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Hard/Soft Stepping to Dial in Shaft Feel


farris207

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I've been reading a bunch of posts recently on shaft feel, hard stepping, and soft stepping. It would seem that it takes two soft step/hard steps to make much of a difference in feel. I currently play S400 in my wedges, and love them for partial swings, when I have tried them with full swings, they feel too soft. When I've tried X100 it doesn't have much feel at all as I don't think I am able to even load the shaft. I want to maintain shaft weight of around 130g and would rather go higher than lower. Would it make more sense to hard step a S400 since soft stepping drops weight? Is there anything I can do to stiffen up my PW and 52* since I use those for full swings as well? For reference my 6 iron swing speed is around 100.

 

For an experiment I picked up a 6 iron X100. Cut to 7 iron length to it weighed 122g. I was surprised it weighed that low, although its the first shaft I've ever weighed. I've always went off the manufacturer information in that past.

Edited by farris207
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We cant hard step a wedge shaft, there is no shorter and stiffer S400 shaft than the #9, so if you want it stronger, tip trim is the only option. We can normally tip trim a taper tip shaft 3/8" without insert issues, depending the hosel, some even more, and if wanted we can tip trim 1 full inch, but that demands a ream job to 0.370 on the head/hosel.

PS uncut shaft weight is what you find on the web, so a shaft like S400 as #9 at 37.00 is right above 3.5 grams pr inch, so you loose 3.5 grams pr inch you cut off to play length.

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11 hours ago, Howard_Jones said:

We cant hard step a wedge shaft, there is no shorter and stiffer S400 shaft than the #9, so if you want it stronger, tip trim is the only option. We can normally tip trim a taper tip shaft 3/8" without insert issues, depending the hosel, some even more, and if wanted we can tip trim 1 full inch, but that demands a ream job to 0.370 on the head/hosel.
 

How much flex change would you expect with tip trimming an iron shaft? If I tip trimmed S400 shafts 3/8" for 4-PW,50 how close would that get to an X100? If it made it about half that sounds like it would be the way to go.

 

I've seen your chart showing X100 to be a 6.8 and S400 to be 5.5. If a tipped S400 could get to around 6.3-6.5 range I think it would be worth trying for sure.

 

How will tip trimming effect launch characteristics? Is this enough tip trip do even show a launch change?

Edited by farris207
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40 minutes ago, farris207 said:

How much flex change would you expect with tip trimming an iron shaft? If I tip trimmed S400 shafts 3/8" for 4-PW,50 how close would that get to an X100? If it made it about half that sounds like it would be the way to go.

 

I've seen your chart showing X100 to be a 6.8 and S400 to be 5.5. If a tipped S400 could get to around 6.3-6.5 range I think it would be worth trying for sure.

 

How will tip trimming effect launch characteristics? Is this enough tip trip do even show a launch change?


Since feel of flex is strigger for how you will swing, load and release the shaft, we CANT say for sure what changes we will se, but tipping a S or X flex DG shaft will for sure make it even lower launching.

1/8" tip trim = 1 CPM, so "on the paper" 1.25" is a full flex stronger, and for a ROBOT 1 CPM = 1 feet at apex, 3 CPM (3/8" tip trim) is 1 yard lower apex.

X100 strait in is AVERAGE FCM 6.8, while DG S400 132 grams is FCM 6.0, so on the paper 1.0" tip trim will make a S400 about the same BUTT CPM strengt as X100, but X100 will still be stronger over all with a shorter tip section.

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3 minutes ago, Howard_Jones said:


Since feel of flex is a trigger for how you will swing, load and release the shaft, we CANT say for sure what changes we will see, but tipping a S or X flex DG shaft will for sure make it even lower launching.

1/8" tip trim = 1 CPM, so "on the paper" 1.25" is a full flex stronger, and for a ROBOT 1 CPM = 1 feet at apex, 3 CPM (3/8" tip trim) is 1 yard lower apex.

X100 strait in is AVERAGE FCM 6.8, while DG S400 132 grams is FCM 6.0, so on the paper 1.0" tip trim will make a S400 about the same BUTT CPM strength as X100, but X100 will still be stronger over all with a shorter tip section.

 

It would seem in a normal human the change in launch conditions would be basically not noticeable due to changes in strikes. 

Am I correct in thinking 1" tip will stiffen the S400 up to match the butt cpm, but will still feel softer than the X100 due to the overall profile of the shaft? 

