Tipping/trimming and head weight

[third-times-a-charm]

So the general consensus is tip tripping isnt for changing the flex really but for compensating for head weight, and butt trim for length but can also effect weight of the head.

 

If I pulled a shaft from a TM driver to put in my fairway, and it was tipped 1" from TM (for whatever odd reason they do that), and then butt-cut it ~1" to fit my 3W length...would I still have a shaft that is 'too stiff' for a 3 wood since it was tipped? Or do I just need to add ~ 2.5g of head weight for each 1/8" it was tipped (in general - so about 16g) to bring it back 'down to flex'?

 

(BTW - The shaft in question (Fuji Pro) tipping instructions say 0" for driver and 0" for 3w, but .5" for 5w.)

 

Or would this just result in a stupid feeling club...?

[Adam C]

Not sure I am completely understanding your thought here, but you don't need to add 16g of weight to the 3 wood. The average 3 wood is already around 12g heavier than a driver. If you ad that much head weight, you will have a sledgehammer, and not in a good way.

I would recommend getting the head weight to where you want it based off feel (ie swing weight and balance) and let the flex be what it is at that point. Unless you have issues closing the face at impact or hitting it too low, flex won't be as important to the end result.

[third-times-a-charm]

Basically, I'm trying to make use of a 1" tipped shaft from a driver into a 3W and wondering if it's worth it...and if adding a bit of head weight will make up for the tip trim, and/or if the butt trim will effect that or reduce the effect of the tip trim.

[Howard_Jones]

Flex is not even close to the importance of total weight and balance, so misusing head weight to make flex softer is not a good idea.

You will either have to live with it, or use a different shaft. However, some players does benefit from more head weight than standard, but thats for swing and impact reasons, NOT to soften flex.

You can also shim up the tip so insert becomes limited to 1.0", but i guess its 1.25" standard, so it changes effective tip trim from 1.0" to 0.75" only....a marginal difference

Most shafts has 0.5" as standard tip trim for a 3W and 1.0" for a 5W.

[third-times-a-charm]

So all things said and done its still pretty true to flex, it's just about feel and trajectory and 1" off the tip is not really a 'huge deal' for most players? And especially in a fairway wood given most shafts are .5" off anyway?

[Howard_Jones]

I dont know the actual shaft or why they have a tip trim instruction as they do, but there is only one way to figure out how that works for you, and tip trimming more than standard is not uncommon so all i can say is give it a try, it might feel just right.

[third-times-a-charm]

Its a Fujikura Pro 2.0, which from what I can gather says no tipping for Driver/3w but 1" for 5w. I find it odd it says 0" for 3w but I know the old Fujikura Pro's said .5" for the 3w - but I also know Fujikura is very 'anti tipping'.

[GLF4EVR]

Howard knows vastly more about this than practically anyone. If you are trying to get a specific weight for the MOI is where I would see that you might need a different shaft. TM has the shaft tip trimmed to account for the adapter. If your 3 wood does not have an adapter, just insert the shaft & try it a little. An example is my 3 wood. It is an old TM 580. The shaft I put in is an Ozik Con 6 shaft. It was already tip trimmed by 1/2". I did not butt trim it at first and it was 3/4" over standard. After some use I started choking down 3/4" and got to a consistent pattern. Only thing I did not like was the trajectory was a little high. Tip trimmed a little over 1/4" & that seemed to bring the height down. So butt trimmed the 3/4" & after around 8 years I have no reason to think of anything else for a 3 wood.

[Howard_Jones]

Again, i dont know why they have those specs. If the player is NOT familiar with the shaft, and we wants to make it "right", we have to include hosel specs, not only head weight, but we also need to know how the tip and butt section of the actual shaft is.

Example, a shaft where the mid to butt section is progressive stiffer all the way (like RIFLE FCM is). A shaft like that would play stiffer the longer the butt section is.

When we now compare driver to 3W, we have those 3W with way lower BBGM than drivers = more butt section in play on the play ready club. In those cases we can/should drop tip trim for the 3W since the longer butt section compensate for flex.

The 2 EI profiles i can find has a rather normal butt section, (going against weaker) so the example above is not the reason for why Fuji made those instructions like they did, and shaft manufacturers never know what head/hosel specs the user has, but this is considerations a club maker should be aware of. What i can see from this 2 profiles is that the one to the left (5) should have normal tip trim, while the 7 could be a profile where tip trim makes the tip side much stiffer compared to the norm.

 

[third-times-a-charm]

Great info as usual.

 

This is going into a 3W with a hosel adapter (callaway optifit) - not a bonded model - so I guess TM's principle of tipping to compensate for the adapter will come into play a litte bit here as well and the shaft will play closer to its true flex than it would with a bonded 3W....if I'm interpreting this correctly.

 

Anyway, again, what I'm trying to get at is if the 1" of tipping is really having a huge effect. It doesnt seem that it is, and if I like the 'feel' of the shaft, its good to go.

[Stuart_G]

FYI - TM's tipping policy has nothing to do with any need to compensate for the use of an adapter. The presence of an adapter doesn't actually play a role in the shafts performance - other than you just need to make sure you add the weight of the adapter to the weight of the head when considering the role of the head weight on the shaft performance.

 

And no, I dont' know the real reason for the policy. As far as I can tell, no one outside the TM inner circle knows or even agrees with it for that matter.