Distance or Dispersion rate

[juanrjackson]

Check out the link below & say which you would rather have:

http://www.clevelandgolf.com/index.php?alias=launcher_xl270_test_results

Cleveland XL270 or Taylormade Superfast 2.0?

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by juanrjackson

Check out the link below & say which you would rather have:

http://www.clevelandgolf.com/index.php?alias=launcher_xl270_test_results

Cleveland XL270 or Taylormade Superfast 2.0?

Do what now?

[juanrjackson]

Originally Posted by sean_miller

Do what now?

Would you rather have the distance or the tighter dispersion rate?

[sean_miller]

Originally Posted by juanrjackson

Would you rather have the distance or the tighter dispersion rate?

Maybe your link doesn't work where I am. All I get is the Cleveland Golf site and their default banner. Whatever.

[jamo]

The link works for me. I'll take the happy medium, gimme the Titleist. :-) What I think is most interesting is that this goes against some of Callaway's claims that the [URL=http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6013/5923520441_0687a5959e_z.jpg]RAZR Hawk is 6 yards longer than the R11.[/URL] In the Cleveland testing, the R11 is nearly 10 yards longer.

[WUTiger]

Cleveland isn't saying what shafts they used, only the flex.According to many posters, shaft is half the club.

I would have to test the drivers myself and see which one worked. I swing differently than the robot. One drawback of robots: they only hit their settings; a semi-skilled golfer can make adjustments in stance and set-up to account for different course conditions.

Plus, the Cleveland protocol sheet was pretty sketchy on info about the shafts.

And as jamo said, what happened to the mightly RazR Hawk?

For me, this is the year of the swing . I'll worry about club tweaks in 2012.

[x129]

I am sure if I paid any testing lab 500k, they could give me pretty much whatever results I want by selecting various shafts , ball selection, and other adjustments options. It would be nice to see all the makers submit clubs for optimized something like 90,100, and 120 mph swing speeds and see what the results are.

Originally Posted by jamo

The link works for me. I'll take the happy medium, gimme the Titleist.

What I think is most interesting is that this goes against some of Callaway's claims that the RAZR Hawk is 6 yards longer than the R11. In the Cleveland testing, the R11 is nearly 10 yards longer.

[tweaky]

gotta include 110mph swingspeed in there.  other things to consider are tempo, transition, wrist cock and release, and angle of attack.  manufacturers take the easy route and use the KISS system.  for them to cover ALL the proper fitting aspects for a shaft and head would require waaaayyy too much energy ($$) than they care to exert.

[x129]

I read the test protocol again and I am wondering what 150mph ball speed is. If that is the speed of the ball as it leaves the driver that is really BS. It seems to me that swing speed is what should be constant and the ball speed that comes out will be a result of how good the driver is at translating swing speed to ball speed. Of course swing speed has other issues (you should be able to swing a lighter club faster).

Originally Posted by tweaky

gotta include 110mph swingspeed in there.  other things to consider are tempo, transition, wrist cock and release, and angle of attack.  manufacturers take the easy route and use the KISS system.  for them to cover ALL the proper fitting aspects for a shaft and head would require waaaayyy too much energy ($$) than they care to exert.

[Stretch]

Quote:

Originally Posted by x129

I read the test protocol again and I am wondering what 150mph ball speed is. If that is the speed of the ball as it leaves the driver that is really BS. It seems to me that swing speed is what should be constant and the ball speed that comes out will be a result of how good the driver is at translating swing speed to ball speed. Of course swing speed has other issues (you should be able to swing a lighter club faster).

Yes. The way they are portraying the results is complete rubbish. Cleveland states in their ad copy:

Quote:

The reason the XL270 won the test is because it's so much lighter than the others, creating more clubhead speed resulting in longer drives.

But, as you note, the robot was set up to generate the same ball speed with each club. This takes clubhead speed completely out of the equation since with perfect contact (which is why you use a robot!) any increase in clubhead speed is necessarily also going to increase resultant ball speed. Looking at the protocol, it seems far more likely to me that the observed differences simply result from the setup tolerances allowed, which permitted up to one degree variation in launch angle and 200 rpm variation in backspin.

[delav]

Originally Posted by Stretch

But, as you note, the robot was set up to generate the same ball speed with each club. This takes clubhead speed completely out of the equation since with perfect contact (which is why you use a robot!) any increase in clubhead speed is necessarily also going to increase resultant ball speed. Looking at the protocol, it seems far more likely to me that the observed differences simply result from the setup tolerances allowed, which permitted up to one degree variation in launch angle and 200 rpm variation in backspin.

I am confused by why ball speed was used.  Once ball speed and launch angle and spin have been controlled, this becomes a lesson in projectile motion and basic physics.  A leaving the club at 150 mph at similar launch and spin angles should have little variation regardless of what it was hit with.  This testing doesn't really translate into how each clubs performs given a set of input parameters.

Also, assuming each club was hit in the dead center, and all are designed against the legal limit of COR, ball speed should translate into near identical smash factors and clubhead speed, shouldn't it?  It would be interesting to see what the robot was set at to achieve 150 mph ball speed for each driver, assuming that the lighter drivers would require less input from the machine to achieve the desired ball speed.

[Stretch]

Originally Posted by delav

Also, assuming each club was hit in the dead center, and all are designed against the legal limit of COR, ball speed should translate into near identical smash factors and clubhead speed, shouldn't it?  It would be interesting to see what the robot was set at to achieve 150 mph ball speed for each driver, assuming that the lighter drivers would require less input from the machine to achieve the desired ball speed.

Absolutely. That's the funny thing. Cleveland's key claim -- that a lighter club can achieve a higher club head speed -- may even have validity for some subsets of actual, human golfers like seniors or higher-handicap women. But there's simply no way to demonstrate that with a robot, which is just going to produce the exact clubhead speed you specify with whichever driver you attach to it.