Driver Shafts

[chipping]

Hi,
At what point do you need a stiff instead of regular shaft in a driver,I know it is down to swing speed, but what effect would a stiff shaft have on the ball flight,I use a 10.5* Regular at the moment,but find I get too much height, so I am looking for a lower ball flight,would a change of loft and shaft give me this or are stiff shafts just for the better player.

 

[d1217]

they're definately not just for the better player, i use a stiff shaft, what shaft is it, as you may just need a lower launching shaft like the prolaunch red or something like that.

 

[chipping]

Just Swapped from a R7 Ltd To a R9 SuperTri both 10.5* and both regular, but I hit my R7 on a lot lower flight,and as such it runs, but the SuperTri is much higher,and just lands and stops, ,so was tempted to try a different shaft in the SuperTri.
Thanks

 

[d1217]

would stick to reg but try a different shaft model and make, as they are all different, one can launch and and the other low

 

[GB72]

The findings from my driver fitting at the Belfry were surprising to me in that all the drivers I tried gave different launch angles despite being the same spec. I even tried a 12 degree version of the R9 and could not get a launch angle over 9.5 degrees. It seems to me that the combination of shaft and head and result in massively different results and it is not as simple as I used to think (pick a head I liked with the shaft flex I thought right). Finding the right driver is way too complex now so it is custom fitting for me every time

 

[Ethan]

Regular and stiff vary so much between clubs that it is almost meaningless just to refer to flex without stating what shaft you are talking about. There are regular shafts available (Grafalloy Blue, say) that are stiffer than some stiff (Ping TFC for example). Weight also is a factor, and other characteristics such as spin and launch angle.

 

[RGDave]

Slightly off topic (maybe) but I've been messing around with multiple drivers for a while and I had an interesting chat with my pro the other day.

If you are clearly in one camp or t'other (clubhead speed) you should certainly get fitted for the right flex. Other than that, turn your attention to the loft first. No two players swing it the same and discounting pure speed, the loft is where you need to look....some players might get an effective xx degrees of loft off a yy degree driver, some more, some less, it depends how much you are catching the ball on the up or not.

(this isn't going very well )

BUT the physical loft of the face (not forgetting kick-points) with spin and clubhead speed is going to give you the LAUNCH angle, which is where the clever money is.

(damn, I shouldn't have had 4 Stellas )

You have two choices. The only sensible one is to get a proper fitting. The silly one is to have more than one driver, discover that all of them (more or less) have a similar carry and roll out the same distance.