Garden Putting Green

dwolf20

Hey,

I am considering attempting a small DIY putting green in my back garden using some sort of cheap astro turf on top of a sand base. Just wondering if anyone has ever tried something similar, seen one in a friends place, thinks its a silly idea or has any advice on providers of suitable materials etc?

I currently have no real grass in my back garden so it would add a bit of colour - and also be useful for some well needed putting practice!

There are some companies who would do the full install - but they seem to be quite expensive.

Draupnir

Why astroturf rather than grass? It wouldn't be hugely difficult and probably cheaper to do in the first phase.

Decent second hand equipment is cheap also and it would be a lot more meaningful to practice on.

Camarillo Brillo

If i was you I'd go for grass.
I built an 1800 square foot green with 2 bunkers over 5 days last august, its still not ready to play but should be by June/July. It involved a fair bit of effort and expense, chief of which were €900 for 40 tonnes of a sand soil mix and €500 for a second hand cylinder mower, but having priced a synthetic one of much smaller size it worked out cheaper.
I bought this guys book:
http://www.putting-greens.com/index2.htm

It seems daunting but its well doable

PhilipMarlowe

http://www.tourgreens-europe.com/ have some nice images on their site... site is a bit weird but worth a look.
Actual grass for a putting green is hardly an option for a home project in fairness unless you are prepared to give it massive attention.

Draupnir

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

If i was you I'd go for grass.
I built an 1800 square foot green with 2 bunkers over 5 days last august, its still not ready to play but should be by June/July. It involved a fair bit of effort and expense, chief of which were €900 for 40 tonnes of a sand soil mix and €500 for a second hand cylinder mower, but having priced a synthetic one of much smaller size it worked out cheaper.
I bought this guys book:
http://www.putting-greens.com/index2.htm

It seems daunting but its well doable

Would be really good to see a few photos of that, fair play.

Draupnir

PhilipMarlowe wrote: »

http://www.tourgreens-europe.com/ have some nice images on their site... site is a bit weird but worth a look.
Actual grass for a putting green is hardly an option for a home project in fairness unless you are prepared to give it massive attention.

Not really the case, after initial laying, you can maintain a green with a programme of about an hour of work a week. 45 minutes of that would be cutting.

dwolf20

There is no grass currently in my back garden - so was trying to avoid anything where ongoing maintenance was involved.

stockdam

What's wrong with using the hall carpet or else laying a temporary putting mat down.

Half of the battle is holing the straight 6 footers and less.

link_2007

stockdam wrote: »

What's wrong with using the hall carpet or else laying a temporary putting mat down.

Half of the battle is holing the straight 6 footers and less.

Are these any good? Are they realistic?

stockdam

link_2007 wrote: »

Are these any good? Are they realistic?

What do you want realism for? You want to be able to hole the 3 to 6 foot putts as these are the ones that you'll need to hole to save par. Practising the 6 footers will groove a goody putting stroke. It doesn't matter if the carpet is "realistic" - just get one that's short pile and fast. The putting mats that have a slight incline up to a hole will show up anything offline better.

If you have a carpet that is 25 feet or so then you can practice your lag putting - try to hit balls to a target. Be very critical and have a really small target. The closer you can group your putts the better.

Installing a green in your back garden will not do much more. Yes you can add a few hills but all you are doing is learning how to read your own green which isn't that much benefit elsewhere.

I'd stick to carpet putting to groove your swing and then go to a practice putting green at a golf course to learn how to read greens.

The rest is really down to experience - different greens and different conditions.

k.p.h

stockdam wrote: »

What's wrong with using the hall carpet or else laying a temporary putting mat down.

Half of the battle is holing the straight 6 footers and less.

I think stockdam is right TBH, now I wouldn't be upset if I had a putting green out the back, it would be grand if had the time/money etc. and would be a nice hobby to take of it but in regards to doing it to improve my putting I'm not sure if it would be necessary.

If you break putting down, three main aspects are line,speed and the read. If you further break that down the only thing that's a constant is line, aka the ability to hit the ball straight.

The speed you hit you hit the ball changes from course to course,green to green, putt to putt and even at different times of the year. And the read changes pretty much for every putt. I'm not sure how much genuine practice of these things you could get off having your own green before you knew the reads and the speed and it was just an automatic shot.

Line on the other hand could be practiced a lot, just grooving a consistently straight stroke would be invaluable as it would make anything inside 3ft pretty much a gimmie. Thing is you wouldn't really need a green to practice that, a practice mat or some carpet would do fine, think what would be more important than the surface you putt on is the time you would put into practicing it.

