Does shaft bend profile really matter?

[golfare123]

Could someone explain to me why the bend profile of a shaft matters from a performance perspective?

 

When the ball hits the club face, does the ball ask the club what part of the shaft is flexing? Obviously not...

 

Is bend profile only a "feel" thing, or am I missing something? My thinking is that only the shaft's overall stiffness can affect the ball flight.

Edited March 26 by golfare123

[phizzy30]

It's mostly a feel thing.  My swing works better with linear shafts that don't have a lot of kick.  Just that feel of a shaft that kicks too much completely throws off my swing which leads to face control issues.  A shaft's overall stiffness can definitely affect ball flight.  I'm more prone to the lefts with a shaft that's too soft. 

Edited March 26 by phizzy30

[Pepperturbo]

Yes.   However, depending on how athletic you are, paying no attention might allow you to make any ole shaft profile work for now.

 

Bend profiles have differently configured tip, mid-section and handle sections.  For the most part, those need to align with different swing and tempo characteristics.  It's NOT rocket science 👨‍🔬 but sometimes sounds 👂 like it. 

 

I have a fast tempo and transition, almost hitter, and the shaft seldom reaches the top, thus a very stiff handle and stiff tip section fit me better than softer shafts.  

 

[bcflyguy1]

1 hour ago, golfare123 said:

Could someone explain to me why the bend profile of a shaft matters from a performance perspective?

 

When the ball hits the club face, does the ball ask the club what part of the shaft is flexing? Obviously not...

 

Is bend profile only a "feel" thing, or am I missing something? My thinking is that only the shaft's overall stiffness can affect the ball flight.

Shafts and everything about them (weight, overall stiffness, profile) do matter...they just don't matter in the way "forum fitters" and shaft company marketing would have you believe.

The best fitting shaft for any player is the one that best positions a player's strike pattern on the face AND is most transparent (not heavy, light, stiff, soft etc.) to the process of hitting a quality shot. Only way that can be determined is through testing/fitting.

[CTgamer]

Predominantly a feel thing, but if we're talking "what's the pure mechanical effect of shaft profile on ball flight" - assuming robot testing with no differences to swing, delivery, etc. - then a shaft is just a stick that bends a certain amount a certain way. 

Think about a line on a clock face from the center to 6 o'clock. It's broken up into 4 equal sections, so it has three points along it - we can call these 3 points low, medium, and high. Assume at "impact" the line bends forward towards 5 o'clock, and all of the bend happens at either the high, medium, or low point. Then, let's draw a perpendicular line at the end of that stick (i.e., a tangent vector representing ball flight). The direction (or trajectory) of that line changes based on the high, medium, or low bend point. 

At the high bend point, the tangent vector is still close to horizontal (a lower trajectory) while for the low bend point the tangent vector points much more upward (a higher trajectory). 

The differences from golf shaft to golf shaft are much smaller than this hypothetical, and there isn't so much a single "bend point" as there is a whole shaft profile and dynamic deflection - but the effect is the same. For a given amount of "total shaft deflection" (i.e. shafts of equivalent total stiffness), the more that deflection is comprised of bend from lower down the shaft, the higher the tangent vector of trajectory will point. This represents the small mechanical impact a shaft can have on dynamic loft, launch angle, and spin rate. 

 

 

[Stuart_G]

1 hour ago, golfare123 said:

Is bend profile only a "feel" thing, or am I missing something? My thinking is that only the shaft's overall stiffness can affect the ball flight.

 

As other's have said it's mostly a "feel" thing.  And that's because for some people (not everyone) the feel of the shaft loading and unloading can be used as a type of feedback from the motion to help individuals control the swing - especially different timing aspects of the swing.

 

For those that do not use that feel to help control the swing - the effect on performance is very minimal.   Depending on the mechanics of the swing, it might result in the shaft adding a different amount of dynamic loft to the head at impact.  But nothing that couldn't be compensated with a change in head loft.

 

So some individuals will see zero effect on performance.  Some might see a noticeable but minimal effect.  Then there is a group of individuals that have to have the stiffness profile in a certain specific range in order to get any kind of consistently good swing.

 

If you are "missing something" - it likely means you're not in that last group - a fact that you can be very thankful for 🙂

 

 

 

[Stuart_G]

23 minutes ago, CTgamer said:

The direction (or trajectory) of that line changes based on the high, medium, or low bend point. 

