The Stimpmeter speed of my carpet is...

[kfowler]

6.6 .

So I created one of those homemade Stimpmeters that's been discussed here lately. Only difference was I added a support to consistently give me the 20*. Seems to work pretty well. I have standard builders grade carpet. I thought it would have been closer to 4. According to Wikipedia, the USGA says 6.5 is medium speed for standard greens.

Pretty interesting.

[Scott_K]

LOL. This place is great. I was waiting to see who would do it first.

[golfaddiction]

You gotta cut that thing down to at least a 10.

[mchepp]

I always thought that stimp number was calculated as downhill- (minus) uphill roll. Is that not accurate? Or do you have a slope in your house?

[jamo]

How do you know this really is accurate? What if the real USGA stimpmeters make the ball travel faster compared to yours? Either way, it is probably a solid estimate...

[zeg]

You should stimp on a level part, and you go in opposite directions and average them to account for any residual slope or grain.

There's nothing magical about the official stimp meters, they're just a piece of metal with a groove set to release a ball at 20° inclination. I can pretty much promise you that being a fraction of a degree off on the release point or a centimeter off on the length is not going to be the dominant error in this measurement. I intend to try to build one of these myself, not so much for my carpet but out of morbid curiosity about the greens I play on.

[jamo]

You should stimp on a level part, and you go in opposite directions and average them to account for any residual slope or grain.

I was thinking more about the material, if it would produce more or less friction that the official one.

[saevel25]

"The Stimpmeter is an extruded aluminum bar, 36 inches long, with a V-shaped groove extending along its entire length. It has a precisely milled ball-release notch 30" from the tapered end (the end that rests on the ground). The underside of the tapered end is milled away to reduce bounce as a rolling ball makes contact with the green."

"The V-shaped groove has an included angle of 145 degrees, thereby supporting a golf ball at two points ½" apart. A ball rolling down the groove has a slight overspin, which is thoroughly consistent and has no deleterious effect on the ensuing measurments"

"The ball-release notch is designed so that a ball will always be released and start to roll when the Stimpmeter is raised to an angle of approximately 20 degrees. "


It sounds like a pretty easy built to me

[zeg]

Actually, from that description, it sounds like getting the angle of the V right might be the biggest source of error. In terms of friction between a ball and a surface or edge at those sorts of speeds with a rolling ball, it's going to make very little difference. However, the difference between a 135° angle (from the description) and a 90° angle (what I think is typical for "cove molding") might have an effect. Do they make wider-angled molding?

[kfowler]

Mine is based off of the one listed here: How to build your own Stimpmeter

I modified mine to not use the 1/8" notch. I drew a line at 30 inches and then created a stand that would put the height at 10.26". I figured this out by taking 30" * sine(20*). This gave me the correct 20* angle to set the incline at. I cut the end to make it flush with the carpet. I'll try and post a pic.

[drglew]

The Stimpmeter is an extruded aluminum bar, 36 inches long, with a V-shaped groove extending along its entire length

Dang, my stimpmeter has U-grooves...now it's illegal in tournament play.

[natureboy]

13+ (ball rolled off the end of the carpet) which I suspect is much faster than the greens I usually use.

I looked at cove molding and found most of the stock pretty warped. I substituted an L-shaped drip cap door bottom which is a 3' long piece of aluminum bent 90*. The extra little flanges are annoying, but can be worked around, or snipped and sanded down without too much effort, especially if you have a dremel type tool.

I expect it's similar enough to the USGA model (though not to spec as the angle is more acute so contact is made with the edges higher up on the ball) to be in the ballpark for making relative comparisons.

[Ernest Jones]

My carpet stimps at 11.5 according to the iStimp app on my phone. Seems about right based on putts I've hit on that carpet.

[Hammer 4]

we have Berber carpet, so I'd hate to see what ours is....

[natureboy]

My carpet stimps at 11.5 according to the iStimp app on my phone. Seems about right based on putts I've hit on that carpet.

Any idea what would be a better target stimp for average (muicipal) greens? Mine is too fast.

I expect it may be throwing off my intuitive sense of speed even though I only really use it for work on line.

[RFKFREAK]

Yah, it seems the iStimp isn't very accurate. [VIDEO]http://youtu.be/q4JhVFNFhpY[/VIDEO] Too bad because I would have loved to have found a similar app for my Android device to use at my local courses since most of the time I ask about the stimp they respond that they don't know. I remember for my AimPoint class this summer the instructor demonstrated a way to get the stimp without a stimpmeter but at the moment, I don't recall how.

[mchepp]

I remember for my AimPoint class this summer the instructor demonstrated a way to get the stimp without a stimpmeter but at the moment, I don't recall how.

There are like 10 on the internet showing how to get the stimp from the aimpoint class. John Graham has the best one in my opinion.

[Ernest Jones]

Any idea what would be a better target stimp for average (muicipal) greens? Mine is too fast.

I expect it may be throwing off my intuitive sense of speed even though I only really use it for work on line.

Most middle-of-the road courses stimp at about 9-10 or so in my experience, usually closer to 9.

Yah, it seems the iStimp isn't very accurate.

Too bad because I would have loved to have found a similar app for my Android device to use at my local courses since most of the time I ask about the stimp they respond that they don't know.

I remember for my AimPoint class this summer the instructor demonstrated a way to get the stimp without a stimpmeter but at the moment, I don't recall how.

Yes, the iStimp tends to read the greens as faster than they are. I don't use it. The best way is to make some putts under known conditions and correlate to your chart till you find the corresponding stimp, you need to have good speed and line control for this. I usually just assume it's about a 9 and adjust from there based on the first few putts. That's a tip I got from @Golfingdad and it seems to work well enough and it fits nicely with my laziness. High end courses will typically stimp at a higher speed but most of the el cheapos I play are a 9.