Will someone explain how closing the face adds loft?

[Smallville]

On all the adjustable drivers you see, the way it works is if you set it to a closed face, the loft INCREASES, but if you set it to an open face, the loft DECREASES. You see this in club specs, as well as all over this forum.

How the hell is that possible? It doesn't work that way on irons. Many people say that if your highest loft is a 56 and you need to get it higher (more loft), then set the open up the club face before you hit the ball.

I am not saying this is not true, but I don't know how or why it works that way.

Why is it different with woods/drivers?

 

[coers]

I thought its the opposite, that by opening the face your adding loft not by closing it. Found this comment online if it makes since to you (Effective loft is the loft of the club at impact when the driver is square to the target. Closing the face angle of a driver decreases loft and opening the face increases loft. So when a 10 degree driver with a 2 degree closed face is square at impact, the driver is actually open 2 degrees adding loft to the driver. )

 

[Smallville]

I thought its the opposite, that by opening the face your adding loft not by closing it.

Search the forum. It says it all over the place.

But yeah, I agree that's the logical way of thinking about it. But not what the manufacturers say.

 

[blugold]

I thought its the opposite, that by opening the face your adding loft not by closing it. Found this comment online if it makes since to you (Effective loft is the loft of the club at impact when the driver is square to the target. Closing the face angle of a driver decreases loft and opening the face increases loft. So when a 10 degree driver with a 2 degree closed face is square at impact, the driver is actually open 2 degrees adding loft to the driver. )

But that is not how it works as stated by OEMs. I am very curious on this question. I cannot wrap my head around it.

 

[jhstew1]

I have never understood this either and look forward to the answeropcorn:

 

[Trout Bum]

I can tell you from experience that when I added loft on the SLDR it closed the face and my shots were lower and left lol, I can't grasp it either.

 

[golf4life]

This does seem counter-intuitive, as the exact opposite does happen when you open or close the club with your grip when setting up to swing. But when you have these adjustable adapter drivers, the manufacturers have the option of choosing which way the rotation of the shaft in the adapter connector will add or decrease loft. So the vast majority (if not all) of them have chosen to have the club face close when loft is increased, and the prevailing thought is that poorer golfers need both more loft to get distance and tend to slice the ball. So more loft should go with a closed club face.

 

[lmh3]

The easiest way to explain is that the part of the face that is moved affects the loft. When you roll a club open, you are moving the top of the toe away from the target, adding loft. With metal woods and there adapters, you open the face by moving the lower portion of the toe back, therefore the face tilts closed. Opposite for closing the face, the low toe moves in and the face tilts back. Hopefully that makes sense.

 

[mrvandelay]

Great article by Tom Wishon here: http://wishongolf.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/adjustable-hosel-drivers.pdf

 

[golf4life]

I would add that in an ideal world, it would be great to be able to adjust loft without affecting how open or closed the club sets up at address. Some of these multiple ring adapters may address this to some degree, and TM tried to do it with the goofy sole plate thing that never worked for me.

 

[Nebgolfer]

I think it has to do with the axis at which you're adjusting the face. On an iron, to open or close the face, you're rotating around a single axis, so open face = higher loft. With an adjustable head driver, I believe the adjusting hosel actually changes the axis of the head relative to the shaft, so the same rules don't necessarily apply. I could be way off, but that's the only way I could think it would work.

 

[baldguy]

the difference is in the shape of the sole, how we adjust the loft, and how we think about "open" and "closed". With an iron you add loft manually by opening the face. You're laying the club flatter to make the ball take a more diagonal path across the face. With an adjustable driver, the loft is changed by actually altering the angle at which the shaft mates with the head, assuming. The higher loft settings change the angle of the face and the angle of the sole in relation to the ground. When you lay the driver flat on the ground while set at a higher loft, the shape of the sole will tend to close the face a little bit. This is only when lying on the ground and has nothing to do with your actual face position at impact, unless you ground the club first (most of us do) and take your grip based on how it lies flat.

This is counter-intuitive, too... especially since if you close the face in your swing it will actually decrease the effective loft, and if you leave it open it will increase the effective loft. But that's because you're changing the angle that the ball travels across the face, just like with an iron. So, adjustments to the driver affect how the club *sits on the ground* - open or closed. but if you open or close the face yourself in the swing, you're taking the ground out of the equation and actually changing the angle of impact which has a different effect.

FWIW, the face angle adjustments on drivers are kinda suspect to me. I'm not going to trust that the club is square based on how it sits on the ground. I'm going to square it up with my eye, effectively removing any impact that the "open" or "closed" settings have. I think 90% of golfers are going to do that.

 

[ChristopherKee]

To see why just do this:

Take your right hand and hold it out like a karate chop in front of you. Now pretend there is a vertical shaft going through your wrist and with this in mind increase the loft of the club without breaking the shaft. You will see that the only way to accomplish this is by pivoting up and to the left.

That's why when you add loft to most drivers it closes the face and adds some more lie angle. And yes, I know this is over simplified but I couldn't draw an accurate 3D model simulation in the short minute I had to respond to this thread =)

 

[Trout Bum]

Thanks for the answers guys, it still doesn't make a,ton of sense to me but I'll take your word for it. It's one of the most horrible things I've ever looked at lol the face is closed and looks like a giant lightweight putter lol.

 

[ddec]

it's more effective loft. It's why you see TM label the adapter higher and lower. In theory if you close the face, to return it to square position at impact you are opening the face up and hitting it higher with more loft than what you started with from the closed position. In the open spot it's the opposite, you are closing the face down at impact and your effective loft is lower.

With wedges if you open the face up you usually end up keeping the face open so it doesn't exactly work the same.

