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Who DESIGNS the Maxfli golf balls?


glofer

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Does anyone know who actually DESIGNS the Maxfli golf balls?

 

Some premium/tour urethane golf balls are designed (if not manufactured) by the branded name (e.g Titleist, Bridgestone, Callaway, TaylorMade, Snell).

Some premium/tour urethane golf balls use third-party designs (e.g. Vice, Cut, MG, Kirkland, and most of the direct-to-consumer balls) and simply re-badge.

 

I know the Maxfli brand history with TaylorMade (I saw on another thread here that most of the Maxfli IP stayed with TM) and that Dick's Sporting Goods currently manufactures Maxfli (or has the ball manufactured for them).

 

This question is about design (not manufacturing).

 

Which category are the Maxfli UFli Speed, UFli Soft, new Tour and new Tour X golf balls in: in-house design or third-party design?

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My guess would be manufactured to customer spec. Dick's/Golf Galaxy/Golfworks is big enough to sell enough golf balls to have their own ball engineer. He can design a spec and then they probably work with whoever makes them to work through prototyping to release.

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Mizuno ST Max 230 15/18 - LinQ Red 6F4

Mizuno ST Max 230 22 - LinQ Blue 75F4

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So, no one knows definitively if the Maxfli UFli Speed, UFli Soft, new Tour and new Tour X golf balls are in-house designs or third-party designs?

LTDx 10.5 + Velocore blue 7S 

M6 3h + Diamana blue 8S

0311P 4i + SFi95cwS

i210 5i-7i + SFi110cwS

921Tour 8i-G + SFi110cwS 

SM8 52F/RTX 56S/Jaws 60J + Recoil Proto Wedge F4 

QB7

TP5X 

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So, no one knows definitively if the Maxfli UFli Speed, UFli Soft, new Tour and new Tour X golf balls are in-house designs or third-party designs?

Yeah. It looks that way.

Mizuno ST Max 230 10.5 - LinQ Red 6F4

Mizuno ST Max 230 15/18 - LinQ Red 6F4

Mizuno ST Max 230 22 - LinQ Blue 75F4

Mizuno JPX 923 Tour 5-P  DG120 S300

Vokey SM9 50/54/60 - DGS200

Mizuno M-Craft II

CSX   

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Max.

Marty's brother? Max McFly?

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Vokey SM8 50° F & 56° M SM9 60°M

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Max.

Marty's brother? Max McFly?

No. This guy

 

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I do not know who designs Maxfli balls but I suspect that Dicks farms it out since they do not design and make golf balls as their main business. Whoever is designing them has done a great job going back to the U/2, U3, U4, and U6, as well as the UFli and Softfli series. And now they have released a new set of tour balls. Many of their designs are awarded "gold" ratings by golf digest but their marketing strategy is suspect in my opinion. They seem to have a hair-trigger on golf balls that do not meet sales goals or profitability and when they have a winner (Top-Flite Gamer) they discontinue it for no apparent reason. The Maxfli U/3 was one of the best balls I have ever played as well as the Gamer V2 and Soft. I currently play the Softfli's along with a couple of other brands and think they are as good or better than the Callaway Supersoft but I try not to get too attached to them.

 

Dicks has no middleman and does not sponsor tour pros so they can sell the golf balls at bargain prices. They also have limited availability (DSG, Golg Galaxy, and Rock Bottom) which turns people off and has to hurt their sales numbers. But the designers of their golf balls do a terrific job.

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  • 3 weeks later...

> @NJpatbee said:

Agree with your analysis, NJ. Part of why I am asking is what you are saying: I have found their urethane balls to perform very well, as good as the top brands at thrice their price. But if they don't design their own balls, and instead may change next year to some completely different design instead of tweaking the current ball, I wouldn't want to settle on Maxfli in my quest for my main ball. I haven't called DSG or the manufacturer to find out, because my trust level in either of their answers (for different reasons) would be very low. Didn't play the U series, but the UFli Speed is fantastic.

LTDx 10.5 + Velocore blue 7S 

M6 3h + Diamana blue 8S

0311P 4i + SFi95cwS

i210 5i-7i + SFi110cwS

921Tour 8i-G + SFi110cwS 

SM8 52F/RTX 56S/Jaws 60J + Recoil Proto Wedge F4 

QB7

TP5X 

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I was told TaylorMade makes them by 2 different GG employees in two different cities. Maybe they assume, no clue, but that’s what I was told.

Driver: Callaway Paradym Triple Diamond 8*, Tensei AV White 75g
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  • 1 month later...

From a very reliable source regarding Maxfli Tour and Tour X in response to my kudos regarding the recent MGS ball test:

"Thanks for the comments. I will pass it on to the Product Development Group at Dick’s sporting Goods. They are the ones that developed the product. We did some testing here at The Golfworks for them and the results were excellent."

 

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> @Minarets said:

> I was told TaylorMade makes them by 2 different GG employees in two different cities. Maybe they assume, no clue, but that’s what I was told.