 

Looking at the tangent of the tip of the shaft when deflected is a good way to think of the influence of the shaft.  But that really has nothing to do with "bend point" (or "kick point" for that matter).   Both those terms are really archaic measurements of the shaft bending characteristics that at one time were thought to be meaningful.  But they turned out not to be useful at all in the early 2000 after full shaft length profile started to come onto the scene. Even among shafts with very different profiles, the actual measured bend point or measured kick point turned out to be very similar.   Unfortunately the customers never got the word about that and the shaft OEM marketing departments just wont let the terms die like they should because it's what customers have been programmed to ask about.  [\rant]

Edited March 26 by Stuart_G

[CTgamer]

49 minutes ago, Stuart_G said:

 

Looking at the tangent of the tip of the shaft when deflected is a good way to think of the influence of the shaft.  But that really has nothing to do with "bend point" (or "kick point" for that matter).   Both those terms are really archaic measurements of the shaft bending characteristics that at one time were thought to be meaningful.  But they turned out not to be useful at all in the early 2000 after full shaft length profile started to come onto the scene. Even among shafts with very different profiles, the actual measured bend point or measured kick point turned out to be very similar.   Unfortunately the customers never got the word about that and the shaft OEM marketing departments just wont let the terms die like they should because it's what customers have been programmed to ask about.  [\rant]

 

Just to clarify, I fully agree hence the last few lines of my post. Only using "point bending" because it's a helpful simplification in the analogy to understand the tangent vectors 🙂 

[ReviellGolf]

If shaft profile testing is done on a robot and all things are equal, so same clubhead, flex, swingweight, etc. Only thing that is different is the shaft profile and the measurement is clubhead speed, is there a difference between shaft profiles? Would the clubhead speed be the same between all three shafts, despite the difference in shaft profile?

[Valtiel]

21 minutes ago, ReviellGolf said:

If shaft profile testing is done on a robot and all things are equal, so same clubhead, flex, swingweight, etc. Only thing that is different is the shaft profile and the measurement is clubhead speed, is there a difference between shaft profiles? Would the clubhead speed be the same between all three shafts, despite the difference in shaft profile?

Yes the clubhead speed would be the same. What you'll see on a robot is the raw difference between shafts which, without the human variable, is how much dynamic loft and face closure a shaft produces via forward deflection. It would basically come down to a game of tip stiffness and how/what the robot was calibrated around. I'm not entirely sure what the process entails for Iron Byron, but If for the sake of argument you had a matrix of shafts ranging from softest tip to stiffest tip and robot was calibrated to basically hit whatever shaft was in the middle of that matrix dead straight, then the softer tipped shaft would launch/spin slightly higher and draw slightly, and the stiffest tipped shaft would launch/spin slightly lower and fade slightly. Emphasis on "slightly" here, to the point that minor variations in delivery or strike location would immediately override these. You may also see differences in toe droop that might impact strike location heel/toe slightly.

Everything else comes down to feel, and by extension confidence. If you can feel the difference between very stout, linear shafts and more bendy/flexible ones, and that has any bearing on how you swing the club, then profile matters. Generally speaking though this will usually be further back in line behind weight, length, and overall flex. Profile and Flex are connected as well, with profile basically being a sort of flex subcategory. This becomes useful for fitting purposes as a "softer" feeling profile in X-flex or a "stiffer" feeling profile in S-Flex can be tweeners for people of certain swing speeds or tempo/loading types. It's just another data point for people that care about data points in fitting.

 

[Denny100]

Golf equipment manufacturers, forum posters etc might say that a certain shaft is "high launch" or "low spin" or "anti left" etc....and the implication of what they are saying is that you deliver the club the same way all the time, and the shaft changes the ball flight, makes it lower, higher, spinner, etc etc.

 

This is not what happens. And its why different people hit different clubs with different shafts differentLY.

 

The actual effect of the shaft is making you the golfer deliver the club slightly differently, with different timing, angle of attack, maybe changing the strike location, which produces slightly different results.

 

The effects vary from person to person. Generalisations are only just that....when people generalise that softer shafts go left, or that they go higher, etc etc. They may do for THAT person, they dont for everyone.

 

Likewise, if youre playing golf you cant swap your shafts for every shot....what if you WANT it to go left? or high? or low? it shows that youre the one creating the shot, not the shaft.

 

But certain shaft profiles can certainly work better with your swing and feel more usable than others.

[jvincent]

4 hours ago, golfare123 said:

Could someone explain to me why the bend profile of a shaft matters from a performance perspective?

 

When the ball hits the club face, does the ball ask the club what part of the shaft is flexing? Obviously not...

 

Is bend profile only a "feel" thing, or am I missing something? My thinking is that only the shaft's overall stiffness can affect the ball flight.