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Another option.

Go with the X100 in the wedges and add a few grams of lead tape to the heads. Bring the SW up a point or two. Since you like heavier this might be a good feel in that it will slightly soften the X100 and give a bit heavier feel to the wedges.

 

Also much easier to mess around with vs numerous tipping experiments.

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6 hours ago, farris207 said:

 

It would seem in a normal human the change in launch conditions would be basically not noticeable due to changes in strikes. 

Am I correct in thinking 1" tip will stiffen the S400 up to match the butt cpm, but will still feel softer than the X100 due to the overall profile of the shaft? 


I never tip trimmed S400 more than 0.5" and some likes it, some dont (feels hars compared to the std #9).

I understand that weight is wanted as high as possible, and if you dont mind lead tape on your clubs, i would like Adam C suggest using X100, but NOT the #9 iron shaft, use the #8.

Thats only SS1 when we compare DG to DG, it will bring flex down against S400 butt side about half way, but it will launch lower than S400 strait in or tipped 3/8" (never tested side by side with the same player with more tip trim on S400), and spin is higher than S400, so its a good option for the S flex player who wants lower launch or the X-flex player who want better control on full shots than S400 gives for a X100 iron player.

DG X100 130 gr. #8 iron shafts would have a "comparable weight" as SS1 of 128.5 grams vs S400 who is officially 132, and i suggest you add the difference on the "down side/underside" of the shaft about the middle in head to grip direction so you dont see it from address.

Using lead tape on the shafts like this also gives you the option to go above what S400 would have given, and this can be done with ANY club in the bag, so consider this. Its easy and most who have tried DG X100 #8 for wedge will never play another shaft, so just buy a GOLD sorted (not tour issue) DG X100 #8 - 37.50" and try one club. (absolutely no reason to pay for "tour issue" in wedges since its only tighter weight sorting if you will adjust shaft wgt anyway.

No matter what you choose, or what ever help needed if any to make it, use this forum and simply ask for help to what ever, and tell us about your progress, its always at least 20 x more readers that participants in a tread, so lots of hobbyists, professionals and others around the world reads along to learn.

DO NOT SEND PMs WITH CLUB TECH QUESTIONS - USE THE PUBLIC FORUM.

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On 1/14/2021 at 3:20 PM, Howard_Jones said:

Using lead tape on the shafts like this also gives you the option to go above what S400 would have given, and this can be done with ANY club in the bag, so consider this. Its easy and most who have tried DG X100 #8 for wedge will never play another shaft, so just buy a GOLD sorted (not tour issue) DG X100 #8 - 37.50" and try one club. (absolutely no reason to pay for "tour issue" in wedges since its only tighter weight sorting if you will adjust shaft wgt anyway.

 

I'm reading your driver tuning write up to review the process of adding shaft weight. Once you find the balance point of the shaft do you place the lead tape down the length of the shaft with the center of the lead tape landing on the balance point, or do you wrap the tape directly on the balance point?

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4 hours ago, farris207 said:

 

I'm reading your driver tuning write up to review the process of adding shaft weight. Once you find the balance point of the shaft do you place the lead tape down the length of the shaft with the center of the lead tape landing on the balance point, or do you wrap the tape directly on the balance point?

The best is to distribute it both ways from the BP, and then it want be visible from address either

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Thanks! Should get some range time this weekend with the iron builds and will report back. 

 

Also going to experiment with adding weight to my driver shaft. Playing a 70g at D8. I've slowly dropped weight to D2 when on a launch monitor and lost ball speed, but never swing speed. Going to see what happens when I replicate a 80g shaft. It is much easier for me to feel the club fall inside with 130g iron shaft vs 120. Curious if this will happen with the driver as well and maybe I can drop the swing weight to pick up some swing speed.

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Well I spent some time on the range and tried out my soft stepped X100. It does have a very good feel to it. I was surprised that the 1 x SS made a noticeable difference. I have soft stepped a X7 and Project X 7.0 and couldn't tell the difference with either of those. I suppose they were still stiffer than my swing could load. Unfortunately the shaft doesn't agree with my swing. The good shots are great, but too many bad shots. I find myself much more consistent on strike with Project X and much less overall curvature to my shot shape. The X100 I tend to push more then turn over where the Project X leaves on a much straighter start line with less shape. I was using a Project X 6.5 as a comparison shaft. 

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