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Put my clubs onto a swingweight scale for the first time: Results inside!

Nippon Shafts
pingman222

pingman222

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So i've always been a tinkerer with my clubs, and learned to do as much of my own work as possible. Started with regripping, then re-shafting, shaft pulling etc etc and i like to think that i'm an ok hobbyist club builder.

However, there was one thing i would never do and that was check swingweights. For the most part i always just figured if the club feels good, who cares what the swingweight is (and i still abide by this too). However, i got a swingweight scale, the cheap $60 balance beam one and decided to throw my set on there out of curiosity. This all started as last season and early this year i played my driver at 44.5", it was a 6M3 that was cut down. I assume this thing was VERY light at the short length, and i struggled mightily with it. I replaced it with a Fuji 757 speeder Evo TS @ 45.5" and even with the added length im way more in control and hitting the best drives i've had in a long time. It made me start thinking that perhaps the swingweight is back up into my "optimal" range and maybe that's making the difference.

So here were the results from my set:

Driver - D3.5
4W - D1
3Hy - C8
4i - D4
5i - D2.5
6i - D2.5
7i - D2.5
8i - D1
9i - D0.5
W - D1
52 - D1
58 - D2


I'm no expert with regards to swingweight, and i know that it isn't the end all-tell all of fitting parameters, but can anyone help me diagnose my set here and let me know if there is anything i need to address?

First thing that jumps out, and even before i did the weighing, i always thought i struggled a little with the Hybrid, but the 3Hy at C8 is something i'll be looking to fix a little here. I'm willing to throw some lead tape on it or onto the port screw of my I25 and get it into that D1-D2 range. I would think that could maybe help that club get a little more consistent.

The other thing that concerned me was the 4i, and 9i. Im admittedly not the best long iron player, however, i seem to really struggle with the 4i, and after seeing it come in at D4, maybe it's a little too heavy for my "optimal". However, i'm unsure as to how i can get the weight of that club down 1 or 2 SW points. I know my S55's have the CTP and ping could probably change it, but i'm not entirely certain how that goes, nor do i want to send in my clubs for that at this point in the season, maybe over the winter.

The 9i on the other hand i don't have any inherent issues with it, so i'd be inclined to leave that alone for now.



I know this is only one part of the equation, but i would just love to hear some other builders experiences and insight as to what my set could benefit from here, and thus, my game. Shafts are listed in my sig if that makes a difference, and everything has GP Tour Wrap 2G's on them.
 
I recently put my driver on a scale and it was C8. Added some lead tape to it and it's made a noticeable difference especially in consistency of my contact.

I think testing the swing weight is something everyone should take a look at.
 
Swing weight fascinates me. Entire product lines have been geared towards low swing weights. Jack played low swing weight. Then some swear by high swing weights. Then some (me) have no idea what their swing weights are and don't care.
 
That interests me a lot considering we have the same set and according g to the website they should be d1. The 4 iron is the only one that stands out in your irons the rest seem to fall in line fairly well though not perfect.
 
Scrap Iron said:
That interests me a lot considering we have the same set and according g to the website they should be d1. The 4 iron is the only one that stands out in your irons the rest seem to fall in line fairly well though not perfect.
Click to expand...

I know there's probably a little room for "reading error" so I was thinking of adding lead tape to the clubs and try to get everything right around D2-D3 range. That's the easy part and an easy enough experiment with lead tape.

Removing weight from the 4i I'll have to experiment with though. If the results are favorable then over the winter perhaps I'll send them back into ping and get the weights adjusted via the CTP, or I'll re-assemble myself and just use tip weights.

It's kind of surprising because like you said, website shows D1 for S55, and that would have been with the ping CFS shafts. I switched out for heavier Ctapers. Overall weight increased and I thought the SW would be right where the 5-6-7 are, but the short irons surprised me. And the wedges were D2 and D4 according to pings website as well, and mine got reshafted heavier and came up lighter. Boggles my mind!
 
Scrap Iron said:
That interests me a lot considering we have the same set and according g to the website they should be d1. The 4 iron is the only one that stands out in your irons the rest seem to fall in line fairly well though not perfect.
Click to expand...

I know there's probably a little room for "reading error" so I was thinking of adding lead tape to the clubs and try to get everything right around D2-D3 range. That's the easy part and an easy enough experiment with lead tape.

Removing weight from the 4i I'll have to experiment with though. If the results are favorable then over the winter perhaps I'll send them back into ping and get the weights adjusted via the CTP, or I'll re-assemble myself and just use tip weights.

