Rusty Dave
#staffproto
After years of waiting for a golf sim, the journey is complete. I was waiting until we built a new house however the market for lake view lots here in Kelowna BC is ridiculous so we decided to stay in our current place (which I love). After agreeing to getting new counter tops and hardwood for the wife, I decided to put a sim on the garage. That’s the only place where I can swing a club freely.
After months of research and dealing with Cory at Par2Pro, I ended up going with a used GC2 for my launch monitor. The Skytrak just had too many disadvantages and the extra $3500 for the GC2 is well worth it.
My biggest struggle was the software. Foresight FSX2018 is incredibly expensive. TGC has nice graphics but lacks in the true golf sim experience. E6 is outdated. The boys at OnlineGolfTour got in touch with me and got me looking into Jack Nicklaus Perfect Golf using the OGT interface. Wow, these guys are awesome. Support has been amazing and their tour is top notch. Glad I went OGT.
The first step was rearranging a few things in the garage. Shelving above my garage door was moved. The major part of this was the garage door opener. I ended up having to remove the current one and go with a wall mount opener to have the space for the roll up screen and to swing.
After the install it was time to mount the screen. Thanks to Par2Pro I have a pretty slick system. He ordered a sportscreen and they added an extra 18” of fabric with a velcro line to attach the impact screen. After securing some mdf to the ceiling joists I mounted the brackets and the sportscreen. After that we attached the impact screen.
Next were the side impact screens. Par2Pro made them from black out curtains and after a little grinding the brackets to add room for the thick fabric, they were installed using a blind roller system. I clip and velcro them to close any gaps during game play.
The biggest part of the build was the impact netting. I made a frame of 1x4 mdf and attached 6’ of impact netting on it. Hanging it was tough but it’s a great ceiling protector. It also protects the sportscreen roll up bar from direct impact.
I bought some 12x8 thick turf from Home Depot and place that in front of the screen. I’m using my CCE mat but honestly it’s just to penalizing on less than perfect shots so I ordered a TrueStrike mat that will be here tomorrow. I’ll build a platform that has the CCE as my stance mat and the TrueStrike as my hitting mat. I’ve drilled some anchor holes into the concrete to keep it from moving around.
The projector is a BenQ gaming HD unit. The picture is crazy sharp and I run it with a new gaming laptop.
The whole setup takes me 8 minutes to hit the first shot. It’s the same to get my wife’s car back in the garage.
It’s taken a few months and was WAY more expensive than planned but it’s pretty amazing. There’s no hiding swing flaws on the GC2.
A couple of video shots from YouTube because Tapatalk won’t let me add videos.
https://youtu.be/kjbSxa9_RYU
https://youtu.be/RVFyyGwjXcI
After months of research and dealing with Cory at Par2Pro, I ended up going with a used GC2 for my launch monitor. The Skytrak just had too many disadvantages and the extra $3500 for the GC2 is well worth it.
My biggest struggle was the software. Foresight FSX2018 is incredibly expensive. TGC has nice graphics but lacks in the true golf sim experience. E6 is outdated. The boys at OnlineGolfTour got in touch with me and got me looking into Jack Nicklaus Perfect Golf using the OGT interface. Wow, these guys are awesome. Support has been amazing and their tour is top notch. Glad I went OGT.
The first step was rearranging a few things in the garage. Shelving above my garage door was moved. The major part of this was the garage door opener. I ended up having to remove the current one and go with a wall mount opener to have the space for the roll up screen and to swing.
After the install it was time to mount the screen. Thanks to Par2Pro I have a pretty slick system. He ordered a sportscreen and they added an extra 18” of fabric with a velcro line to attach the impact screen. After securing some mdf to the ceiling joists I mounted the brackets and the sportscreen. After that we attached the impact screen.
Next were the side impact screens. Par2Pro made them from black out curtains and after a little grinding the brackets to add room for the thick fabric, they were installed using a blind roller system. I clip and velcro them to close any gaps during game play.
The biggest part of the build was the impact netting. I made a frame of 1x4 mdf and attached 6’ of impact netting on it. Hanging it was tough but it’s a great ceiling protector. It also protects the sportscreen roll up bar from direct impact.
I bought some 12x8 thick turf from Home Depot and place that in front of the screen. I’m using my CCE mat but honestly it’s just to penalizing on less than perfect shots so I ordered a TrueStrike mat that will be here tomorrow. I’ll build a platform that has the CCE as my stance mat and the TrueStrike as my hitting mat. I’ve drilled some anchor holes into the concrete to keep it from moving around.
The projector is a BenQ gaming HD unit. The picture is crazy sharp and I run it with a new gaming laptop.
The whole setup takes me 8 minutes to hit the first shot. It’s the same to get my wife’s car back in the garage.
It’s taken a few months and was WAY more expensive than planned but it’s pretty amazing. There’s no hiding swing flaws on the GC2.
A couple of video shots from YouTube because Tapatalk won’t let me add videos.
https://youtu.be/kjbSxa9_RYU
https://youtu.be/RVFyyGwjXcI