considering the extra weight and shorter length.

[Stacey_E]

Can't you just choke down on the club like Anthony Kim?

A lot of people cite Anthony Kim in this regard. I think it has good that he has brought to the forefront the excessive lengths of driver shafts. But choking down can cause an odd feel. Basically you are reducing the fulcrum point of the shaft but you haven't increased the clubhead to compensate. So in a way you are cutting the shaft down and not reweighting it anyway. Plus you have that extra butt end of the club sticking out. Depending on grip design, going down an inch or more gets you in an area where the grip is smaller in diameter. This doesn't bother a lot of people including AK, but some people (including myself) it drives nuts.

A shorter shaft obviously increases the likelyhood of center shots. Center shots increase ball speed. Although swing speed is very important, ball speed is the ultimate concern. This is where some of the new high MOI drivers excel. Toe and heel hits with some of these clubs have a relatively high smash factor compared with the same hits with smaller drivers. Of course if you center the shot with any club, regardless of size, your ball flight will be greatly improved. You may loose a little swing speed in going with a shorter shaft. But often times you will have the same or greater swing speed because you can go at the ball more aggresively and confidently. To the OP, good luck on finding the right head. 12* is far more common in driver heads than it used to be. A lot of high lofted heads have very closed faces as well. I was playing a 44" shaft on a 12* G5 for a couple of years. Getting the swingweight up with lead tape is hard to do. It takes a ton of tape to make 8-10 grams. That's about what you need to turn a 45" head into a 44" head and keep the same swing weight. A good idea might be looking for heads with weight ports, using those weighted hosel plugs (some say those create a draw bias) or going for an OEM in the general range you are looking for. Someone mentioned the SUMO 4950, that's a good place to start. If you are interested in how the head weight relates to shaft weight/length and swing weight, I'd give this chart a look see. http://www.ustgolfshaft.com/docs/Charts_PF_V2_Woods.pdf It doesn't matter if you aren't intersted in a V2 shaft. I just posted this to give you an idea of what you are going to have to shoot for in weights and such. You can search websites for similar charts that are specific to your intended shaft. Good Luck!

[clearwaterms]

If you go to myostrichgolf.com Tim has a swingweight spreadsheet (lower right on the main page) where you can plug in the head weight, shaft weight and length, etc. and estimate what the swingweight would be.

I have the swing weight calculator. I know I can get a d2 swing weight with a 120gram steel shaft in less then 44" total weight. If I use an 80+ gram graphite shaft, I have to add about 19 grams to head to get the correct swing weight when the total club length. If I do this, I am thinking I will have to tip it like a 3 wood to get the correct shaft response. However, I honestly don't know.

Thoughts?

[glebert]

Related to Stacey's post, if you are building a club I think it is easier to add a tip weight than use lead tape. Some people also put rat glue into the head to add weight, you can search for threads on that here or other forums. MWT does make it easier if you can get it and get the heavier weights.

[clearwaterms]

A lot of people cite Anthony Kim in this regard. I think it has good that he has brought to the forefront the excessive lengths of driver shafts. But choking down can cause an odd feel. Basically you are reducing the fulcrum point of the shaft but you haven't increased the clubhead to compensate. So in a way you are cutting the shaft down and not reweighting it anyway. Plus you have that extra butt end of the club sticking out. Depending on grip design, going down an inch or more gets you in an area where the grip is smaller in diameter. This doesn't bother a lot of people including AK, but some people (including myself) it drives nuts.

The powerplay System Q2 driver head is specifically what I was looking at. It's a square head. it has weight ports which would allow me to get the weight up to 211G. I can then add a tungsten tip weight into the shaft for an additional 7 grams if I wanted to increase the weight all the way to 218 grams. At this point I have not used any lead tape. Using a SK fiber shaft, I can get a swing weight of d2 in less then 44". If I used a steel shaft like a TTlite from True Temper, I could get the swing weight I want in under 44" and I wouldn't have to add any weight to the weight ports.

My question is, If I add all that weight to the head - it will end up with approx. the same weight as a 3 or even 5 wood. Do I have to trim tip the shaft to that clubs specs? In other words, do you trim tip based on the weight of the club head? club head - http://www.hirekogolf.com/hireko/ord...1016/0/0/0/0/0 Shaft - http://www.hirekogolf.com/hireko/ord...1450/0/0/0/0/0

[glebert]

Do I have to trim tip the shaft to that clubs specs? In other words, do you trim tip based on the weight of the club head?