 

TaylorMade to my knowledge doesn’t manufacture golf balls

ONOFF Labospec 358 — Tour AD TP6
Titleist TS2 16.5* — Kuro Kage XM 80
Justick Proceed 21* UT — Nippon GOST 
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> @MBBG said:

> > @Minarets said:

> > I was told TaylorMade makes them by 2 different GG employees in two different cities. Maybe they assume, no clue, but that’s what I was told.

>

> TaylorMade to my knowledge doesn’t manufacture golf balls

 

You are wrong. They mfg balls in Liberty SC.

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When TaylorMade acquired Maxfli a lot of the ball development moved over, this 2001-2003. Dr Hyun Kim and dean snell were in charge of overall ball development for TaylorMade and maxfli. We I think sub branded to some outlets. Even though I was designing irons, wedge and putters only I was asked to help design the ball CAD model including dimple patterns. It was very experimental stuff we were investigating back then. I wasn’t doing material investigations or manufacturing, just dimple design and aerodynamic (cfd computational fluid dynamics). After I setup the models which I was only working 50% of the time I went back full time to clubs.

 

Not sure who designs them now but dr.kim and dean were the ones doing it back then.

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> @trackcoach13 said:

> > @MBBG said:

> > > @Minarets said:

> > > I was told TaylorMade makes them by 2 different GG employees in two different cities. Maybe they assume, no clue, but that’s what I was told.

> >

> > TaylorMade to my knowledge doesn’t manufacture golf balls

>

> You are wrong. They mfg balls in Liberty SC.

 

I believe the SC plant only handles urethane cover assembly, painting/stamping, and packaging. Cores/mantles for urethane models and all surlyn models are produced somewhere in Asia.

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I have a hard time imagining that D*ck's has ball designers on staff, so unless I'm wrong that points toward 3rd party design. It's somewhat common knowledge that Maltby designs many of the D*ck's golf clubs so it stands to reason that the balls are designed by either the manufacturing house or some other third party as well. What D*ck's is likely to have a hand in is in providing the basic specs such as the hardness, cover type, stuff like that. The details then are handled by the designers who spec the nitty gritty details.

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  • 2 years later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Lots of Dicks employees think TM makes the Maxfli balls. I’ve tried to explain they are made by Foremost but I might as well be speaking to a wall. 
 

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Maltby MXU 23* 
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A better question may be, who designed the Pro V a few years ago....most people would guess Titleist, but Bridgestone Patents say otherwise. That's why Titleist had to pay Bridgestone a few $ for every dozen sold for a number of years. Guess that was a small price to pay for the value of "borrowing" those patents.

 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB119162032229150556

 

 

Edited by cardia10
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58 minutes ago, cardigan said:

I have an old 2019 Maxfli Tour box that has a couple of patent numbers on the back and one of them is for dimple pattern.  The name and location of the inventor on the patent seems to link to Hye Precision in Perry, Georgia.  I don't have a box for the 2019 Tour X or any of the 2021 balls.

Yeah Bridgestone stole them from old Mr. Hye before Titleist stole them from Bridgestone, before Costco stole them from Titleist. Old man Hye told me, "Them guys owe me HUNDREDS!". 

Edited by North Butte
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6 hours ago, deepred said:

Lots of Dicks employees think TM makes the Maxfli balls. I’ve tried to explain they are made by Foremost but I might as well be speaking to a wall. 
 

This. Speaking as someone who used to work at Dick's, most of the golf workers including the lead don't know what they are talking about half the time.

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5 hours ago, cardia10 said:

A better question may be, who designed the Pro V a few years ago....most people would guess Titleist, but Bridgestone Patents say otherwise. That's why Titleist had to pay Bridgestone a few $ for every dozen sold for a number of years. Guess that was a small price to pay for the value of "borrowing" those patents.

 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB119162032229150556

 

 


First, the US suit was settled out of court with some kind of cross licensing agreement (there was a future royalty component but the details were confidential and likely long expired at this point given that the patents in question have likely expired). Acushnet settling doesn’t admit guilt of intentional IP theft, it means their corporate council felt they would spend far less in a voluntary settlement vs several years of litigation and a potential injunction on their best selling product. 

 

Next, if you actually read any ball patents it will be clear how big of a joke all of this past litigation really was (Acushnet has been as guilty as any with the questionable litigation). 

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10 hours ago, deepred said:

Lots of Dicks employees think TM makes the Maxfli balls. I’ve tried to explain they are made by Foremost but I might as well be speaking to a wall. 
 


TMaG sold the Maxfli brand (minus Noodle) to DSG in 2008. From what I recall this may have included some design licensing for the first few years, but TMaG wasn’t even producing their own balls at that point let alone white label product for other brands.
 

As mentioned earlier, all DSG house brand balls (Maxfli, Top Flite, Slazenger), have been produced by Foremost in Taiwan for years now, however it is not clear if DSG is contracting 3rd parties for R&D (they have done this for some of the house brand club design) or using Foremost’s white label offerings like many DTC companies (with exception to the Top Flite D2 dimples). 

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