Can you hear the hiss of your own ball?

[flopdarock]

my brothers and i had this discussion on the range one day when we heard one of us hiss a ball by... we discovered that the uglier the ball was the louder the hiss... and i could only produce it by hitting my hybrids, longer irons, and my 4w whereas my long hitting brother could do it from his mid irons to his shorter woods... the "cleaner" balls even if struck purely hardly made a sound... the ugly balls with lots of scuffs made mean hissing sounds... but the ballstriker never heard it... i couldnt hear it when i hit it... etc etc etc

[bunkerputt]

I've got an update. Every shot I hit well, I can hear. This means that the trajectory is somewhat boring, the speed is very high, and I probably have some ball rash on the sweet spot of my club. I think the lowness matters a lot because the sound bounces off the ground like when you open your car window at highway speeds and pass by a barrier. You hear road noise much louder. I noticed that I can hear it about 3/4 of the way to the apex of the flight, or around 100 yards out or so. It did matter whether the ball had gouges or not, but it was definitely noticeable with clean/new balls. The quality of the hiss is somewhat dependent on how much I shredded the ball. I hit a 7-iron into a green where the ball had some serious strings left on it (Dunlop loco - firm cover). That was by far the most noticeable hiss I've ever hit in my life. I think the strings just made a weird weed-eater sound going through the air.

[enduro]

There may be times when you'll here it a bit but not often. Variables such as moisture in the air and wind direction can influence it.

Think of it the same way as a baseball. When you throw it you can't here the whizzing sound the seams make very well if at all. However, the person batting or the catcher here them quite well.

If you go to a PGA event and stand behind a player you won't here it. But if you stand to their side you will.

[Grndslmhttr3]

On occasion I hear it. I seem to hear it a lot more often with my hybrid.

[is2linda]

its such a cool feeling when i strike the ball and it hisses! mostly its on my irons.

[amcquay]

I had a lesson earlier this week and after a couple of tweaks to my swing he had me striking the ball much better and with more club head speed. For the first time, I was hearing the hiss of my own shots. I only heard it for a split second before the ball gets more than 50-60 yards out, but it was very noticeable.

[gasfreak]

I heard that if go out and buy the new Cobra irons and driver you get a lot more hisssssssssss out of your balls

[Grndslmhttr3]

I heard that if go out and buy the new Cobra irons and driver you get a lot more hisssssssssss out of your balls

Haha that's a good one

[misty_mountainhop]

There is no doubt you can hear them, read the answers in this thread and you'll see it.

As I think iacas said, it's more spin related than pure speed. There'll be a component to do with the speed though.

ahh... i was really hoping to see an answer to my longtime question on this thread, but havent. is a hissing ball good or bad?! or neither?

Precisely.

First, sound does travel in 360 degrees,

Sound waves can be very directional; with the right equipment you can project a sound very specifically so someone it's aimed at will hear it and someone 180° in the other direction won't hear a thing. If you hear something that's ostensibly directional and not pointing your way, you're often hearing a reflection.

I've never heard my own ball no matter how well it's hit and I can't say I've heard a ball coming straight at me until the last fraction of a second. For some reason, it always seems clearest when I'm stood at ~90° to the flight of a ball going past.

[flopdarock]

i heard my ball hiss after it careened off a tree at full speed right back at me

[TempoIsKey]

I usually can't hear mine over all the profanity

[MiniMoe]

I only hear mine when my wife tells me that she has a headake.

[Bullitt5339]

When I was in the Army, I was Artillery, and had the same experiences with the cannons. Because you are directly behind your gun, it's not loud, the sound waves go forward and out to the sides. But when the gun beside you shoot, it was horrible.

[safetrip]

There may be times when you'll here it a bit but not often. Variables such as moisture in the air and wind direction can influence it.

I had a similar experience as above. You hear better when standing in front of the player along the side. My guess is that it takes some time for ball to gather enough speed to generate the hiss. The ball doesn't go from 0-150mph at the impact. Exactly when it reaches the point where it's fast enough to makes noise will depend on a lot of things but the maximum speed is not at impact but some where down the line.

As an acoustical engineer, I can clarify the issue of whether the sound travels in all direction or not. That depends on the wave length of the sound and the size of the source. If the wave length is bigger than the object, it will diffract(bend around) and travel in all direction. But if the wave length is smaller than the object, it can't diffract and just travel straight a head. Of course there is a grey area where it's somewhat directional but not entirely. For example, even a 12" big woofer will emit bass in all direction since the wave length at that low frequency is much larger than 12". On the other hand a 4" high frequency driver will beam sound to the front since high frequency has very small wave length. For a golf ball in the air case, a 10kHz sound wave has about 1.5" wave length so any sound lower than that will travel in all direction. I'm pretty sure that the hissing sound that you hear has most of energy at below 10khz so in that sense it's mostly 'omni' directional.

[steve8820]

I usually only care where the ball goes............not the sound it makes

[sean_miller]

I had a similar experience as above. You hear better when standing in front of the player along the side. My guess is that it takes some time for ball to gather enough speed to generate the hiss. The ball doesn't go from 0-150mph at the impact. Exactly when it reaches the point where it's fast enough to makes noise will depend on a lot of things but the maximum speed is not at impact but some where down the line.

Approximately how long after the ball leaves the clubface will it reach maximum velocity?

[enduro]

Approximately how long after the ball leaves the clubface will it reach maximum velocity?

Its translational (tangential?) velocity peak will be as it is struck. The ball will never get faster as it flies to its target.

I'm not sure about the rotational velocity of the ball though. I'm assuming it can rotate at different speeds in its flight as its center of gravity is found and it stops "wobbling". And the spinning creates much if the hissing sound.

[chspeed]

I can't hear the hiss, but I can hear the sonic boom a few seconds after impact.