 

While it's primarily a feel thing, that feel is what influences how you deliver the club at impact.

 

[KevCannon]

No offense to anybody…but the whole “if a robot was swinging” is just to make a point about consistency. Humans are not robots (duh) and we all have different swings, different movement patterns, and different feeling sensations. That last part is a biggie for me, as if I can’t feel any flex at all it will cause me to try and overpower the swing creating a bunch of flaws. Too much flex and causes me all types of power leaks and timing issues. I am very sensitive to subtle changes in where the shaft flexes, and weight, so long way of saying that- yes, bend profile 100% matters for me.

[petep5280]

There have to be huge differences in shaft bending for me to notice any differences. Within reason they all feel totally the same to me. 

[Andygolderson]

For me it's a timing thing.

When a shaft is to soft, you feel it bending sooner, which impacts your low point. When a shaft is too stiff, i feel it tends to bottom out earlier. 

i still feel there is some value in finding the right one, but at the end of the day there are so many shafts, that can fit to your swing needs.

You can always make something work if you adapt to it 

[Howard_Jones]

13 hours ago, golfare123 said:

Could someone explain to me why the bend profile of a shaft matters from a performance perspective?

 

When the ball hits the club face, does the ball ask the club what part of the shaft is flexing? Obviously not...

 

Is bend profile only a "feel" thing, or am I missing something? My thinking is that only the shaft's overall stiffness can affect the ball flight.

Yes, shaft profiles as we see them on labels (High, mid, low), is "swing dependent", and really only valid for less than 10% of players, for the rest, its mostly a feel thing, but never underestimate what feel can do to your timing and delivery of the club head.

Deeper info directly in this link to my fitting concept, Visual Fitting.
- We can take advantage of shaft profiles and flex, to improve the players swing and impact, by using shaft spec parameters as triggers for what we like the player to do. We can SEE club specs when the player swing the club, if we know what to look for. By doing that, we will be able to SEE if a certain parameter is good or not for that player.
 

 

[Stuart_G]

11 hours ago, Valtiel said:

What you'll see on a robot is the raw difference between shafts which, without the human variable, is how much dynamic loft and face closure a shaft produces via forward deflection.

 

As I understand it, for most of the robot's used in testing, it wouldn't even effect that very much.   Most of them don't really mimic human mechanics all that well - so think of them more like a player with a very early release.

 

 

10 hours ago, KevCannon said:

No offense to anybody…but the whole “if a robot was swinging” is just to make a point about consistency.

 

Not exactly.  Consistency is certainly a byproduct of the difference but it's not the main point.  The main point is that the robot doesn't change what it will do based on how the shaft feels or how much it loads or unloads - humans can.  

 

It's an important distinction IMO because a lot of people who don't know any better attribute the change in inconsistency directly to the shaft itself.  e.g. "the shaft isn't stable."   When in reality it's the swing that's not stable with a poor fitting shaft. 

Edited March 27 by Stuart_G

[TWGator]

14 hours ago, jvincent said:

 

While it's primarily a feel thing, that feel is what influences how you deliver the club at impact.

 

Yea it’s kinda like when people get more speed/distance from a shorter shaft.  If the feel inspires confidence and adds timing it can absolutely help your contact and all that goes with that.

[TKS]

I work to keep it simple. 

1. shaft weight (strength & speed)

2. shaft length (stature & posture)

3. shaft profile (Timing and Feel)

4. shaft price (pocketbook)

[KevCannon]

4 hours ago, Stuart_G said:

 

As I understand it, for most of the robot's used in testing, it wouldn't even effect that very much.   Most of them don't really mimic human mechanics all that well - so think of them more like a player with a very early release.

 

 

 

Not exactly.  Consistency is certainly a byproduct of the difference but it's not the main point.  The main point is that the robot doesn't change what it will do based on how the shaft feels or how much it loads or unloads - humans can.  

 

It's an important distinction IMO because a lot of people who don't know any better attribute the change in inconsistency directly to the shaft itself.  e.g. "the shaft isn't stable."   When in reality it's the swing that's not stable with a poor fitting shaft. 

I hear ya on that Stuart. I just see the whole“ robot swinging the club “ argument tossed around so frequently. Just trying to say that it is never the robot swinging when a golfer is swinging. 

[Stuart_G]

9 minutes ago, KevCannon said:

I hear ya on that Stuart. I just see the whole“ robot swinging the club “ argument tossed around so frequently. Just trying to say that it is never the robot swinging when a golfer is swinging. 