 

[ChristopherKee]

Thanks for the answers guys, it still doesn't make a,ton of sense to me but I'll take your word for it. It's one of the most horrible things I've ever looked at lol the face is closed and looks like a giant lightweight putter lol.

You need to follow the directions in my post. You'll understand it perfectly =) (or look silly..)

 

[WardF]

Great article by Tom Wishon here: http://wishongolf.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/adjustable-hosel-drivers.pdf

As a fellow geek, I love this guys work.

 

[Smallville]

it's more effective loft. It's why you see TM label the adapter higher and lower. In theory if you close the face, to return it to square position at impact you are opening the face up and hitting it higher with more loft than what you started with from the closed position. In the open spot it's the opposite, you are closing the face down at impact and your effective loft is lower.

With wedges if you open the face up you usually end up keeping the face open so it doesn't exactly work the same.

This actually makes a bit of sense.

 

[ddec]

This actually makes a bit of sense.

nice.When Nike first came out with the STR8 fit I was working at Golf Galaxy. One of our sales guy debated the Nike Rep to death about this very topic. I stood around and just soaked it all in.

 

[bellairemi]

This is spot on - it is effective loft and assumes (a big assumption) that you will be returning the club back to square. If you start closed and bring it through impact in the same position, you have not added effective loft (and will probably hit the ball lower and more left than you hoped

it's more effective loft. It's why you see TM label the adapter higher and lower. In theory if you close the face, to return it to square position at impact you are opening the face up and hitting it higher with more loft than what you started with from the closed position. In the open spot it's the opposite, you are closing the face down at impact and your effective loft is lower.

With wedges if you open the face up you usually end up keeping the face open so it doesn't exactly work the same.

 

[drp3434]

it's more effective loft. It's why you see TM label the adapter higher and lower. In theory if you close the face, to return it to square position at impact you are opening the face up and hitting it higher with more loft than what you started with from the closed position. In the open spot it's the opposite, you are closing the face down at impact and your effective loft is lower.

With wedges if you open the face up you usually end up keeping the face open so it doesn't exactly work the same.

Thanks, this clears it up a lot. So when you adjust it, it doesn't actually change the loft. A 10.5* club will still be 10.5* when you adjust up to say 11.5* setting. But it will now be setup with a closed face. You rotate it back to a square face, it opens it up to 11.5*. Makes sense.

 

[SkiBumGolfer]

ddec nailed it. I knew that somewhere in my brain, but couldn't think of a good way to express it.

 

[mark blanchard]

Here's one way to help you think about it. What all hosel adapters do, be they adapters with one factor of adjustment (as in Ping and TMag shafts) or two (as with new Cally Opti, Titleist, Nike, Cobra) is "bend" the angle in which the shaft fits into the hosel. They have the ability to "bend" that angle slightly to a more upright or flat lie or bend it to slightly more forward or back, or a combination of the two. That's it.

What the manufacturers are trying to do with their various (and often confusing) hosel measurement systems is to communicate these various "bend" combinations in a way that somewhat accurately describes the effect of the bend on your shot shape. Some companies might stamp "10.5 draw" right on their hosels hoping that you'll get an approximation of what to expect, Titleist is a bit more honest and confusing with their A-2, B-3 system which which shows a grid containing the various bend options. If you've seen the TMag R1, you'll recall that one of its twelve settings is simply stamped "UPRIGHT". That really tells you what it's doing! They could just say "Flat, Flatter, flattest etc." Instead they all stamp degrees and "draw" and "fade" on them, even though we know that what is 10.5 for one company may equal 8.0 for another. It's really all just fine shades of gray and from that palette you try to pick one that works for you.

Compare this driver adaptor "bending" to the physical hosel bending of your irons and it begins to make sense. If you play an iron that is too upright for you, your face will be too closed at impact and the ball will go left. If your lie angle is too flat, the face will be more open at impact and the ball will go right. You might then go in and have your irons bent up or down a degree to correct this right-left, open-closed flaw. (This directional feedback is one data point that Ping fitters use to change their famous color code (lie angle) recommendations.) From there, you can also change of the shaft angle to the hosel in another direction by bending it forward or back to increase or decrease the loft of the club in question. This is more commonly done with wedges, turning a 54 degree wedge into a 52, etc.

Make sense? It probably does if you've played your irons for a while. Well, that's all driver hosel adapters do, but you don't have to push or pull on a crow-bar to get the same effect.

Which raises the question: what happens if you change your swing from a upright, hands high & away swing, to a flat, hands close & tight swing? Will your loft and face angles of your driver change? The answer is, you bet you life they will! As I used the same set of Ping irons over 20 years, I bent their shafts up and down anywhere in a range of about 3 degrees as my swing changed. And if you don't use a ribbed or reminder grip and you shift your grip ever so slightly, your open/closed set up will change greatly! No matter what hosel set up you choose, you can vary that delicate hosel setting by just changing your grip, stance, set-up, or swing plane. That's what we do by open the face for sand shots (also changing our stance and swing plane for best results) or close the face for stinger/punches.

When you realize it's all about hosel "bends" it kinda takes the mystery of it, doesn't it?

 

[Nate]

it's more effective loft. It's why you see TM label the adapter higher and lower. In theory if you close the face, to return it to square position at impact you are opening the face up and hitting it higher with more loft than what you started with from the closed position. In the open spot it's the opposite, you are closing the face down at impact and your effective loft is lower.

With wedges if you open the face up you usually end up keeping the face open so it doesn't exactly work the same.

So in this case if you don't square it at impact on the closed position but return the face to it's org. position you will probably hook or pull the ball and in the open would probably slice or push the ball?

 

[ddec]

So in this case if you don't square it at impact on the closed position but return the face to it's org. position you will probably hook or pull the ball and in the open would probably slice or push the ball?

pretty much