We've launched the new forums! Read more here

Custom Fitting-For Real?

Nippon Shafts
A

Arnold

New member
Joined
Feb 7, 2013
Messages
97
Reaction score
0
Location
Minnesota
Handicap
3
I get these videos from Revolution Golf sent to me. I like them, the instruction seems very good.
Thye, occassionally, have a club maker/fitter fellow, Bronson, talk about equipment issues.
He claims that manufactires, 99 out of 100 times, ship "custom fit clubs' that ,if one measures lofts, flexes , lie etc do not met the specs sent to them.
This seems odd. It does not seemt o be that difficult a task, even with mass production, to do quality control that would insure thatsomeone spending the kind of money involved gets a conforming product.
Have others experienced what he is taliking about. If so, how does it happen?
 
That's a pretty bold number to throw out there.

I ordered a set of irons and wedges bent to specs last year and they were spot on when I put them on a Mitchell.
 
I saw a study recently where there were
Some pretty astounding numbers being off. It made me go hmm


^Siri probably sucks.
 
That's very interesting. 99 out of 100 seems a bit extreme though.
 
I too ordered a set of irons to my specs and they were spot on
 
I have no idea as to 99% but it is common. When I worked for a fitter, we checked every order coming in and probably 3/4 of the orders had issues that needed to be fixed (usually loft/lie related which makes sense given manufacturing tolerances). This does not account for shaft flexes which cannot reliably be checked without taking the club apart. One of our local teaching pros. who has a few PGA guys in his stable, received a set from his sponsor a few years ago and the 8 iron always felt wrong to him. On the Trackman you could see that it spun more than the 9 iron and the ballflight was different. Tore the club down and put it on the frequency meter - it was 1.5 flexes softer than anything else in the set. Not surprisingly he had the fitter reshaft the whole set. The only way to guarantee that you will get the exact specs you order is to work with a clubmaker that will build them from scratch.
 
I'm sure it's common but that's why your fitter should be checking this prior to handing them over. I know that both times I have been fit to irons, the fitter had me hit them all and made sure that they were exactly as we expected them to be.
 
I looked at a video(perhaps from here) from Ping lauding their quality control and checks etc.
One would think, with the manufacturer's reputation on the line and all the competition for business, that not conforming would be the exception vs the rule, though. The flex deal is especcially disturbing, as lofts and lies can be fixed relatively cheaply. But, to have to re-shaft is costly.
 
I will say that Ping was the best of the OEMS in build quality so they do have a right to be proud - but even some of their clubs needed work. Of the 75% or so I quoted, many of the corrections were minor (a degree of loft or lie here or there) and probably would not have been noticed by the golfer. Honestly I have no idea how common serious flex issues were given the time and cost it would have taken to check each set that arrived already built.
 
Hawk said:
That's a pretty bold number to throw out there.

I ordered a set of irons and wedges bent to specs last year and they were spot on when I put them on a Mitchell.
Click to expand...
I ordered a set of custom irons a couple years ago and they were spot on!
 
If a company sends you irons that are incorrect when ordered to spec they need to fix the mistake. If I custom order a 7 iron with 35 degreed of loft, I want 35, not 33.8.


THPing on Tapatalk
 
Not to jump off topic here, but I've seen loft/lie issues, on more than one occasion with standard sets. This one makes even less sense to me. Rule of thumb, always check them out.
 
JLit26 said:
Not to jump off topic here, but I've seen loft/lie issues, on more than one occasion with standard sets. This one makes even less sense to me. Rule of thumb, always check them out.
Click to expand...

When they are churning out head after head on an assembly line to be sold to a hacker who doesn't care about fitting, checking every head is not gonna happen. If it's custom ordered though, it better be spot on.


THPing on Tapatalk
 
I've wondered about this when I see people talking about not being able to hit a certain club well. My 6 iron is my favorite and the go-to iron in my bag. But my 5 iron is just awful for me. I seem to rarely hit it well. You'd think it was just because it's a longer iron and harder to hit. But my 4 iron is also good, not quite as good as my 6, but I'm pretty confident with it. It just doesn't make sense to me why one club would be so off. Maybe it's a mental thing, but I have to wonder if it's different in some way from the rest of the set.
 
For the life of me I cannot believe a 99% failure rate on custom ordered irons at all. It seems it would be too easy for quality control to check out each iron in a custom order and give a slight adjustment to each iron just as a clubfitter does when you have lie and loft adjusted by them. I just can't see companies jepordizing their reputations in such a competitive market with something that seems to be such an easy part of their job.
 
Trust me Cobra screwed up my wedges when I ordered them. First one had the wrong grip and shaft. They fixed it second one came like this
y9upagaj.jpg
 
Yes, i questioned the 99 out of a hundred deal, too. But, this guy , clearly said it. One wonders if he is not courting a defamation suit, although he did not single out any particular company.
I spoke to a master clubfitter once about this, too. He was of , essentially, the same opinion, although he did not go as high as 99%.
He did tell me that it is very common that lofts are way off, even in sets right out of the box.He did not mention shaft flex.
If this is true, that it is common, despite mass production, it seems really shoddy. These are relatively simple implents and loft, flex and lie should be easily controlled in a quick quality check.
It really makes me wonder how devoted mfgs are to quality vs just turning a profit. These are not inexpensive investments and it seems to me thay should meet expectations.
 
I've had 3 custom sets of irons sent my way over the years, each one has been spot on spec wise. PING inscribed my name on my irons, which I didn't want, but that was the only thing that was different from the original order. Everything else has been good.

Yes mistakes do happen and we've seen that around here from time to time. Is this that same Bronson guy that did the stock shaft video?
 
This gentleman may want to check his info. Perhaps he meant that a high percentage of off the rack equipment is measured incorrectly, which would be more believable. We have not seen any variance at all in our custom orders.
 
JB said:
This gentleman may want to check his info. Perhaps he meant that a high percentage of off the rack equipment is measured incorrectly, which would be more believable. We have not seen any variance at all in our custom orders.
Click to expand...

that part is certainly more believable. During my Golf Galaxy days we would randomly check iron sets and the lie angles would be off from iron to iron quite often.
 
I did not see the shaft video, although I am relatively new to receiving the videos.
I am very satisfied with my Pings, too. I was fit at their facility in Phoenx, given my specs and bought a set on Ebay that matched exactly.I bought s-56s that matched and had one round(allegedly) that I have really liked.
Only thing that has gone wrong is the ferrules on two chipped. Probably my fault from bag wear and traveling.
Is there an inexpensive way to replece ferrules without pulling the shafts? Seems like a waste to pay 18 bucks to put on a ferrule.
 
JB, he was talking about shaft flex, lie, loft,and even swingweight, I think.
The flex thing, in particular bothered me, as rehafting vs adjusting loft and lie is much more expensive.
He is a clubfitter, so , perhaps he had a profit motive in makingthis claim.
I am not good enough so it has never really been a concern to me until this.
I have really liked every set I have ever bought.
 
If I order custom clubs they better be what I order, but I think I still would get them checked out
 
Hawk said:
That's a pretty bold number to throw out there.

I ordered a set of irons and wedges bent to specs last year and they were spot on when I put them on a Mitchell.
Click to expand...
your order was a little diferent than someone going online and purchasing. I am sure it happens more often than not.
 
Yea I know our situation was a little different. Maybe I'm overly optimistic, but I have a hard time believing that the majority of orders are wrong.

Shafts frequencies are a different story since the club company doesn't have a lot of control over it, but lofts and lies seem pretty straightforward. I honestly have no clue though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top