The golf club design paradox

Sandwich

Chat during 18 holes today (Winter League!! - better day than any of the "summer") generalising from the recent thread on which irons to choose :

Thesis.
Gold club manufacturers have created a myth that game improvement/forgiving clubs will get the best out of any given shot and that player/workable clubs will not, but the hitter will sense how well he hit the ball.


'Forgiving' clubs : Sensation in the hands is much the same with hits whether the ball flies well or poorly. Golfer Conclusion : the balls that flew poorly didnt feel so bad so the club 'forgave' and got the best out of the hit.

'Feel'/'Better Player' clubs : sensation is good on shots when the ball flies well, feels bad or jarring when the ball flies poorly. Golfer Conclusion, the balls that flew poorly were my own fault, I could not expect the club to do anything to help it.


So :

Design Brief to make a 'Forgiving club' - design as little variation in the sensation as possible. The golfer will conclude that on bad shots, due to no change in feel, that the club helped him out. It doesnt matter whether the club head made any difference to the shot flight - only that the hitter gets the impression that it does.

Design Brief to make a 'Feel'/'Workability'/'Better Player' club : design the club so that some shots will feel 'bad' to the golfer, and some good. It doesnt really matter what effect the design has on the flight of the ball. If the feel is bad, the golfer will blame his swing, yet be happy that it felt bad. If it feels good, he will conclude that he cought it on the sweet spot. He will never know for sure so it doesnt really matter whether he did or not.

copacetic

hmmm, not sure thats a paradox. What exactly are you looking for?

'players' clubs have a smaller sweetspot, if you hit out of it the shot feels good. They will also fly well unless you have put too much sidespin on. Personally I have never hit a shot that felt great and went nowhere, have you?

You don't design for the sensation, you design for the forgiveness/result of the shot, which automatically sends vibration down the shaft.


Possibly the newer shafts with vibration damping would insulate you from the feel while still giving you bad results. Is that what you want?

waterville72

Your thesis is incorrect Sandwich. For a start the manufacturers have not created a myth. In fact even if they wanted to they wouldnt be able to create a myth..thats called mis-representation...and is prosecutable in a court of law.
All of the features on top end manufacturers equipment have been researched and tested and proven to work. The fact is that perimeter weighted irons do hit the ball further and straighter on "off centre" hits than blades. Its not a myth.
Aswell as this you are claiming that they are saying that the sensation in the hands on forgiving clubs is much the same on all types of hits...Wrong again! Almost every golfer out there from complete beginner to tour player level can tell you how well he/she struck a shot with either perimeter weighted or blades. A toe hit on a cavity does not feel anything like a centre hit.
So sorry Sandwich but your thesis is wrong.

stockdam

I used old style blades for a long time and eventually changed to cavity backs.

I remember hitting two irons off the fairway and when you didn't get them right you ended with stinging hands. I also remember that if the blade was slightly open then the shot for a 2 iron to 7 iron would have been a lost ball. I also struggled to hit a draw with an iron.

I gave up on my blades when I found high handicappers hitting their irons both straighter and further than I could. I was hitting an 8 iron to their wedges at times!

When I changed, the first thing I noticed was that the lofts of the new clubs were all stronger - that's why people were outhitting me. However I also found that it was very hard to hit a wild banana slice with an iron and drawing the ball was much easier. The heads of the new clubs were much bigger and that helps a lot. I hit a lot less "stingers".

It was an even more remarked difference between the old persimmon drivers and old metal ones and then the new ones. The new drivers are so much easier to hit than say they were 10 years ago and these were a quantum leap ahead of the old persimmons I had.

So to summarise. The perimeter weighed clubs are easier to hit straight and bad shots aren't nearly as bad. I think that hitting a good shot is just as hard but at least the bad ones land just off the green rather than 30 yards wide.

BrianD3

I have never noticed a significant difference in "forgiveness" with modern perimeter weighted cavity back irons compared to modern musclebacks. Off centre hits feel bad and fly bad from both types of club. Thinned or heavy shots are crap no matter what the iron head design.

Also there is so much talk about forgiveness on off centre hits yet as far as i' can see off centre hits on iron shots are a minor concern for most golfers compared to slicing/pulling/hooking which AFAIK the clubhead weighting does little or nothing to reduce. But perhaps the high offset that is commonly found on game improvement clubs is a help to reduce the effect of a slice, how much of a help though?

So many variables and so much marketing. It's hard to know what to believe.

ShriekingSheet

waterville72 wrote: »

if they wanted to they wouldnt be able to create a myth..thats called mis-representation...and is prosecutable in a court of law.

Eh, that's a watery theory to say the least. Myths are easily and I would say frequently created in this area.

Eg myth: Surveys on various PGA tours showing very high percentages of Taylor Made drivers being used.

What it doesn't say is that TM offered a deal in the same time period as the survey where every player who tee'd up on a Thursday with a TM driver got handed a nice cheque on the spot. Given that the minority of players on tours are on the pigs back and the vast majority of surveyed players are either down the rankings of main tours or on smaller and less lucrative tours, it wasn't hard to effect results.

No laws have been breached there, yet TM got the big % they wanted for their marketing campaigns which wasn't actually a lie.

It's a similar story with iron heads. Any good marketing machine with enough $$$ behind it (check and eh, check) can create the perception that a real golfer needs these "tour" clubs and a less talented guy can hit tour calibre shots with these other "forgiving" clubs. Yes there's truth in what they say. But yes there are various myths that are created to exagurrate the reality.

waterville72 wrote: »

So sorry Sandwich but your thesis is wrong. .