I definitely don't think it's a bad idea, would love to do it myself but wouldn't think it's completely necessary either.

k.p.h

Thanks stockdam,just missed your post took me 15min to type up exactly what you said.

stockdam

Say you have a 12 foot putt that has about 2 feet of break. Holing the putt is pretty hard as you have to get the pace and the line correct. With lag putting practice you should be able to get these within 2 feet for a reasonably comfortable tap in.

Now imagine a perfectly straight 12 foot putt or one that doesn't break more than 3 inches. You want to have the confidence that you can attack these putts and make a good lot of them. You don't want to be aimlessly wandering the putt towards the hole but instead with a good solid putting stroke you want to hole or be very close to holing.

Lastly imagine that you have a 30 foot putt with 3 feet of break. You should be thinking of leaving your next putt straight uphill. Now with your demon putting you should be banging those straight 2 or 3 footers in.

It kinda boils down to being able to hole straight putts. For all other putts you are trying to estimate the borrow which is difficult, so often you are just trying to get the ball close and if possible, leaving a straight uphill putt. When you do get the straight putts then that's when a good putting stroke pays dividends.

Camarillo Brillo

I'm lucky that I have the space to build a green with space for shots of up to 70 yards away. I agree that if you only have space for the green and no room for chipping and pitching it wouldn't really be worth the effort.

dwolf20

Appreciate the comments.

I realise the benefits of a small green would not be much different to just using the carpet aiming at a mug on its side or getting a putting mat - but its more as a novel addition to a boring back garden as anything else!

Just interested if anyone has installed a similar synthetic style outdoor green. Is a diy effort possible or would you be just p*ssing into the wind!! Unfortunately i dont have the acres of space to install bunkers and the like!! Lucky for some is right!!

Dr_Colossus

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

I'm lucky that I have the space to build a green with space for shots of up to 70 yards away. I agree that if you only have space for the green and no room for chipping and pitching it wouldn't really be worth the effort.

Draupnir wrote: »

Would be really good to see a few photos of that, fair play.

Your place sounds amazing, would also like to see pics to be even more jealous.

Camarillo Brillo

I have some on my laptop but left it in work, I'll stick some up in the morning.
BTW how do you post pictures here.

Senna

A few years ago I remember seeing a picture in the paper of some fella in dublin who was objecting to a large building be built behind his house. Its showed his back garden, which was (from the look of it professional done) a huge putting green, with maybe 6-8 pins, bunker etc. maybe 30 ft long and 20ft wide.
I'm guessing that's what its like to have money:D

link_2007

stockdam wrote: »

What do you want realism for? You want to be able to hole the 3 to 6 foot putts as these are the ones that you'll need to hole to save par. Practising the 6 footers will groove a goody putting stroke. It doesn't matter if the carpet is "realistic" - just get one that's short pile and fast. The putting mats that have a slight incline up to a hole will show up anything offline better.

If you have a carpet that is 25 feet or so then you can practice your lag putting - try to hit balls to a target. Be very critical and have a really small target. The closer you can group your putts the better.

Installing a green in your back garden will not do much more. Yes you can add a few hills but all you are doing is learning how to read your own green which isn't that much benefit elsewhere.

I'd stick to carpet putting to groove your swing and then go to a practice putting green at a golf course to learn how to read greens.

The rest is really down to experience - different greens and different conditions.

Thanks stockdam. I think you misunderstood what I meant by realistic, I meant are the putting mats comparable to putting on a green (I didn't mean look/feel). Living in a apartment with all wooden floors hence the question. Well there's a big thick rug in the sitting room but I don't think that would be much help!

charlieIRL

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

I'm lucky that I have the space to build a green with space for shots of up to 70 yards away. I agree that if you only have space for the green and no room for chipping and pitching it wouldn't really be worth the effort.

I have a similar set up at home except I didn't put in a green - I just cut the grass lower in a large circle kind of making a target area to aim for. I have a pin inside this area. I have 2 different areas to pitch from - one is 30m and the second is 70m. From the 70m one you can practice 70, 60, 50m etc. Its great for practising pitches of different lengths / types.

there's nothing but fields / bog behind my house so some evenings i use practice balls and use the driver. There's two large trees about 150m away and i use these as kind of "goal posts" to practice accuracy rather than distance.
Its great living out the country!!:D

Camarillo Brillo

Heres a link to photos of the green construction, in the last photo you can see the second bunker which is 15 yards back from the green with a big mound in front of it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/77409227@N02/sets/72157629108409652/

charlieIRL

that is deadly, when do you hope to have it finished........and when can we call around?!!!