It's kind of surprising because like you said, website shows D1 for S55, and that would have been with the ping CFS shafts. I switched out for heavier Ctapers. Overall weight increased and I thought the SW would be right where the 5-6-7 are, but the short irons surprised me. And the wedges were D2 and D4 according to pings website as well, and mine got reshafted heavier and came up lighter. Boggles my mind!
 
First question is the grip the same on 4i? Also is it progressive in length with the other irons? I always record the club length when checking my swing weights. Instead of making the head lighter in the 4i you could counter balance the grip end with some weight. That should decrease your swing weight.

I'm just getting started with building and blueprinting my clubs so by no means am I and expert. Hopefully, someone else can shed some more light on the subject.
 
Now you have me thinking about the swing weights on my clubs. I might have to stop by and do some measuring at your place. Lol
 
Schanker said:
First question is the grip the same on 4i? Also is it progressive in length with the other irons? I always record the club length when checking my swing weights. Instead of making the head lighter in the 4i you could counter balance the grip end with some weight. That should decrease your swing weight.

I'm just getting started with building and blueprinting my clubs so by no means am I and expert. Hopefully, someone else can shed some more light on the subject.
Click to expand...

it is, GP tour wrap 2G's on all 12 of my clubs. I'm not sure if the manufacturing tolerance is great enough at golf pride to maybe throw it off even 1/2 pt. I blow all my grips on so i could take em all off and throw them onto my kitchen gram scale and get pretty in depth.

Last i measured (which was recently too) the length of all the clubs is right on standard, with .5" gaps and .25" gaps in the 9-W as per standard spec. Perhaps i'll measure again, maybe the 4i could be a 1/4" too long?
 
I'm gonna do this, gonna buy a swingweight scale....
 
You can actually find the swingweight of your clubs without an official swingweight scale, but you need a postal scale (generally will read in ounces) and a way to balance the club. I used a blank CD that I cut a 45° notch out of then clamped in a vice - works perfect to lay the shaft in to find the balance point. When you have the weight and the fulcrum, you can plug the info in here to get a pretty accurate reading:
http://www.leaderboard.com/SWINGWT.HTM

I checked this just recently and had my 4-9 irons at C9 since I added the GP MCC+4 grips in midsize (a heavier grip will lower the swingweight). Adding four grams of weight to each iron brought them up to D2, which is the TM spec. I did the same with my wedges as well which were originally all around D1. They FEEL much better now and with the extra weight, my distance has gone back up (not an issue with the woods).

Here's how they looked as an FYI:

Driver: D4 (31g of weights in M1 head vs. 25g stock).
3 wood: D2
Hybrid: D3
(TM spec is D4 for all the woods, but I am fine with them as they are now with the 62g grips)

4-PW: D2
GW & SW: D3. TM specs are D3 & D4
LW: D4. TM spec is D5

As an FYI, here are the 2g weights I ordered from GolfWorks (two fit in the cavity near the toe of each - perfect for my normal draw):
http://www.golfworks.com/rubber-tungsten-swingweight-tape/p/GW0054/

Those weights will work fine for now, but I also ordered 5g strips from GolfSmith that will probably look a little more discreet on the irons if I decide to tinker a bit more and bring the wedges back up slightly:
http://www.golfsmith.com/product/30084941/golfsmith-5-gram-stick-on-lead-swing-weights-pack-of-20-

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EDIT. Forgot to add this link, which is a great read on swingweighting in PDF format: http://advancedballstriking.com/Swing_weights.pdf
 
Last edited:
UPDATE:

decided to spend a couple hours and run back through my entire set from top to bottom and just get everything recorded. I also added some wraps under the grips to go somewhere between std & midsize, so that had a slight effect on my SW's too. From my early recordings, my 4i was showing to be a bit heavy, and after checking its length, it was actually about 3/8" too long, so i checked all lengths as well.

Set now looks like this:

D- D3
4W - D3
3HY - D2.5
4i - 9i - D2.5
PW - D3
52 - D3
58 - D4

I ran through quite a bit of lead tape to get these all to where they're at right now, but i took a few swings on course yesterday (played 5 balls up the first hole then walked back, the range was closed early at my course) and most notably, the hybrid felt awesome to swing and hit vs where it was before at C8. All the lead tape on the S55's is fairly unsightly, but i can deal with it while i run my experiment of going with a SW matched set. I'll go to tip weights when i feel the urge to pull the shafts and re-glue at another time if i concur that these are my optimal playing weights. Again, i understand that SW matching is only 1 method of making a consistent set of clubs, but it was the easiest and cheapest way so far to at least take any little amount of doubt away from my set of clubs and just let me focus on making the swing, which is probably the most important factor anyways.
 
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