This is childish.
Sandwich is a regular poster of decent discussion and ideas. Lots of posters will disagree with theories but post your argument and leave it at that.

ShriekingSheet

Sandwich wrote: »

So :

Design Brief to make a 'Forgiving club' - design as little variation in the sensation as possible. The golfer will conclude that on bad shots, due to no change in feel, that the club helped him out. It doesnt matter whether the club head made any difference to the shot flight - only that the hitter gets the impression that it does.

Design Brief to make a 'Feel'/'Workability'/'Better Player' club : design the club so that some shots will feel 'bad' to the golfer, and some good. It doesnt really matter what effect the design has on the flight of the ball. If the feel is bad, the golfer will blame his swing, yet be happy that it felt bad. If it feels good, he will conclude that he cought it on the sweet spot. He will never know for sure so it doesnt really matter whether he did or not.

I disagree because I think this hinges too much on what a bad and good shot feels like. Design of club heads is all about results IMO.

A bad strike with a Callaway X 20 will go further and possibly straighter than a similarly bad strike with a Callaway X Forged blade.

Secondly, there's a functional trade off. If you want these bad strikes that work out okay and you chose the X20s, when it comes to a windy day and you have 150yds into a stiff breeze, even with good technique, you will do well to fire in a low mid iron. Because the clubs are designed to get the ball in the air, there's a real tendancy this particular kind of shot will balloon.

Similarly in the rough, the X20 will not cut through the rough like a smaller, sharper X Forged.

Fourthly, bigger, offset clubs like the X20 are quite difficult to hit a fade with unless a fade comes very natural to the player. But when a left to right shot may be requried the X forged with it's lack of offset will be easier to play.


So what it boils down to is this. On a straight forward shot, the X20s will give better results to all golfers.

But straight forward shots can be few, very likely in the minority. As I've said, in the wind, from the rough or for certain shape shots, the X20s can be limited. Better golfers might want more from the rough and might want to be able to keep it low when necessary. But to get this they need to accept the trade off that from the fairway, with a straight forward shot with no wind, the blades they have in their bag won't be as forgiving of mis-hits.
But of course the reasoning is, the reason they are better golfers is because they have very few mis-hits from the fairway.

Other golfers might not even be thinking about low shots, fades etc. They are happy to accept what they might call a "fictional limitation" of the X20s in return for more forgiveness.

Sandwich

Maybe not stating it very well.

The nub of the discussion was 'how do you know how accurate your strike on the ball is?'. In short, you dont. But you guess, based on 1) the flight of the ball, and 2) the sensation at contact. So we are vulnerable to club makers designing clubs that exploit this so that we conclude that their club does a better job with any given hit than another.

e.g assorted urethane implant designs : to improve the flight of the ball ? or to mask the sensation - leading us to conclude after a poor flight, yet lack of jarring sensation,that the club did a good job and got the best result from a poor swing?

Sandwich

BTW, if I was able to have every club maker prosecuted who has sold me a club claiming it was longer, strighter, more consistent etc, there woulnt be many of them left in business.

spurscormac

Sandwich wrote: »

Maybe not stating it very well.

The nub of the discussion was 'how do you know how accurate your strike on the ball is?'. In short, you dont. But you guess, based on 1) the flight of the ball, and 2) the sensation at contact. So we are vulnerable to club makers designing clubs that exploit this so that we conclude that their club does a better job with any given hit than another.

e.g assorted urethane implant designs : to improve the flight of the ball ? or to mask the sensation - leading us to conclude after a poor flight, yet lack of jarring sensation,that the club did a good job and got the best result from a poor swing?

In a way you've kinda disproved your argument.
If you hit a poor shot, it is the result of a poor swing or grip, ie one that caused the clubface to turn, or to be off centre, above or below optimum height (topping or deeper divot) on impact.

If my forgiving clubs give me a bit less jarring, then thats fine with me - but I'm not gonna assume that the shot was any better because of the club I use - I'll see the results from where the ball lands, and from that I'll know how poorly I hit the shot, not think how well the club managed to save me from my terrible swing.

I'll judge my clubs based on the good shots I hit - ie the few that go straight.

waterville72

ShriekingSheet wrote: »

Eh, that's a watery theory to say the least. Myths are easily and I would say frequently created in this area.

Listen mate if Callaway etc say that its new model X22 or whatever has a 5 % larger sweet spot than its old model or that it is 6 yards longer through the air than a Taylor Made tour burner you can be certain that it does. This isnt "myth creation." These are facts that they have tested and they are not going to leave themselves open to multi million dollar law suits.
Now when Taylor Made say that they have won the driver count on tour well then they have. I take it you are implying that they are creating a myth that the reason why they win the driver count each week is because their drivers are the best. Well my friend you should maybe consider crediting other people in the world with some intelligence and realise the vast majority of golfers are aware that they pay players to use their equipment. Are TM drivers better than their competitors. Probably not but they do perform and the fact that they do win the driver count to me means that the pros think they are good enough to use.(which I see as a positive thing when making a purchase)
Id be interested in an example if you could find one of one of these myths..maybe a quote from the manufacturers website.

And finally mate I am fully entitled to give my opinion on Sandwich's thesis. And in my opinion I believe it is incorrect as I have stated. Im sure Sandwich is a valuable contributor as you have stated. So please dont tell me how to post or what way to post mate.