Redzah

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

Heres a link to photos of the green construction, in the last photo you can see the second bunker which is 15 yards back from the green with a big mound in front of it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/77409227@N02/sets/72157629108409652/

Fair play to u, a bit too much work involved for my taste but i can understand that you might get enjoyment out of developing and maintaining this. I'm more of a beleiver in joining a club with good practice facilities and leaving others do the work for me. A 15 minute drive to the club with good short game practice facilities will;

a. Be maintained to a much higher standard than any back garden facility (real or synthetic)

b. Provide the most realistic scenario possible on the greens you will be playing week in week out.

c. Save you a few grand (less a small amount of petrol money)

Just to clarify after Whyners comment below that your facility is very impressive and can have benefits of not having to leave the house if u've to keep an eye on the kids etc. as well as impressing your friends but for others thinking of putting in a facility my comments above are merely based on my opinion of the costs outweighing the benefits of this. Wasn't trying to be a party pooper as ur facility looks like it will be impressive and if u have the cash then why not i suppose.

Whyner

Jesus Redzah, you sure know how to kill the party

dwolf20

My thoughts in the first place would be to try and create something similar to the attached image without the 2,500 euro price tag that one company quoted for such an installation.

[Ballsbridge Putting Green April2011.JPG

FixdePitchmark

dwolf20 wrote: »

My thoughts in the first place would be to try and create something similar to the attached image without the 2,500 euro price tag that one company quoted for such an installation.

[Ballsbridge Putting Green April2011.JPG

I'm all for my golf, but that looks like something that could be a big mistake.

The decking
The outside heater
The water heater
The modern sphere thing
The glass house

The putting green , Aka slime damp looking ice rink.

The wife hating it.

Your friends at a party "Ha Ha, who does he think he is Rory ", " Ha Ha Ha ". "Any more heino, Ha Ha Ha, they are green Ha Ha Ha ". :mad::o:rolleyes::)

dvemail

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

Heres a link to photos of the green construction, in the last photo you can see the second bunker which is 15 yards back from the green with a big mound in front of it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/77409227@N02/sets/72157629108409652/

Wow, fair play to ya. Make sure to keep us updated on how you are getting on with it.

Draupnir

dwolf20 wrote: »

My thoughts in the first place would be to try and create something similar to the attached image without the 2,500 euro price tag that one company quoted for such an installation.

[Ballsbridge Putting Green April2011.JPG

A real grass version of something that size would cost in the region of 1000 to establish in my opinion and probably 200 quid per year from then on to maintain.

Biggest expense would be a cylinder mower for about 500 quid second hand to cut it.

Consider it a hobby you could invest in!

The_Architect

The simple answer here is

"Don't do it"

If you want something that replicates a real green, it costs large money to build and requires an enormous amount of specialist know-how, time and money in maintaining to any decent level.

Camarillo Brillo

dvemail wrote: »

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

Heres a link to photos of the green construction, in the last photo you can see the second bunker which is 15 yards back from the green with a big mound in front of it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/77409227@N02/sets/72157629108409652/

Wow, fair play to ya. Make sure to keep us updated on how you are getting on with it.

Cheers Dvemail, I'll post some pictures in the coming months as the green develops.
I'm also planning on adding floodlights for the winter evenings.

Redzah

Camarillo Brillo wrote: »

Cheers Dvemail, I'll post some pictures in the coming months as the green develops.
I'm also planning on adding floodlights for the winter evenings.

Haha, fair play to you, you lunatic, more money than sense. Any chance of 20e for a putting mat for my living room

Camarillo Brillo

Im by no means rich, total cost so far 1800.
If it ends up as planned it'll be well worth it, It has also been a very enjoyable process to date.

lowelife

link_2007 wrote: »

Thanks stockdam. I think you misunderstood what I meant by realistic, I meant are the putting mats comparable to putting on a green (I didn't mean look/feel). Living in a apartment with all wooden floors hence the question. Well there's a big thick rug in the sitting room but I don't think that would be much help!

Want a length of carpet?
Will bring it down over the weekend

link_2007

lowelife wrote: »

Want a length of carpet?
Will bring it down over the weekend

I've been rumbled!

That would be great if you had a piece to spare, thanks.