 

No worries.   But I don't see it as an argument.  At least not an independent one.  It's just breaking down the answer into it's separate parts to help with a more complete understanding of that answer.  Part A comes from the shaft, part B comes from the individual. 

Edited March 27 by Stuart_G

[KevCannon]

In your first response you summed up what I was basically trying to get across, just in a better way than I said it. 

[Stuart_G]

5 minutes ago, KevCannon said:

In your first response you summed up what I was basically trying to get across, just in a better way than I said it. 

 

Thanks - but I certainly can get a bit pedantic at times when I'd normally be twiddling my thumbs at work 🙂

[RSLP]

Quick count shows shaft distributors have about / over 350 shafts available.  If we narrow it down to steel for this short thread, we have 3 main manufacturers in the USA market:  FST/KBS , Nippon , True Temper.  These 3 each make a wide variety of steel shafts divided up by weight, bend points, and whatever the flex is.  

 

Fitters have a whole gaggle of shafts to select from.

 

Players have preferences.

 

{🤫Significant others monitor price.)

 

I think it matters.

 

 

[3step]

Of course shaft bend profile really matters.

 

When a golfer swings and applies force onto the different sections of the shaft, those sections are too firm, too loose, or just right. If our shaft sections are too firm or too loose for how our swing applies force, we can only gain an optimum result if we adapt our swing to match the shaft profile. But, changing our swing speed, rhythm, angles almost always gives us less. However, if the shaft sections are an exact match to how our individual swing applies force..,  then we get the most power, control, and uniformity, without the need to contort our swing. 

 

Of course, we also need to choose the optimum weight, flex, etc. But shaft bend profile selection really, really matters.

 

3step

[NHenson815]

On 3/27/2024 at 9:27 AM, TKS said:

I work to keep it simple. 

1. shaft weight (strength & speed)

2. shaft length (stature & posture)

3. shaft profile (Timing and Feel)

4. shaft price (pocketbook)

I agree with this order.  I’ve experimented with dozens of different shaft types and weight seems to be more important than anything else.   If that is off, it may be difficult to execute a proper swing, rendering the bend profile moot.   Also, a bend profile’s launch characteristics may not line up with what the manufacturer says it will do on paper (because everyone’s different).  It makes relying on that information more difficult, whereas weight “is what it is” and much more reliable.

[YAMS49]

On 3/27/2024 at 2:27 PM, TKS said:

I work to keep it simple. 

1. shaft weight (strength & speed)

2. shaft length (stature & posture)

3. shaft profile (Timing and Feel)

4. shaft price (pocketbook)

 

Also agree with this order. Shaft weight I find the most important part to get correct then try different profile shaft options within say 5g's of that weight. 

[Stuart_G]

On 3/27/2024 at 10:27 AM, TKS said:

I work to keep it simple. 

1. shaft weight (strength & speed)

2. shaft length (stature & posture)

3. shaft profile (Timing and Feel)

4. shaft price (pocketbook)

 

Not bad but the main problem here is that the fit for shaft weight is dependent on the playing length.  That's why people commonly fit into a heavier shaft for their fairways than they do their drivers - and even why some people cutting down their driver might find they want to move to a heavier shaft. 

 

So playing length really needs to come first and shaft weight second.

Edited April 4 by Stuart_G

[driveandputtmachine]

Weight is far more important for a big majority of people from the limited help I have done for friends and what I saw when working with Dana Upshaw.  After he fit me, I spent many a days down learning from him on the early/mid 2000's, especially once I learned I was moving away from Atlanta, and wouldn't have as easy of an access to him.

 

I wanted to be able to better fit myself so I needed to understand what he saw as my best performance from.  With woods for instance I get good performance from super handle stiffness and that affects me more than anything.  Ventus blue has NEVER worked for me in any way shape or form, but Red works well and Black performs pretty well too.

 

My order of preference is

1. Weight

2. Profile ( I include stiffness as part of the "profile")

3. Length

 

 

[driveandputtmachine]

17 minutes ago, Stuart_G said:

 

Not bad but the main problem here is that the fit for shaft weight is dependent on the playing length.  That's why people commonly fit into a heavier shaft for their fairways than they do their drivers - and even why some people cutting down their driver might find they want to move to a heavier shaft. 

 

So playing length really needs to come first and shaft weight second.

Since I am not a fitter, I know my personal lengths I like, and while yes changing weights I can change lengths or vice versa I tend to stick where I know I am.  When I went from KBS Tour V to the Recoil 110 I did end up increasing my overall playing lengths.

 

For helping people length and weight go hand in hand when looking, and that seems to make sense.

Edited April 4 by driveandputtmachine