alternatives to impact tape

[RandallT]

Anyone ever tried to analyze where on the ball they are making contact?

Of all places, I just read on "The Dan Plan" (http://thedanplan.com/an-early-winter/comment-page-1/#comment-51401), a regular commenter named Richard Chen who had idea that it's useful to see if you are hitting the ball on its midpoint. Obviously you need to go retrieve your ball and look at the pattern left on it, which is left from something like crayon that you put on the tape of your club.

The guy is incredibly verbose in all of his comments and frankly totally nuts. I've found, however, that it is sometimes the nuts of this world that occasionally have pretty darn good ideas just because their thinking is a bit "out there."  The trick is to sift through all the crap to find it. This idea he posted is one I hadn't considered before, but wondered what use it might be. If you are hitting the ball that far off-center, you'd surely know with the ball flight anyway, right?

Here's the applicable section of his comment (verbose! and totally off-topic to the blog entry, which is discussed over in the Dan Plan thread):

A golf analyzer can be developed for pennies, and a few minutes as described below:

(1) Tape a piece of “masking” tape on the face of the driver, or any other club. Masking tape sells at hardware, and even in large drug stores for use during house painting to protect areas from being painted.

(2) Use a kid’s crayon of black or dark color, and draw a layer of crayon on the masking tape, which is taped onto the face of the driver at in step 1 above. Completely cover the face of the masking tape with crayon.

(3) Tee up the golf ball at the course, and at an empty full shot practice area. The ball is teed up with the label name of the ball on top, and square to the direction of the drive. Alternatively, the ball can be teed up with the ball name vertical in line with the target line.

(4) Hit the ball with the driver. At impact, some crayon on the masking tape, which is tapped to the driver clubfrace, will be imprinted onto the ball, leaving a “ball mark” of crayon on the ball. This is similar to hitting a golf ball out of rough, and some grass comes between the clubface and the ball during impact. The grass imprints a circular green colored ball mark on the golf ball, as well as on the clubface of the iron.

(5) Walking up the course, the ball can be retrieved to measure the position of the ball mark imprinted on the ball.

(6) After getting to a safe area, as there are always the danger of being hit by flying stray golf balls on the course, the position of the ball mark on the ball relative to the ball name label can be determined and measured.

(7) If the ball mark is in the vertical mid-line of the ball, the clubface is square at impact. If the ball mark is inside of the mid-line of the ball, the clubface is opened at impact, and so forth.

Over the last week end, I found a remaining small stash of a transparent templete with grid lines, and circular centering lines to precisely measure the ball mark on the ball, and to display a replica of the clubface at impact. It makes it easier to visualized the the clubface angle in 3-dimensions, as the clubface is not just about squareness at impact, but the clubface also has a combination of loft at impact. There is a linkage between clubface angle and clubface loft, which is vividly display by the Accu-Golf Swing Analyzer template.

The act of stamping the crayon “ink” from the clubface onto the ball to form a ball-mark onto the ball is similar to using a large rubber stamp. In using a large rubber stamp, it is instinctive to have the rubber stamp face squarely striking the paper to imprint the ink on the face of the rubber stamp fully onto the paper. In the same way, when using this analyzer system, it is instinctive to have the clubface squarely striking the ball to imprint the crayon “ink” onto the ball.

Both the act of imprinting the ball mark, and the displaying using the ball mark template will provide intuitive and instinctive reflex and understanding on producing accurate and consistent clubface angle at impact to generate those long and true drives endlessly to score better than par rounds.

[iacas]

Anyone ever tried to analyze where on the ball they are making contact?

Of all places, I just read on "The Dan Plan" (http://thedanplan.com/an-early-winter/comment-page-1/#comment-51401), a regular commenter named Richard Chen who had idea that it's useful to see if you are hitting the ball on its midpoint. Obviously you need to go retrieve your ball and look at the pattern left on it, which is left from something like crayon that you put on the tape of your club.

Why? All that would tell you is the loft and direction of the clubface at impact.

Here's a top-view of a golf ball with a clock on it. I made it because someone was trying to argue that the path changed where the ball was struck, and that players who swing inside-out could strike the ball at 4 o'clock. I said you could swing outside-in and still strike the ball at 4 o'clock.

The same is true of loft though too. The less loft you have, the higher on the back of the ball and the closer to the equator you'll hit the ball. Only a club delivered with 0° loft would impact the equator (assuming we're not talking about thinning the ball with the leading edge hitting the equator, of course).

BTW, I'd make a new thread for this… but I expect that to kind of be the end of the conversation, unless I've missed something…

[Patch]

I must be missing something here. I don't use anything on my club face to show impact. I can hit a ball, and there is always a slight imprint on the face where it contacted the ball. Granted, using something else will enhance the mark, but you have to wipe it off and reapply it before each shot. I wipe my club faces after every shot, even after practice shots. Also, as much as I play and practice, there is a wear mark on the face of all my irons which shows where the club face has been contacting the ball, most of the time. They are not dime size like Hogan's, but close enough.

On another similar note, I know a guy who would put some of that "non-skid tape" stuff on the face of his irons to get them to spin the ball more. Yeah, he was cheating, but he only did it when the round did not count for anything. What he was actually doing was roughing up the ball surface, and would use those roughed up balls during important rounds. That of course was probably cheating too. He did this until I suggested he use my rock tumbler with some abrasive materials in it to do the same thing. He was/is one of those golf hustlers from another era of golf.

[iacas]

I must be missing something here. I don't use anything on my club face to show impact. I can hit a ball, and there is always a slight imprint on the face where it contacted the ball.

Some clubs show that mark better than others.

[newtogolf]

I use impact stickers from longshotgolf.  The good thing about them is that I can peel them off the club face after practice and onto a piece of paper to take home and refer to later, with notes I add to explain what I was trying at the time.  Like this:

You can get the impact stickers at:  http://www.longshotgolf.com/productdetailsheet.aspx?CategoryID=5&ProductID;=3380

I got my first stickers at golfsmith in an introductory package.

I use the stickers from longshotgolf as well along with ones for the putter that I got from Dave Pelz, they work great.  I have had a problem with hitting the ball too close to the toe and work with the stickers to ensure I hit more towards the middle - heel.  I take photos of them with my iPhone before I toss them in the garbage so I can refer back to them.

[gregsandiego]

Wow. That does work great! Is it as dramatic on the irons as well? Definitely gonna buy a can for the range. Thanks.

Record holder Lisa Longball from Canada told me the same thing - use foot spray.Just bought a can of this  Dr Scholl's stuff,only $7 on Amazon.