Should I reshaft my 4 wood?

[JaxBomber17]

I thought it was 44", but just measured it at 42". I just picked up my new driver and it's 47". I feel so much better swinging the extra 2" on my driver, but my 4 wood is a really comfortable club for me off the tee on medium par 4s and on par 5s. Tour Edge Exotics CB4 tour 16.5 with an Aldila RIP x-stiff shaft. Should I stick with what works or try to see what a new shaft can do? I'm 6'7" with shorter arms so I feel like that could actually improve my consistency, but if I'm spraying my driver it's a real security blanket for me as-is.

Edited January 17, 2018 by JaxBomber17

[WUTiger]

42" or 42.5" is about average shaft length for a 4W. For many golfers - including some big hitters - the 4W flies better than a 3W. Reasons: a little extra loft, and a shorter more controllable shaft.

A common lament among teaching pros and better amateurs I know: they can't find that FW which really works for them. If you have an FW that works, keep it!

(And I'm a bit biased, because the benevolent TE Exotics XRails are my backup FWs.)

In the long clubs, I suspect your reliable CB4 would be a good counterbalance when paired with your bomber 47" driver.

[JaxBomber17]

3 hours ago, WUTiger said:

42" or 42.5" is about average shaft length for a 4W. For many golfers - including some big hitters - the 4W flies better than a 3W. Reasons: a little extra loft, and a shorter more controllable shaft.

A common lament among teaching pros and better amateurs I know: they can't find that FW which really works for them. If you have an FW that works, keep it!

(And I'm a bit biased, because the benevolent TE Exotics XRails are my backup FWs.)

In the long clubs, I suspect your reliable CB4 would be a good counterbalance when paired with your bomber 47" driver.

I think that's a great answer, and i'm leaning towards leaving it alone now. No reason to change something that works, and definitely no reason to spend the first part of the season learning two new clubs.

[onthehunt526]

On 1/17/2018 at 3:29 PM, JaxBomber17 said:

I think that's a great answer, and i'm leaning towards leaving it alone now. No reason to change something that works, and definitely no reason to spend the first part of the season learning two new clubs.

I was going to say leave it alone. I have an Exotics EX9 4-wood that I got at 43" (3-wood) length. I hit it okay, but I should of maybe stuck to 42.5" in the 4-wood. I'm revamping my set this year and am actually going shorter in the Driver and 4-wood this time. 44" in the driver and 42" in the 4-wood. It should work out fine.

Especially if your ball striking is good with it, why get a longer shaft?

[1badbadger]

Increasing the length of a club substantially (like 1 to 2") will very rarely increase a player's consistency.   The longer a club is, the more difficult it becomes to swing it consistently time after time.

You mentioned "my 4 wood is a really comfortable club for me off the tee on medium par 4s and on par 5s", so it sounds like it's a club you have a lot of confidence in and normally hit it well.  If that's the case, keep this in mind...when a player has a club that he hits really good almost every time, how much better can you make it?  Your window for improvement is pretty small, and the potential gain is minimal.  Let's say on a scale of 1-10, that club is an 8.5 or 9.  How much difference would there be day-in and day-out if the club was 1/2 point better?  Not much.  But man, you got a whole lotta room to make that club worse!  My point is, in this type of situation there might be 1 thing that will improve it for you (and again, any improvement would be slight) and 100 things that either don't help or actually hurt the performance.

If it was a club that you were indifferent about, and hit it good maybe 50% of the time, but you liked the shape of the head, or it sounded really good, then by all means...get that thing to the doctor and start operating.  That would be a situation where you don't have anything to lose, and it will be easy to make it noticeably better.  Hope this makes sense!