I think that is the right thing to do as long as you are also shortening the club to a similar length as the corresponding fw.

[Stacey_E]

Man that is totally beyond my (lack of) expertise. I would initially think that butt trimming would be the way to go because it wouldn't affect the flex as much. Then when you mentioned adding that much head weight would make the shaft more whippy (I think that's what you implied?) that makes total sense too. A few grams might not change the flex but 20ish grams....kinda makes me think you would want to tip it a little. Some would say simply having the shaft shorter would stiffen it to an extent anyway.

I think a lot of it has to do with the shaft itself? It might be a different result for a different model shaft.

So in a nutshell...I have no clue. I can give you my experience with tipping a driver shaft, the V2 specifically. It brought my ball flight down a LOT even with a 12* head. I unintentionally had that V2 tipped an inch (miscomunication) which would basically be instalation procedure for THAT shaft in a 3 wood. I had probably 10 grams max in lead tape on that head. That's a LOT of tape. I couldn't tell it made it more whippy, but I never had the flex measured post cut and that G5 head is light to begin with (192 grms I believe).

I'm sure as the thread stays active, we will get more professional advice. I'll be watching to learn something as well.

[JOSEPHLB]

My new driver in the bag this year will be a high loft, "short" driver. I built an Ashton MS-5, hand picked at 12* of loft (has 12.5* stamped on the head).

It comes in at 198 grams. Shaft of choice is the Graman UL540 Limey. I believe the trimmed weights of these fall in the 65-69 gram range. Raw cpm's of 249, I tipped it 1/4" and have it installed with a completed club length of 44 1/4" total length.
No tip weighting , lead tape, hot melt .. nada..
Waggled it .. and it felt good..

Took it to the range this weekend and I was pleasantly suprised. Nice, boring mid-launch.. about 245-250 carry.. Excellent feel.. as good as the OEM's off the shelf I have tried..

Swingweight is only a number, that comes up, in relationship to the parts you have selected. You might be suprised that if you just go ahead and built that short driver and try it out, you just may like it.

[clearwaterms]

Swingweight is only a number, that comes up, in relationship to the parts you have selected. You might be suprised that if you just go ahead and built that short driver and try it out, you just may like it.

using a calculator, what does your club swing weight out to? Is 42.5 or 43 to short? did you consider a steel shaft? If I use a steel shaft, I have alot more options on heads because of the higher weight of the shaft. I guess at this point, I have two questions - can i use steel? and If I use graphite do I want to tip it to match the increased weight on the head?

[JOSEPHLB]

using a calculator, what does your club swing weight out to?

Not really sure what the raw weight of my shaft was.. The specs list it as 65-69 grams.. but still trying to find out if that is after trimming or raw.. If its raw.. then the swingweight spreadsheet calculator I have estimates my SW around C7 or so.. I think the general concensous is, once you start going below 44", you have to either start looking at heavier graphite shafts or lightweight steel. With lightweight shafts, you start lowering the overall static weight too much, once you start wacking off driver lengths below 44".. Not only is sw a feel factor.. but so is total overall static weight of the club. I did consider steel.. but I have always wanted to try out a Limey.. so I took the plunge. If you are serious going to go shorter than 44".. I would go this option.. this could be a low cost experiment: Grab the Dynacraft Genesis, in 12* of loft. They are in stock and are on closeout for $29.95. It has adjustable weighting, so you can increase the static weight with just screws. No need with any tricky "hot melting/rat glue".. or tip weights, etc.. http://www.hirekogolf.com/hireko/ord.../835/0/0/0/0/0 Get yourself a graphite wood shaft that weighs in the 70's range.. preferably one that shows some tip trimming instructions for a 3w/5w/7w ..etc.. Now, decide what length you want to build it at. If 43-43.5".. that is around 3 wood length. Get the screws you need for the Genesis driver head above to get the weight to standard "3 wood" weight. Now whatever shaft you get, just follow the tipping instructions to tip it if you are putting it in a 3 wood. This is basically all you are building.. is a large, low lofted #3 wood, in reality.

[beachbreak]

Sorry for the incomplete club information. It is called The Tour Edge Bazooka HOUDINI driver. Key word is HOUDINI.

[clearwaterms]

Not really sure what the raw weight of my shaft was.. The specs list it as 65-69 grams.. but still trying to find out if that is after trimming or raw..

That is a good deal. I was looking at the powerplay Q2 in 12 degree's as I am left handed (the ultimate golf crutch) its $60 so a little more money but it has the weight screws. so it's a start.